Bob Dylan Once Pitched a Slapstick Comedy Show to HBO

Imagine a parallel universe where Bob Dylan created a hit comedy show. That reality almost came to pass in the early 2000s, when the folk-rock icon approached Curb Your Enthusiasm collaborator Larry Charles with an idea inspired by the slapstick style of Jerry Lewis (via CBR).

Dylan’s pitch for the show was…Dylanesque. He “provided…a box of writings that Dylan had done on various pieces of hotel room stationery from around the globe, with lines of dialogue on some, character names on others and plot ideas on others still.”

The pair took their idea to HBO and met with an exec who loved Bob Dylan and bragged that he had tickets to the original Woodstock framed in his office. The compliment didn’t go over well because Bob Dylan didn’t play at Woodstock. The scenario was recapped on an episode of Pete Holmes’ You Made it Weird podcast from several years ago.

Nevertheless, HBO greenlit the idea— but by that time, the “Like a Rolling Stone” legend was “over it” so they show never got made.

However, Dylan would go on to collaborate with Charles on Masked and Anonymous, a 2003 film drama starring Dylan, Jeff Bridges, John Goodman and Jessica Lange.