Timothée Chalamet rides a motorcycle in Cape May in new Bob Dylan biopic trailer
Set in 1965, the Shore town is a stand-in location for Newport, R.I. where Dylan headlined the Newport Folk Festival
A trailer for the upcoming Bob Dylan biopic starring Timothée Chalamet and Elle Fanning provides a glimpse of Cape May, where the movie filmed earlier this year. Out in December, A Complete Unknown follows the 19-year-old Dylan as he arrives in 1960s New York and begins his career as a folk singer and songwriter.
The trailer briefly shows Chalamet (playing Dylan) and Fanning, who plays a character based on the singer’s former girlfriend Suze Rotolo, riding on a motorcycle through Cape May. The Shore town is a stand-in location for Newport, R.I., where the biopic concludes with Dylan’s headlining performance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival, his first concert with electric instruments.
Directed by James Mangold, who previously directed Ferrari and the Johnny Cash biopic Walk the Line, the film features Monica Barbaro as folk singer Joan Baez and Edward Norton as Pete Seeger. Cash will also make an appearance, played by Boyd Holbrook.
Though most of the film is set in New York, Dylan made many memories in New Jersey, on and off stage. He was even arrested in Long Branch: One rainy day in 2009, the singer, then 68, was walking around a residential neighborhood, prompting one family to call the police to report an “eccentric-looking old man” in their front yard. When he told the arresting officer his name, she didn’t believe him.
Dylan also played a show at Rutgers University’s gym in New Brunswick — to an audience that included Cash. (They got local Chinese food afterward.) That was in 1965, the same year captured in A Complete Unknown, but we don’t know if that encounter gets any screen time.
Either way, Cape May makes a scenic backdrop and Chalamet’s visit was memorable for locals who caught sight of him this past spring. Some signed up to play extras.