Who was Bob Dylan’s girlfriend Suze Rotolo? The person who inspired Sylvie Russo

The biopic 2024 A complete unknown revisits Bob Dylan’s rise to fame and describes one of his most important relationships.

In the film, in which Timothée Chalamet plays the lead role as Dylan, the “Like a Rolling Stone” musician’s girlfriend is called Sylvie Russo (Elle Fanning). But in real life, his famous New York muse was the late artist Susan “Suze” Rotolo.

The couple dated between 1961 and 1964 and were famously photographed for the cover of their 1963 album Bob Dylan on the loose. Dylan and Rotolo’s time together inspired many of the singer’s early hits such as “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right”, “One Too Many Mornings” and “Tomorrow Is a Long Time”.

Writer and director James Mangold told deadline In December 2024, Dylan requested that Rotolo’s real name not be used A complete unknownwhich came out on December 25th.

“Bob talked to Jim a lot about the script and the only thing he wanted was for Suze’s name to be changed in the script because he felt like she wasn’t a public figure,” Fanning told Gold Derby. “She always wanted to remain a private person. I truly carried the gravity of Bob’s decision in my heart because they remained close until her death in 2011.”

So who is Sylvie Russo based on? A complete unknown? Here you can find out everything about Bob Dylan’s real-life ex-girlfriend Suze Rotolo and her relationship with the singer.

She was born in New York City

Susan Elizabeth Rotolo was born on November 20, 1943 in New York City. Both parents were members of the Communist Party: her mother was an editor at an Italian-language communist newspaper and her father was an artist and union organizer The New York Times. Rotolo’s father died when she was 14 years old.

In an interview with NPR in 2008, Rotolo said that she kept her parents’ political affiliations secret until 1989 – which helped her understand Dylan’s desire to keep his real name, Robert Zimmerman, secret. Rotolo discovered Dylan’s birth name when he accidentally dropped his wallet and his draft card fell out.

“I saw his name and I was really – I was hurt,” she said. “I said you never told me that was your real name. I understand you didn’t tell anyone, but you could have at least told me.”

She was an artist and activist

Like Dylan, Rotolo was involved in the New York folk revival scene. She made jewelry, illustrated and painted before finding her niche in book art, creating book-like pieces from found objects. She also taught at Parsons School of Design, according to NPR.

Rotolo was also an activist in the civil rights movement. While with Dylan, she worked for the Congress of Racial Equality and took part in demonstrations against America’s nuclear policy. The artist remained politically active throughout her life.

In 2004, she joined a theater group called Billionaires for Bush and protested at the Republican National Convention in Manhattan under the pseudonym Alla DaPie.

She met Dylan at a folk concert

In July 1961, Rotolo attended a folk concert at the Riverside Church in Manhattan, where Dylan was performing. In his 2004 memoir Chronicles: Volume 1the singer said that he couldn’t take his eyes off Rotolo “from the start.”

“She was the sexiest thing I had ever seen,” Dylan wrote. “She was fair-skinned and golden-haired, a full-blooded Italian. The air was suddenly full of banana leaves. We started talking and my head started spinning. Cupid’s arrow had whistled past my ears before, but this time it hit me right in the heart and its weight knocked me overboard.”

When asked what she thought of the excerpt, Rotolo told NPR it was a “wonderful, generous and beautiful thing.” In her 2008 memoir A Free Time: A Memoir of Greenwich Village in the SixtiesShe described Dylan as “strangely old-fashioned-looking, charming in a dry sort of way.”

The couple started dating almost immediately and moved into a walk-up apartment in Greenwich Village.

She was on the cover of one of his albums ​​

Rotolo was famously photographed with Dylan for the cover of his 1963 album Bob Dylan on the loose. She described the reasons behind her outfit choice The New York Times in 2008.

“It was freezing cold,” said the artist. “He wore a very thin jacket because image was everything. It was always cold in our apartment, so I wore a sweater and borrowed one of his big, thick sweaters. I put a coat on over it. I felt like an Italian sausage.”

In her NPR interview, Rotolo said that when she did the photo shoot, she had no idea what impact it would have on her life. Although it was her “identifier” for years, she said the iconic image was far from her identity.

“I thought it was a great cover, a very unusual cover for the time,” she said. “And when I first saw it, it was… in black and white and blown up really big, and that really made an impression. It was almost embarrassing.”

Dylan wrote songs about their relationship – and their breakup

In 1962, Rotolo went to Italy for eight months to study art. She told NPR that she was supposed to go after high school, but a car accident derailed her plans. When Rotolo was given the opportunity again, she took it, but Dylan didn’t want her to leave.

“He said not to go, but he didn’t want to stop me from thinking about going at the same time,” she said. “And it was a difficult decision for me.”

The musician wrote several songs about Rotolo’s departure, including “Boots of Spanish Leather.” When she returned home, Rotolo learned that people who heard the tracks blamed her for making him “suffer.”

“I’ve always been a shy person, so for this relationship to be put right in the public eye was very terrible,” she said. “I was very private. I didn’t make things public, and yet people seemed to know how much pain I had caused him. He announced this publicly. But I see that it was just his way of dealing with it and making it part of his art. But at the time I just felt so exposed.”

Sometime after their return, Dylan had a public affair with fellow folk singer Joan Baez, with whom he had begun performing. Rotolo moved out of her apartment in August 1963 and, after finding out she was pregnant, had an abortion. The couple separated in 1964.

“The alliance between Suze and I was not exactly a vacation in the woods,” Dylan wrote in his memoirs. “Eventually fate stopped it and it came to a standstill. It had to end. She turned once and I turned again.”

Dylan famously wrote “Ballad in Plain D” about an argument he had with Rotolo and her sister American songwriter. He later told author Bill Flanagan in 1985 that he regretted the song, saying, “I must have been a real idiot to write that.” When I look back on this particular song, I think: Of all the songs that I wrote, perhaps I could have done without it.

Dylan said Rotolo heavily influenced his music

The years Dylan spent with Rotolo had a major influence on his songwriting due to their artistic interests and activism. In Robert Shelton’s 1986 book No Direction Home: The Life and Music of Bob DylanThe singer said that he had her sing many of his songs.

“She’ll tell you how many nights I stayed up writing songs and showing them to her and asking her, ‘Is this right?’ said Dylan. “Because her father and mother were involved in unions and she was interested in this equality-liberty thing long before I was.”

She later married an Italian film editor

In 1967, Rotolo married an Italian film editor named Enzo Bartoccioli. Although she first met him during her previous trip to Italy, she told NPR that they didn’t meet again until many years later.

After living in Italy, the couple moved to the United States in the 1970s. They had a son together, Luca Bartoccioli.

She died in 2011

Rotolo died of lung cancer at her home in Manhattan on February 25, 2011, after a long journey. She was 67.

Dylan and Rotolo stayed in touch over the years. After their relationship ended, he helped her when a house fire destroyed most of her belongings – including the famous green coat she wore on his album cover The Guardian.

Dylan asked to change Rotolo’s name A complete unknown

Although Fanning’s character was inspired by Suze, Dylan requested that her name be used changed A complete unknown. Fanning said she wanted to honor Dylan and Rotolo’s story with the way she played the role.

“Suze was the one in real life who pushed him to sing his own songs and not just the same folk songs.” The great The actress told Gold Derby. “She was very active politically in the civil rights movement, and Bob wasn’t very familiar with the politics of the time until he met Suze. So she was a role model for him during that time.”

She continued, “It was a very special relationship for him, so I felt a real responsibility to capture the essence of their young adulthood and their time together and the essence of her as best as I could.”