Ben Pike as Bob Dylan in a scene from the Coen Brothers' Inside Llewyn Davis.

This Christmas will see the release of the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown, where the legendary songwriter is played by Timothée Chalamet. 

The Duluth-born Dylan has been portrayed on screen before, most notably by six different actors playing metaphorical versions of him in 2007’s I’m Not There. But he was also a minor character in The Coen brothers’ 2013 Greenwich Village-set Inside Llewyn Davis. The man who played Dylan in that movie was Ben Pike. He recently spoke with me about his time playing Dylan and how he thinks Chalamet will pull off the performance in A Complete Unknown.
 
Charlie Gilmore: By my unscientific count you were on screen for about 32 seconds in Inside Llewyn Davis.
 
Ben Pike: That sounds about right
 
CG: What is it like to know you have a job, but your job is only going to result in 32 seconds?
 
BP: The best part about that job for me was basically the audition. I got to do improv in front of the Coen brothers, which the whole time they were cracking up and laughing at, and in my head I’m going, ‘Holy shit, I’m doing some acting in front of the Coen brothers, and they are loving it.’ That audition was the best part of it for me, but on set that day, filming it all took under five minutes, but again, I got to work with the Coen brothers and talk to them. They were going to put the voice of Bob Dylan over me, so I had to sync up with the audio guy. So the process of it was really cool.

 
CG: I was looking through the special features and there is one clip where Ethan [Coen] is standing next to you and he’s telling you how to strum the guitar or something like that.
 
BP: Wait, there’s special features where one of them is telling me how to strum the guitar? I didn’t even know about that.
 
CG: There’s no audio of it, someone is talking and you’re the b-roll behind it.
 
BP: That’s still totally cool in my book. I got to look that up. I haven’t seen that.
 
CG: It’s on the Criterion Collection special features. Were they directing you like they would any other actor?
 
BP: Yeah, they were. Basically, I got on set, and immediately Oscar Isaac was there and he was like ‘Hey, everyone, look! It’s Bob Dylan!’ Which was really cool that he broke the ice like that. Then Joel Coen took me aside to the sound guy and he was directing me, ‘You gotta stand back here, you gotta sync up your voice with the actual Bob Dylan, so you’re going to work with the sound guy, and this is how you strum.’ That was all the set up for the shot itself, and then we shot the thing. It was only five-ten minutes of actual filming. Obviously it didn’t go on for very long because the part is very short, so there’s not a lot of time for that. But, yeah, there was a period where I was being directed by them. Now for the rest of my life I get to say, ‘Yeah, I was directed by the Coen brothers.’ That’s pretty fun.

 
CG: I want to go back to your audition, though. What were they looking for in the audition?
 
BP: It’s a small part. The look is the most important thing. They wanted to get the look down. I don’t have any hair right now, this was over 10 years ago so I had hair back then. I had the jewfro that Bob Dylan has. That was important. When I went into the room for the audition, one of the first things that Joel Coen said was ‘How tall are you?’ As soon as he said this, in my head I’m going, ‘Oh, I’m fucked,’ because I’m 5’10” and Bob Dylan is, I think, 5’6.” So I’m going, ‘Oh shit, he thinks that I’m too tall for the role,’ but I decided to turn it into a funny thing. In my Bob Dylan impression I said, “I’m 5’10”, man, how tall are you?’ and he said, ‘I’m 6’2”’ and I said, ‘Not all of us can be so lucky, man,’ then they cracked up. At that point I’m going, ‘Oh shit, I’m actually improvising and the Coen brothers are cracking up and loving what I’m doing.’

 The entire time, until I actually got the part, I was in my head going, ‘Well, I’m too tall for this, I’m fucked, I’m never getting this role.’ The casting people called me and said, ‘We can’t tell you anything for sure, but Joel Coen told me to tell you not to cut your hair.’ Then as soon as they said that I said, ‘Oh fuck, I’m getting the part.’

 
CG: Even though it’s only 32 seconds long, you’re still in a Coen brothers movie. Was that one of the biggest yeses you’ve ever gotten in your career?
 
