Timothée Chalamet thinks his upcoming Bob Dylan biopic could benefit from a dash of Austin Butler as Elvis Presley.
The star of Call Me By Your Name will play Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, and floated the idea of an Elvis cameo after he and Austin were asked about their roles as rock icons in a new interview with NME.
Admitting he had already been picking his Dune co-star’s “brain non-stop” as he prepped for the part of Bob Dylan, Timothée told NME that Austin’s award-winning 2022 turn as Elvis in Baz Luhrmann’s biopic was “phenomenal”.
“Let’s let my film come out before I’m so lucky as to get included with Austin,” Timothée said of the comparison. A release date hasn’t been set yet for A Complete Unknown, which is directed by James Mangold.
Talking about the connection between the artists, the Wonka star said: “I can’t speak from Elvis’ perspective, but deep in the Bob Dylan lore now, he had tremendous respect for Elvis and Sun Records.”
Austin said he was eager to see Timothée and his craft, telling NME: “Timothée works so hard, and it’s just so cool to get to discuss process and talk through things. I can’t wait for that film. I wish I could be on set every day to just watch the magic happen.”
Better yet, Timothée invited Austin to be in the movie, musing how “I was kind of wishing we could create a musical cinematic universe”.
Timothée previously raved about working with Austin on the newly-released Denis Villeneuve sci-fi flick, Dune: Part Two.
“You meet someone by destiny, by the destiny of the script that you know you will have to work with intimately. You go, ’OK, so he’s not only a great talent but a great guy, which is hard to find,” he told NBC New York in an interview last month.