The Dylan-Chalamet Connection – The New York Times

On By Littum

The Bob Dylan biography “A Complete Unknown” focuses on just a few crucial years at the beginning of the songwriter’s career, from 1961, when he moved to New York from Minnesota, up through his connected heresy at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965. In the in a short space of time he revolutionized the folk movement and became something of a pop phenomenon.

Playing him, fittingly, is a modern pop phenomenon: Timothée Chalamet. And the attention he brings thanks to his massive celebrity seems designed to expose Dylan to a whole new audience. Dylan is as well known these days for being enigmatic as for his music. So the buzz surrounding Chalamet’s on-screen performance is only part of the strategy that goes hand-in-hand with how he’s navigated the press tour.

On this week’s Popcast, a conversation about the accuracy and strategic inaccuracy of Chalamet’s portrayal of Dylan; how the film outlines the creative arc of Dylan’s career; and how Chalamet is using his press tour to attract and win over an audience that may never see “A Complete Unknown.”

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