The Bob Dylan biopicA Complete Unknownchronicles Dylan’s meteoric rise to fame in the 1960s, leading to the backlash Dylan faced at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival.A Complete Unknownfeatures a great cast, led by Timothée Chalamet as Dylan, who portray the real people and circumstances important in the folk music scene in the early 1960s. While the film centers primarily on thetrue events of Bob Dylan’s early years as a folk musician, it also focuses a lot of attention on Dylan’s relationships with those closest to him, including one of his partners and musical collaborators, Joan Baez.
A Complete Unknownshowcases the importance of Bob Dylan’s relationship witha renaming of Dylan’s real-life partner Suze Rotolo, Sylvie Russo, and its gradual dissolution as Dylan began to have an affair with Joan Baez. The biographical film explores how these women had an impact on his beliefs and musical style. Understandably, the movie cannot go into too much detail about the lives and careers of the other characters while focusing on Dylan, butbeyond her connection with Bob Dylan, Joan Baez is a great and massively influential musician and activistin her own right who continues to be impactful today.
Joan Baez’s Music Career After 1965
Baez Continued Making Music In The Decades Following A Complete Unknown’s Events
Following the events portrayed inA Complete Unknown, ending with the Newport Folk Festival, Joan Baez continued to have a fruitful musical career. Additionally, thoughthe ending ofA Complete Unknownimplies that Baez and Dylan no longer got along after that point, in reality, they continued to work and perform together for many years. ThoughDylan and Baez’s real-life relationship was very complicated, and they were no longer romantically connected after 1965,they worked and toured together occasionally through the 1980s.
Fitting with her monumental career,Rolling Stoneincluded her on their list of the Greatest Singers of All Time in 2023.
Apart from her collaborations with Bob Dylan,Baez released numerous albums after 1965 which achieved critical and commercial success. Baez’s most recent studio album was released in 2018, marking her 26th studio album. This was followed by a live album in 2019 which marked the end of her farewell tour. Fitting with her monumental career,Rolling Stoneincluded her on their list of the Greatest Singers of All Time in 2023. ThoughA Complete Unknownshowcased the beginnings of her career and political activism, it is safe to say that Joan Baez’s influence continued to grow following those years.
Joan Baez’s Social & Political Work After 1965
Baez Has Lent Her Voice To Many Causes
Alongside her music, Joan Baez is best known for her commitment to social and political causesboth throughoutA Complete Unknownand in the decades following in real life. During the 1960s, Baez was involved in the Civil Rights Movement and protests against the Vietnam War. Her involvement with anti-war protests and concerts continued into the 1970s, during which time she was also a vocal supporter of LGBTQ+ rights. Joan Baez performed concerts and recorded songs to benefit both of these causes.
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In the 1990s and early 2000s, Baez supported several other social causes, beginning with prison reform in the early 1990s. Baez critiqued the use of the death penalty and advocated for efforts to free people who had been wrongfully convicted. Additionally, she took part in environmental activism, specifically regarding causes in her home state of California. During this same period, Baez voiced her opposition to the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, reaffirming the anti-war stance she had held since the 1960s.
More recently, Baez has continued to support these causes, continuing to advocate for prison reform and environmental protections specifically. Beyond these causes, Baez also supported the 2011 Occupy Wall Street movement, whose focus on economic inequality aligned with her previous beliefs and causes concerning inequality and the protection of all people and the planet. Baez has vocally supported many important and influential social and political causes throughout her life, andher activism continues to be one of the most important aspects of her career to this day.
Joan Baez’s Relationships After Bob Dylan
After the relationship portrayed inA Complete Unknownand her breakup with Bob Dylan in 1965,Joan Baez went on to marry activist David Harris in March 1968. Baez and Harris met in 1967 in Santa Rita jail in California after having both been arrested for participating in blocking the doors to an Armed Forces Induction Center to protest the draft. After being married, Harris was arrested in 1969 for refusing the draft, and Baez gave birth to their only child later that year (viaPBS). The couple ultimately divorced in 1973.
Apart from her marriage to David Harris,Baez’s most notable relationship was with Steve Jobs. Joan Baez and the Apple co-founder dated in the 1980s when he was in his 20s, and she was in her 40s. Though their relationship ended, Joan Baez remained on positive terms with Steve Jobs until his death. Baez even performed at his memorial service in 2011, and she shared that he was a kind man even though his genius could make him"erratic"(viaContact Music).
What Joan Baez Is Doing In 2024
Baez Continues To Be Politically Active And Has Received Numerous Awards
WhileA Complete Unknownshowcased the fame that Joan Baez found early in her life and career,she continues to be a legendary figure today both for her influence on folk music and for her activism. Baez continues to support causes that she is passionate about, and she became involved in the Catalan independence movement in 2019. In 2021, she received a 2020 Kennedy Center Honor as a reflection of her contributions to the arts. Baez has also continued to expand her art as a painter, often creating portraits of influential people in her life.
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In recent years, Baez’s musical and activism work has been honored with many awards, including being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and receiving an Amnesty International Ambassador of Conscience Award, among others. Most recently, in April 2024, Baez released a new poetry book titledWhen You See My Mother, Ask Her To Dance: Poems(viajoanbaez.com). Given her decades-long career and influence, it is safe to say that there is more to Joan Baez’s story thanA Complete Unknownpresents, which is impressive in its own right.
A Complete Unknown
Cast
A Complete Unknown is a biographical movie that follows a young Bob Dylan as he integrates with New York and catches the eye of the folk singers in the area, eventually propelling him into stardom.
