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A Paul Mescal lookalike contest in Dublin has delivered some hilariously disappointing results.
On Thursday (November 7), dozens of young men dressed in the Normal People star’s O’Neills short-shorts, gold chains, and wired headphones flocked to Smithfield Square. Hours later, Mescal himself would arrive at the square for the Gladiator II premiere.
The prize for the contest’s winner was three pints, €20, and all the “bragging rights” a Mescal doppelganger could hope for.
Several contestants told the Irish Independent they were inspired by the buzz of New York’s recent Timothée Chalamet lookalike competition held on October 27.
The Irish event was hyped by TikTok account @paulmescallookalike, with a post featuring the competition flyer racking up nearly 300,000 views. Unfortunately, many felt the entries’ resemblance to the Oscar nominee was a bit of a reach.
“The Paul Mescal lookalike contest is sadly an indictment of every Irish lad I’ve met who claims that Paul Mescal looks like every lad in Ireland,” one person noted on X.
“Do you think he went by the Paul Mescal lookalike contest, saw how much none of those men in short-shorts looked like him, and left,” another user remarked.
“None of them even look like him,” one user wrote. “I’m dead.”
“They tried at least,” another added.
But it was local Jack Wall O’Reilly who clinched the win, rocking a curly brunette mullet and Mescal’s go-to shorts-and-hoodie combo. The winning moment came when he delivered Connell’s classic Normal People line, “You look really well” – a pitch-perfect imitation that drew a collective “aww” from the crowd.
The crowd unanimously crowned him the champ, awarding him the grand prize – a giant €20 check emblazoned with the Lidl logo, the supermarket giant behind the event.
“I’m very proud, it’s been a good buzz,” O’Reill told the Irish Independent. “I think it’s good to have events like these as people are having a rough time. I don’t think anyone would have given the Timothee Chalamet one air time if we weren’t all a bit miserable.”
Mescal sadly did not make an appearance at the event as Chalamet did for his own lookalike contest despite being in the city for the Gladiator sequel’s Irish premiere.
The Chalamet lookalike contest seems to have kicked off a trend, with a slew of celebrity doppelganger events popping up around the world.
Just one day after the Chalamet showdown, New Yorkers spotted flyers for a Jeremy Allen White contest promising the most convincing lookalike two packs of cigarettes and a seven-day subway MetroCard.
Later that day, a Zayn Malik contest will go down at Brooklyn’s Maria Hernandez Park, organized by Instagram user @qhio.anon. The grand prize? A free tattoo from artist @hel.heart, with a whopping 342 fans already RSVP’d on Partiful.
Out west, San Francisco is throwing a Dev Patel lookalike bash on 10 November. According to NBC Los Angeles, organizers were inspired by the Chalamet craze and are planning a tribute to the city’s diversity, with a $50 prize and a Monkey Man statue for the winner.
Meanwhile, British journalist Katrina Mirpuri from the Evening Standard is hosting a Harry Styles lookalike contest in Soho Square, London, offering prizes for the three best Harrys and a cheeky reward for the least convincing entry.