BP: Oh, hell yes. [Laughs] Speaking of yes. That’s what I try to focus on. When I think about this story, yeah it was 32 seconds, whatever, but honestly, for me, being able to say I was in a Coen brothers movie, I was directed by the directors who directed The Big Lebowski and Fargo, and I got to audition for five minutes in front of them, in a room, by myself, that’s what I focus on and I try to stay grateful. As an actor, when I first saw the role and I saw the movie, it was very, very short, I’m going to be honest, I was upset. As an actor I’d been working for a long time without it necessarily panning out, I was getting kind of angry and resentful, but then I learned, maybe five years ago, ‘Dude, you’re pursuing this incredibly hard career, you know the odds of it are such that if you get any role it’s a blessing. Just be grateful.’ That’s what I’ve been doing, not just with this movie, but my whole career. That’s what I focus on now. ‘Damn it, I was so fortunate to be in this movie in the first place.’ It was amazing, I got to work with these people.

 
CG: On that note, one of the major themes of the movie is Llewyn Davis’s inability to quit the creative pursuit, even though its torture. I’m sure when you watched the movie you were looking for yourself, but you saw yourself in Llewyn Davis as well.
 
BP: A bit, yeah, of course. Whenever I see the movie now I think about that. I didn’t really know that when I filmed the thing, but as soon as I saw the movie the first time, I was like ‘Oh shit, this whole movie is about a quote-unquote starving artist, his last legs of trying to do this before he gives up because of practicality. Definitely I saw myself in him a bit, and I do when I see this movie now, even today.

 
CG: One of the other themes, and it’s a Coen brothers staple, is just that no matter how hard you try, no matter how good you are or what truth you’re seeking, the universe is still just going to push you down.
 
BP: A lot of their movies are about that, especially the serious ones. Fargo, the theme isn’t exactly that, but there’s definitely notes of that, it’s an overall depressing movie. The whole thing is, ‘Oh look, now another person is getting murdered.’
 
CG: In this case, you’re the bad guy, by being Dylan and showing that everything Llewyn Davis has worked for is going to be taken from him because Dylan’s stealing the spotlight.
 
BP: That’s the whole thing.
 
CG: You got to be in a Coen brothers movie, which is cool, but you also got to play an incredibly famous person – a Nobel Prize winner – in Bob Dylan. How did that feel?
 
BP: It was awesome. When I booked the role, I was like ‘Woah, I actually get to play Bob Dylan, one of the most iconic musicians of all-time? Someone who, my parents being Boomers, everyone in that generation kind of idolizes, this is amazing.’ It was fun. I knew the part was very small, but I decided to kind of method it up. I’m staying positive and hoping the parts in the future will be much longer than this, but at the time I was like, ‘Let’s just enjoy it. Let’s be an actor.’ I was living in New York so I bought a guitar and a harmonica, and I decided to go on the subway and pretended to be Bob Dylan and busk a little bit and see if I can make some money. I actually did do that, going on the subway and being all method, and going down to Greenwich Village and Gerde’s Folk City as Bob Dylan and trying to make some money by doing an impression. I actually made some money doing that. People were liking it and it was fun being on the subway and getting into the role. I totally embraced the whole thing and had fun with it.

 
CG: Do you remember what songs you played when you were busking?
 
BP: I did the same thing I did in the audition, where the whole movie takes place in like ‘61-’62, before The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, Bob Dylan’s second album came out, which is the album with “Blowin’ in the Wind” that made him a superstar. His first album, which a lot of people don’t know about unless you’re a super Bob Dylan fan, is called Bob Dylan and the whole thing is covers. So because that’s when the movie took place, before Bob Dylan got his big break, that’s the album that I focused on. There’s a song on the first album called “Pretty Peggy-O,” it’s this traditional folk song. It’s this corny song like, [singing] ‘Oh, pretty Peggy-o.’ That’s the song I focused on. My point is, it’s not an original Bob Dylan song, it’s not a song people know about, but it’s a song off that first album.

 
CG: True to that era. Are you a big Dylan fan or is he more a guy you grew up knowing of?
 
BP: I’m not like a super, super, super fan, I’m not one of these people who has all of his albums on vinyl, but I’ve always liked him. This is how I look at Bob Dylan: Can you name a movie that you like, that you don’t love, but it’s a famous movie a lot of people love?
 
CG: The first movie that comes to mind for me is Fight Club, I guess.
 
BP: Even that movie, in my head I’m like ‘What, you don’t love Fight Club?!’ That’s one of my favorite movies. That’s what I mean, you can watch it and you can like it and you can appreciate it for what it is, and you can understand at least logically why other people love it or even say it is one of the best movies of all time, even though you don’t. That’s how I think about Bob Dylan.

