Timothée Chalamet takes on the events leading up to Bob Dylan’s controversial electric period in the biographical drama A Complete Unknown. The two-time Academy Award winner’s performance has garnered much acclaim, particularly for his decision to do the singing himself. Chalamet recently revealed which Bob Dylan song made him cry after he performed it live.
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Bob Dylan Wrote This Song For His Idol
A Complete Unknown opens with a young Bob Dylan (Chalamet) heading to New York City to meet his ailing idol, Woody Guthrie (Scoot McNairy.) Dylan (born Robert Zimmerman) grew obsessed with the folk legend’s story after borrowing Guthrie’s autobiography from a college classmate. Inspired, he decided to drop out of college and move to New York in pursuit of a musical career.
Bob Dylan met Guthrie at Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital in Morris Plains, New Jersey. Not yet 50, Guthrie had ended up there after Huntington’s disease left him unable to control his muscles. After performing several of Guthrie’s songs for him, Dylan broke out an original called “Song For Woody.”
"A Complete Unknown" is brilliantly performed, dazzlingly directed, a remarkable accomplishment.
— Joyce Carol Oates (@JoyceCarolOates) December 27, 2024
unexpectedly moving, especially in scenes with ailing, infirm Woody Guthrie & folk singer hero Pete Seeger–young Bob Dylan begins by paying homage to his heroes, then moves defiantly…
Set against the melody from Guthrie’s “1913 Massacre,” Bob Dylan sets his reverence to words: I’m a-singin’ you this song, but I can’t sing enough / ‘Cause there’s not many men that done the things that you’ve done.
[RELATED: Behind The Song: “Song To Woody” by Bob Dylan]
Why Timothée Chalamet “Went Home and Wept”
After spending six months pre-recording his vocals for A Complete Unknown, it was decided that Chalamet would sing live instead. He performed “Song to Woody,” among his “favorite Bob Dylan songs ever,” in the first scene he filmed for the movie.
“You couldn’t do it to a playback because it’s such an intimate scene,” Chalamet told Apple Music. “It’s in a hospital room with Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger.”
He continued, “And I’m making mistakes in the guitar a little bit here and there, but you can kind of fill those in after. I went home and I wept that night, not to be dramatic, but it’s a song I’d been living with for years and something I could relate to deeply.”
Featured image by Kristin Callahan/Shutterstock
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