Before filming began, Call Me by Your Name was already taking shape in small, everyday ways. The actors arrived in Crema, settled into apartments, learned the town’s rhythms, and began spending time together long before the cameras rolled.
What followed wasn’t just preparation for individual roles, but the gradual forming of a shared world — built through routine, proximity, trust, and time. This atmosphere would quietly carry over into the film, shaping its intimacy as much as any scene or line of dialogue.
As the stage was being set in the Perlman house, the actors began arriving in Crema. They rented apartments, started preparing for their roles, and slowly got to know one another. Timothée Chalamet, who had the most to do, arrived five weeks early.
“I jumped into Italian lessons for an hour and a half a day, piano lessons for an hour and a half a day, guitar lessons for an hour and a half a day, and gym workouts three times a week,” says the actor.
“Along with the piano, speaking Italian was crucial for me because it was a native tongue for Elio, and I wanted to get it down to what it would have been for him.”
Armie Hammer arrived shortly after, and Chalamet was one of the first people he met.
I heard somebody practicing piano, and they said, ‘Oh, that’s Timmy!’ And I said, ‘I want to meet him!’” says Hammer.
The two actors became inseparable in the weeks leading up to the shoot.
“We rode bikes, we listened to music, we talked, we went to meals, we hung out in many of the same places you see us in the movie,” Hammer says.
After shooting commenced, they rehearsed their scenes together every night. The intimacy and chemistry that later felt so natural on screen grew directly out of the closeness they developed in real life.
A large part of the story focuses on the many steps forward and backward between Elio and Oliver before their relationship finally becomes physical. Emphasizing anticipation through an unhurried buildup is something Luca Guadagnino often gravitates toward.
“I like a slow burn,” says the director.
Chalamet adds:
“It’s the universally relatable game of cat and mouse — the push and pull that happens between people who are attracted to one another but aren’t sure whether the other feels the same way. There’s also the fear that comes from living in a time and place that isn’t accepting or encouraging of that kind of relationship.”
All of the actors lived in Crema during the shoot, absorbing the rhythms of Lombardian small-town life.
“There is a peace there that one who lives, as I do, in a metropolitan city rarely gets,” says Michael Stuhlbarg, who plays Mr. Perlman.
Guadagnino often invited the cast and crew into his home, where he cooked elaborate meals and screened films.
“He’s a great cook, Luca, and we’d share these delicious feasts,” says Amira Casar. “It made us all closer. There can be fear and apprehension as actors approach their roles, and Luca created an atmosphere of trust and joy that allowed us to really tap into that intimacy.”
Throughout the shoot, the actors could feel Guadagnino encouraging moments of spontaneity and unpredictability.
“Tim was a miracle in terms of his unpredictability,” Stuhlbarg says. “He was different every time. You never knew what was going to happen, and that was really fun to watch.”
A striking example of this approach can be seen in the film’s final shot.
“There were three takes, and they were all wildly different,” says Chalamet. “I’m so happy with the one Luca chose, because it feels like the most truthful version of what Elio was going through at that moment.”
The famous peach scene, adapted from the novel, shows how eroticism is used in the film to illuminate the inner life of the character.
“What’s going on with Elio in that scene is a mix of longing for Oliver and the very relatable confusion of not knowing where to place all that sexual energy when you’re 16, 17, 18,” Chalamet explains. “But when Oliver arrives, the weight of him leaving — possibly forever — hits Elio for the first time, along with the shame of being caught in such a raw, almost feral moment. All of that becomes completely overwhelming.”
Read the first part: Making Call Me by Your Name: Stories from the Set
Images: Call Me by Your Name Japanese brochure