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Summary
- Welcome to a new episode of Collider Ladies Night with A Complete Unknown star Monica Barbaro.
- During her Ladies Night conversation with Collider’s Perri Nemiroff, Barbaro revisits two especially influential leaders on past sets, Tom Cruise and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
- She also breaks down how she prepared to play Joan Baez in A Complete Unknown, and what it was like working with Timothée Chalamet as Bob Dylan.
As I note during this new edition of Collider Ladies Night, while watching a A Complete Unknown, during Monica Barbaro’s first scene of the film, I scribbled down one note — “Monica — WOW,” and then proceeded to underline it quite a few times. She’s downright electric as Joan Baez, the renowned singer, songwriter and musician who developed a professional and personal relationship with Bob Dylan.
Timothée Chalamet plays Dylan in the James Mangold-directed film, which follows the all-time great from meeting his icon, Woody Guthrie (Scott McNairy), to becoming one himself. With guidance from Pete Seeger (Edward Norton), Dylan begins his rise in the New York City folk scene. However, the higher he rises, the more he feels constrained by the expectations of the folk community, constraints Dylan opts to demolish via a controversial and groundbreaking performance.
With A Complete Unknown now playing in theaters nationwide and surging on the awards circuit, I got the opportunity to sit down with Barbaro for a For Your Consideration edition of Collider Ladies Night. During our 30-minute chat, we covered Barbaro’s experience transitioning from dancing to acting, the project that gave her confidence she could make it in the film and television industry, how she was inspired by Tom Cruise and Arnold Schwarzenegger, and, of course, her experience making A Complete Unknown alongside Chalamet.
Barbaro’s Collaboration with Chalamet Mirrored Baez’s Relationship with Dylan
“He had that energy of looking for words and finding new ways to express all of what was going on inside of him.”
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In our press notes for A Complete Unknown, there’s a quote from director James Mangold that states, “When you’re looking for actors to play against each other, you’re looking for actors who have different core energy.” Mangold goes on to specify, “Monica brings this kind of gravity, strength, and a sense of self. Timmy is always finding which way he’s going to attack the scene.”
Here’s what Barbaro said when asked if she could feel those differences while working with Chalemet on set:
“A producer on our film was saying this to me the other day, about a confidence and a core energy, and I feel like I'm maybe like a duck on water where I'm gliding, but my feet are paddling. I think I maybe appear as though I have more certainty than I do. Right now I'm calm but sweating. [Laughs]”
Barbaro continued by zeroing in on her collaboration with Chalamet:
“What was really cool about doing this work with Timmy is that we sort of held true to our characters and our experience of knowing each other. We're sort of getting to know each other now in the post-process, and it's really fun and he's lovely. But as we approached this work, it did feel like the things I've read Joan say about Bob, where he's in his world and he's processing decisions. I asked him at one point if he was even writing because he had that energy of looking for words and finding new ways to express all of what was going on inside of him.”
While Chalamet captured that energy of constantly looking for new ways to express himself, Barbaro chased Baez’s sense of calm.
“Joan’s always drawn a lot, and as we were filming this, I was drawing, and I was sort of leaning into the kinds of process work that would just bring me that calm and sense of certainty because I think, similarly, she feels like she's a duck paddling, but she has a presence that is very magnetic because there is this calm certainty to her somehow. And so, I think our processes were so different, and it allowed for a bit of that push and pull that I think people feel when they see Bob and Joan.”
Who Is Monica Barbaro's Joan Baez?
"When you're playing ... a person who has a following as big as hers, there's the pressure of knowing that people really know Joan."
Image via Searchlight Pictures
Capturing Baez’s calm was a key component to bringing her to screen in A Complete Unknown, but there was also a wealth of other qualities and talents that Barbaro had to tap into. Fortunately, she had a significant amount of source material to work with. “She has written a lot about herself, and she's done loads of interviews. She's very honest about herself, so I was let in in a really big way even before I ever spoke to her.”
Barbaro went on to emphasize that she wasn’t just playing the real Joan Baez. She was also trying to capture how her fans see her.
“When you're playing not just a person but a person who has a following as big as hers, there's the pressure of knowing that people really know Joan. In some of our screenings, people have come up to me and been like, ‘Oh, I knew Joan,’ or, ‘I've seen her in concert,’ or, 'I'm obsessed with her, and I've followed everything she's ever done.’ So there's definitely an added pressure to that. For that, you just want to honor the person that people see in her, as well.”
‘A Complete Unknown’ Uses Creative License During Bob & Joan’s Duets for a Very Important Reason
"It's just an interesting push and pull with fact and fiction."
Image via Searchlight Pictures
Not only is there the real Joan and who Joan is to her fans, but Barbaro also had to find the version of Joan this movie needed and, sometimes, that demands the team take creative license.
“You want to honor the mannerisms and the voice and the way that she specifically played guitar. Sometimes, there are things in a story like this where the story is taking more of a creative license. For instance, Joan, a lot of times when she duetted with Bob, she didn't have a guitar, but it was important to Jim for her to maintain a certain level of autonomy in those scenes. She didn't do two guitars because she felt it looked kind of commercial. I think that's how she explained it in her album and stuff, but I appreciated that Jim really enjoyed the image of Joan with a guitar and he liked her maintaining that autonomy.”
Highlighting that particular quality of Joan's in the movie demanded that some changes be made to how the real Joan carried herself on stage. Barbaro explained:
"The next thing was, of course, to figure out how we work our guitars together and share a mic, and so there's a lot more of an upheld guitar than she maybe had in performances — although, there's a small harp that she played that she held that way, so I felt like, ‘Okay, that kind of relates.’ It's just an interesting push and pull with fact and fiction and creative license, and just hoping at the end that it still is recognizable to people who love her and to her, that there's that authenticity there, but that you also just have to give way to the story and what Jim is going for and how he envisions Joan and in her relationship with Bob. So there's a lot of push and pull between all of those elements.”
Looking for even more on Barbaro’s journey in film and television thus far, and her experience bringing Joan Baez to screen in A Complete Unknown? Be sure to check out our full conversation in the video at the top of this article, or you can listen to the interview in podcast form below:
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A Complete Unknown: Set in the vibrant New York music scene of the early 1960s, the film follows the journey of 19-year-old Minnesota musician Bob Dylan. It captures his rapid ascent from a budding folk singer to a prominent figure in concert halls and on the charts, highlighting his impact on the music world.
Release Date December 25, 2024
Main Genre Biography
Distributor(s) Searchlight Pictures
A Complete Unknown is now playing in theaters.
English (US) ·