Hollywood's Timothée Chalamet spent 5 years trying to morph into Bob Dylan for dream role

The 29-year-old was so determined to do Bob Dylan justice in new biopic A Complete Unknown, that he spent five years trying to morph into the musical icon

Even Hollywood golden boys can sometimes feel a bit starstruck – just ask man of the moment Timothée Chalamet .

The 29-year-old was so determined to do Bob Dylan justice in new biopic A Complete Unknown, that he spent five years trying to morph into the musical icon.

He says: “When I took this role I went to Bob Dylan’s childhood home and saw all the original Sun Records he had. It took me five years to learn to play the guitar. All the downtime in-between filming I would just play. I also learned how to play harmonica for the role. It is the perfect thing to pull out at a party and make everyone go: ‘Oh my God!’”

The circus surrounding Chalamet touches down in Britain next week when his new movie premieres in London’s West End, ahead of its release in cinemas across the country on Friday, January 17. And no one is more excited than the leading man.

He says: “I get to be the voice of Bob Dylan and that is the greatest honour of my life, truly. This is the movie I am the most proud of in my career. Dylan deserves to get this attention.”

Joined by a cast including Elle Fanning, Monica Barbaro and Boyd Holbrook, Chalamet said he enjoyed diving into the dressing up box.

Last month, he turned up at the New York premiere dressed not as the 1960s Dylan but as the star appeared at the Sundance Film Festival in 2003, in a beanie with blond-tipped hair and a riverboat gambler’s moustache.

Praising Dylan’s ever-changing style, Chalamet says: “I wore a green polka dot shirt for the movie and that is what Bob wore at the time. The shirt is now in my closet at home.”

That wasn’t his only souvenir from the set. “I took some guitars, some shirts, the outfits,” he admits. “[And] I take the experience with me.”

Chalamet hopes audiences will take home a deeper appreciation of Dylan. “It was an important role and we worked our tail off on it,” he says.

Timothée, who holds dual US/French citizenship due to his French father, broke into ­acting when he was just 10.

“The US TV show Law and Order was my first gig,” he says. “I remember I got murdered a lot as a 10 or 11-year-old child. I think there is something about the sick folk at New York casting agencies who must have thought, ‘This kid will get slaughtered.’”

When he was a teenager, his mum and gran had to argue with his school, who wanted him to concentrate on his education. “I was the youngest in my grade at school and my teacher said I should be held back,” he recalls.

“My mum kept me going. She had a big heart. My grandmother thought I would become a fantastic actor.”

Their faith paid off when Chalamet went on to land his biggest role yet, appearing in the US drama series Homeland before making his film debut in the comedy drama Men, Women and Children. Aged 17, he was cast in Christopher Nolan’s smash 2014 movie Interstellar, which grossed $681million at the box office.

He was so excited by his role, he put his money where his mouth was.

Chalamet tells the Nardwuar The Human Serviette podcast: “I saw Interstellar 12 times in the cinema. And for an actor with no money, that is a lot of money to go to the cinema and watch a movie that many times. Nobody noticed I was there.”

Born in a tough low-income housing block in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen, Timothée knows he’s lucky people carried on supporting him – as he says he was not the easiest student or son. In fact, he had so much energy, he was a handful from a young age.

He says: “The building I grew up in in Hell’s Kitchen was basically an arts block and was also home to a young Alicia Keys and Samuel L Jackson.

“They built it as regular apartments but back then the mafia was so infiltrated in Hell’s Kitchen they cut a deal with the federal government so they provided low-income arts housing for all these crazy artists to grow up in. I was just a crazy kid in high school. Shout out to everyone who had patience for me at that time.”

Now, thanks to his leading roles in Dune and Wonka, Timothée has charmed Hollywood – as well as his new girlfriend, reality TV star Kylie Jenner. He was nominated for an Oscar for 2017’s Call Me by Your Name, a critically lauded love story between his ­character and an older man, played by Armie Hammer.

He has also picked up nominations for four Golden Globes – including one in this year’s ceremony, for A Complete Unknown.

Based on the book by writer James Mangold, the biopic charts Dylan’s rise to fame when he arrived in New York aged 19 and his pivotal recording years of 1961-1965, when he electrified the world of folk music in every sense.

Chalamet says: “When Dylan played the Newport Folk Festival, he got booed off stage as he played electric music. He was the first punk rock figure of American cultural history but at the time it was like sticking two 12ft middle fingers up to people.

“After that it was the end of folk music and the start of rock and roll.”

• A Complete Unknown is released in cinemas on January 17.