We already knew from Mike Mills’s 20th Century Women that Elle Fanning is great at cultivating chemistry with handsome little wisps of men, but in A Complete Unknown, from director James Mangold, she takes things up a notch, playing the fictional Sylvie Russo opposite Timothée Chalamet’s wiry young Bob Dylan.
Suffice it to say that the stars make a similarly charming duo in a new installment of Off the Cuff, which sees Chalamet and Fanning trade rapid-fire questions about life, work, style, and Dylan lyrics.
After Fanning bravely confesses that she’s never seen Mad Men, which shocks her partner just a little bit, he asks what her top artist of the year was (she’s a Doechii fan!) and whether she’s into “Femininomenon” (answer: yes!). Later, when it’s Fanning’s turn to ask Chalamet about the first Dylan song he ever heard, he’s characteristically thoughtful about the difference between learning music by osmosis and being deliberately exposed to it. “As I got into [A Complete Unknown], the song that really made me fall in love with Bob Dylan’s music was the live version of ‘Ballad of the Thin Man,’” he explains, calling the studio recording “weird, bluesy, spooky and mysterious” where the rendition in Martin Scorsese’s 2005 documentary No Direction Home “feels like you’re drinking battery acid on a cold day.” (Get this man a reviewer job at Pitchfork, stat!)
While it’s clear that in preparing for the role, Chalamet went deep on Dylan’s creative influences—from Woody Guthrie to Jack Kerouac—this edition of Off the Cuff also pays tribute to the musical stylings of another great storyteller: one Lil’ Timmy-Tim. Intrigued? See Chalamet and Fanning get into it above.
Director: Symone Ridgell
Director of Photography: Stefan Vleming
Editor: Michael Penhollow
Producer: Michelle Bruno
Producer, On Set: Chase Lewis
Associate Producer: Marisah Yazbek
Gaffer/Camera Operator: Mike Nelli
Assistant Camera/Camera Operator: Amber Buchanan
Sound: Jennifer Zhang
Set Designer: Leah Waters-Katz
Production Assistants: Karla Rodriguez, Jordan Brown
Production Coordinator: Ava Kashar
Production Manager: Natasha Soto-Albors
Senior Director, Production Management: Jessica Schier
Assistant Editor: Andy Morell
Post Production Coordinator: Scout Alter
Supervising Editor: Erica DeLeo
Post Production Supervisor: Alexa Deutsch
Associate Director, Post Production: Nicholas Ascanio
Director, Video Talent: Lauren Mendoza
Director, Content Production: Rahel Gebreyes
Senior Director, Digital Video: Romy van den Broeke
Senior Director, Programming: Linda Gittleson
VP, Digital Video English: Thespena Guatieri