 
CG: That makes perfect sense. When it comes to playing Dylan, you’re in the same category as a lot of other famous actors [that appear in I’m Not There], like Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Heath Ledger—
 
I’m in the same category as them? Thank you, I appreciate you saying that.
 
CG: How does it feel to have played the same role as those people?
 
BP: Awesome. Very cool, you know. Being humble, the part in that movie is very short. I was cast initially as a featured extra and then it was bumped up on set to a day player role, which was very lucky for me, because I was able to get my union card from that. But logically, yes, all those other people have played it. And then when I saw Timothée Chalamet was going to be playing this, same thing I was like, ‘Wow, this is pretty cool. I get to now say I played the same role that Christian Bale played, Timothée Chalamet is playing.’ I just go back to the thing I said at the beginning. I’ve been trying to make acting work for a while, and it wasn’t popping off like I was hoping, and I was bitter, I was resentful. I have a lot of acting friends who are still like this, everybody knows actors like this who are bitter, and the energy is just really shitty, and I used to be like that. Seeing all of these others that have played this role and they’re all famous, ‘Why am I not? Why didn’t they get me to play the role? Why am I not famous?’ that’s how I used to be, and it’s really bad energy. You do some self-work and you’re just grateful. I’m just like, ‘I played this role, and Christian Bale played this role, and Cate Blanchett played this role, and Timothée Chalamet played this role,’ and I’m just so full of gratitude that I get to say that. That’s what I focus on and it feels really good.

 
CG: Since you’re an expert on playing Bob Dylan, what kind of things do you think Timothée Chalamet would be good at in playing Dylan and bad at in playing Dylan?
 
BP: Oh, wow, I get to rip on Timothée Chalamet a bit? OK. [Laughs]
 
CG: [Laughs] Every actor’s dream, right?
 
BP: Kind of a tricky question. If I say the wrong thing and Timothée Chalamet’s agent hears it, I’m never working in Hollywood again. [Laughs]
 Timothée Chalamet is incredible. That’s what it comes down to. He’s absolutely incredible. Did you see Dune, Dune: Part Two?
 
CG: I have not seen those.
 
BP: Oh man, you haven’t? You gotta see Dune Two. Actually Dune Two is one of these movies I have this reaction to, where it’s like what you were asking about Bob Dylan. I saw it, I think it’s good, but I don’t think it’s the best movie of all time like people are saying. But I can appreciate it. But I thought Timothée Chalamet’s performance in it is great! He’s the new Marlon Brando, the new James Dean, he’s a fantastic actor. Call Me By Your Name! I saw he was doing this movie, and it’s fun to joke about Timothée Chalamet stealing my thunder, but kudos to him.

 At first when I heard he was playing him, I was like, ‘He doesn’t really look like Bob Dylan,’ but then I saw the preview for it and he’s got the hair. The thing with Bob Dylan is there’s this real soulful cynicism. Maybe a little bit of darkness that’s hidden in a whimsicality. When you think about Bob Dylan, that’s his character. So when I saw the preview for it and he’s doing, it’s not “Masters of War,” it’s not “Blowin’ in the Wind,” it’s not “Like A Rolling Stone,” [singing] ‘Oh what did you see my blue-eyed son.’

 
CG: “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.”
 
BP: The song is called “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.” That’s why that song is so good on the album, there’s this darkness there. You see him playing it in the preview, in the same kind of scene as my part in Inside Llewyn Davis, him playing at Folk City, and you can see in his eyes, just in this 30-second clip, the cynicism, this inner darkness. It’s the same thing he’s able to do in Dune Two and all of his movies, and it’s ‘Oh shit, I completely understand why this guy was cast in this role.’ He’s nailed it, he’s probably going to win best actor for this, you can just tell.

 
CG: You worked with the Coen brothers and you played Bob Dylan, so you’ve now crossed paths with some of the most famous Minnesotans. Do you feel like you’re an honorary Minnesotan now?
 
BP: Yeah, I just have to start saying things like… how do they say the word ‘bag?’
 
CG: Bay-g
 
BP: ‘Would you like a bay-g?’ ‘Dontchaknow’. All that kind of stuff. I can go there and get free food and be everyone’s friend, and leave my door unlocked at night like they all do there, right?
 
CG: Thank you for taking the time to do this.
 
BP: Thank you, Charlie. It was a lot of fun.