10 More Actors Who Prepared For Roles In The Worst Possible Way

5. Timothée Chalamet - Bates Motel

The King Timothee Chalamet
Plan B Entertainment

For future Academy Award nominee Timothée Chalamet, his preparation for a Bates Motel audition is guaranteed to put a smile on your face.

Back when the A&E offering was assembling its core cast in late-2012, Chalamet was up for the role of Norman Bates in the stunning series; a part that would go to a Freddie Highmore who absolutely knocked it out of the park for the show's five seasons.

As he revealed in an interview with Backstage (as per the F**kYeahTimothéeChalamet fan site), Chalamet was unfamiliar with Psycho ahead of his big Bates Motel audition. So, like any wise sort would do, Timothée took to Netflix to give Psycho a watch as part of his preparation for the role.

Having searched for "Psycho" on the on-demand streaming juggernaut, the budding Norman watched the flick and then went to his audition, only to have a horrible realisation.

That realisation, was that he'd actually watched American Psycho with Christian Bale rather than Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho or even Gus Van Sant's 1998 remake of Hitch's 1960 film . As such, Timothée went in and did a Patrick Bateman impression when he was meant to be showing his Norman Bates chops.

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Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main day job, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks/Saints, Jamie Hayter, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg. Where his beloved Wrexham AFC is concerned, Andrew is co-host of the Fearless in Devotion podcast, which won the Club Podcast of the Year gong at the 2024 FSA Awards.