Timothée Chalamet Will Do His Own Singing for Bob Dylan Biopic, Says Director

Timothée Chalamet is soon going to find out how it feels to perform songs as the inimitable Bob Dylan.

James Mangold, who is set to direct the actor in the forthcoming Dylan biopic entitled A Complete Unknown, spoke to Collider at London’s Star Wars Celebration in an interview published Friday. During the chat, Mangold was asked whether Chalamet will sing for the film and replied with an emphatic, “Of course!”

Mangold — the director behind Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, hitting theaters in June — explained what appealed to him about Searchlight Pictures’ Dylan film. The project is based on author Elijah Wald’s 2015 book Dylan Goes Electric and has a script from Jay Cocks.

“It’s such an amazing time in American culture and the story of a young, 19-year-old Bob Dylan coming to New York with like two dollars in his pocket and becoming a worldwide sensation within three years — first being embraced into the family of folk music in New York and then, of course, kind of outrunning them at a certain point as his star rises so beyond belief,” Mangold told the outlet. “It’s such an interesting true story and about such an interesting moment in the American scene.”

Mangold added that filming was likely to commence in August and that such music figures as Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger and Joan Baez would be part of the story.

Chalamet, who was most recently seen in Bones and All, has Dune: Part Two set for release in November and Wonka hitting theaters in December. He told British Vogue last year that he has seven musical numbers in Paul King’s Wonka, which serves as a prequel to Roald Dahl’s 1964 novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.