Timothée Chalamet On Immersing Himself In Bob Dylan – “The Greatest Education A Young Artist Could Receive”

Jill Goldsmith
·2-min read

An emotional Timothée Chalamet called the last five years studying and immersing himself in the iconic Bob Dylan “the greatest education a young artist could receive.”

“I promised myself I’d keep it short and sweet, because Bob Dylan was a man of few words,” he said taking the mic at the Gotham Awards last night where the actor and the film’s director James Mangold received a Visionary Tribute for upcoming biopic A Complete Unknown.

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Searchlight Pictures is releasing the film Dec. 25.

“If you’re already a fan of Bob Dylan, this will make perfect sense to you. If you’re not familiar with his work, perhaps our film can serve as the humble gateway to one of the great poets and chroniclers of our times,” Chalamet said. “I’m grateful to everyone who poured themselves into this project, everyone who helped me along this process.”

Oscar Isaac, on hand at the Gotham’s NYC ceremony to introduce the film, said he’d had serious doubts when he first heard of the project.

“I mean it’s Dylan — the Holy of Holies — and it just didn’t sound right. And then Timmy takes out his guitar and starts playing Girl From The North Country. Now this is a song I know to my core. To hear this kid, who had just started learning the guitar, who hadn’t done much singing, and who wasn’t all that familiar with Dylan’s music, approach these songs not as if he was learning something new, but as if he was remembering something he’d always known, just rediscovering.”

Mangold recalled his five year journey with Chalamet. “We started in Toronto in 2019 and since then, I feel like we’ve walked together, sharing song lyrics, sharing music … We have been waiting to make this movie for a long time and preparing for it. And the joy of it for me, more than anything, has been … making it and sharing this great, great process.”

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