Interviews by Elisa Leonelli
Springsteen-Deliver Me from Nowhere, directed by Scott Cooper based on the 2023 book by Warren Zanes Deliver Me from Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska, illustrates a difficult period in the life of legendary singer Bruce Springsteen, played by Jeremy Allen White, when in 1981, after the success of his early albums such as Born to Run (1975) and The River (1980), he retreats to a rented house in New Jersey, close to where he was born, to compose mournful and personal songs, accompanied only by his guitar and harmonica, recording them on a four-track recorder. Those songs will eventually be released as the acoustic album Nebraska (1982).
Elisa Leonelli interviewed for Best Movie from Los Angeles Scott Cooper and Bruce Springsteen.
Scott Cooper and Bruce Springsteen. Los Angeles
Q. How did the music of Bruce Springsteen fit into your life before making this movie?
COOPER: It fits in quite prominently, and very personally. I didn’t really come to Bruce Springsteen until I was a teenager, and the first album was, of course, Nebraska. It came to me just at the right time, when I was a disaffected teenager who wasn’t quite sure of his place in the world, or what the future looked like. So I really related to those characters, to Bruce’s very somber vocalization and his incredible lyrics; for years they have had a great personal resonance for me.
Q. Why did you feel that this was the right time to give your blessing to this biopic and how did you feel about concentrating on Nebraska?
SPRINGSTEEN: I hadn’t thought about doing a film about my life, but our producers heard Warren Zanes, the author of the book, on Marc Maron’s podcast, and thought there might be a film there. So I met Scott and Warren at my house, we spent an afternoon together, and I liked the idea that the film was going to be concentrated around Nebraska, which was an interesting part of my life, because while making that record, I was going through a lot of personal struggles, and even by the time I was 30 and I’d had some success, I was still living in Asbury Park. I also liked that it was not going to be a conventional music biopic, it’s really a character-driven drama with music, and that interested me a lot. I knew from Scott’s other films that he had a real vision and understanding of working class life, and he could really capture well that part of the story.
Q. How did Bruce Springsteen cooperate with you in the writing of the screenplay and the making of the movie?
COOPER: Bruce said to me, “Scott, the truth about yourself isn’t always pretty.” And while I was writing, while I was shooting, while I was editing the film, he said, “I want a Scott Cooper movie. I want a film that doesn’t let the audience off the hook, that doesn’t sand off the edges, where the camera never really looks away. You have to tell my truth in as honest a form as you possibly can.” What I only realized now that we’ve screened the film in Telluride, New York, and around the world, was that this theme of father-son disconnect is much more universal and relatable, sadly, than I ever imagined.
Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen (c) 20th Century Studios
Q. The movie openly discusses Springsteen’s depression and his need for therapy. How important is it to bring those issues into the open in today’s troubled world?
COOPER: That’s really the reason why I made the film, apart from my love of Nebraska, it was about understanding that Bruce Springsteen was at his personal lowest, but also at his creative best. Bruce and I agree that this is his best album, probably will be his most enduring record. But for me it was always about a neglected soul repairing himself through music, who is looking at inherited trauma, going through mental health struggles. We see in the film that Bruce’s father, played so beautifully by Stephen Graham, is suffering through undiagnosed schizophrenia. We see that Bruce moves through the film, as he would say, “feeling the black sludge,” that he didn’t quite know it was depression until he was clinically diagnosed here in Los Angeles. In the United States, there’s a real mental health crisis and it has touched all of us, people from all walks of life, all socioeconomic classes. It doesn’t distinguish. So I thought, if I can make a film about Bruce Springsteen, who very outwardly should have everything in life and be living a life of happiness and joy, but feels anything but that, ultimately then I could shine a light on what is stigmatized in male society. So many men of that generation, and even my generation, are afraid to give voice to their pain. They can’t, because they feel weak by showing that kind of vulnerability.
Q. We live in a culture where, especially for men, they’re not supposed to show their vulnerabilities. It was brave of you to talk about this journey, to allow that aspect of yourself to be exposed so openly.
SPRINGSTEEN: As a songwriter, you’re used to revealing yourself, if you’re an artist, that’s part of your job, that is what you do. And it certainly doesn’t feel courageous, that is how you help contextualize life for your audience, give them a sense of it. But I also think that the stereotype of manhood, which I grew up with from the fifties, simply is not functional in modern times, that you need access to your emotions and permission to express those emotions. That’s the way that I’ve lived, so it was a very natural thing for me to go with that story, and I didn’t have any issues with it.
Q. Springsteen was already famous in 1981, after the release of albums like Born to Run (1975), Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978), The River (1980) and he had already recorded songs for Born in the USA (1984), when he took time off to write Nebraska (1982).
COOPER: Of course, people know him from Born to Run, Born in the USA and Tunnel of Love (1987), albums filled with anthems, that are very often misunderstood. But Bruce has the ability to write very dark and indicting lyrics, and Bruce’s vocalization, when backed by the E Street Band, becomes something different, so you have to pay very close attention. It’s interesting, now that I’m reflecting on Bruce’s larger career, Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995), that’s really who Bruce Springsteen is.
Q. What made you feel that Jeremy Allen White was the right actor to portray you in this film, as a person and as a singer?
SPRINGSTEEN: I’ve seen Jeremy Allen White on The Bear and it may be a cliché, but he simply is a rock star. He has the swagger, the presence and the physicality, in the way he moves. But mostly he has the internal intensity, and the camera reads that intensity, which I knew was gonna be an essential element of the film. What the whole film was really going to be based on was my internal emotional life, which Scott captured so wonderfully through his camera. So Jeremy was really my first choice, and he was Scott’s first choice. So I was extremely happy that he took the part.
Q. What references from cinema or photography did you use in recreating 1980s America, capturing the zeitgeist of that period?
COOPER: The black and white photography of Robert Frank in The Americans is incredibly important to Bruce, and to me. Bruce often said to me that, when he thinks of himself as a seven or eight-year-old, he remembers his father in that very painful time through black and white imagery, which is why the flashbacks are in black and white, and the cover of the Nebraska album is in black and white. For the contemporary pieces, I was inspired by the work of Terrence Malick, who so kindly gave me the footage of Badlands that you see in the film, and who’s been a mentor of mine. I would say Michael Mann’s film Thief, and in terms of music and lighting, Martin Scorsese’s documentary on the Band, The Last Waltz, also Chungking Express by Wong Kar Wai. But a film that has probably been one of the most influential movies on me as a director of actors, and for someone who’s striving for authenticity, it’s Harlan County, USA (1976), the documentary by Barbara Kopple. These are all the films that influenced me as I was conceiving the film about Springsteen.
Q. You had made another film about a singer, Crazy Heart (2009) with Jeff Bridges as Hank Thompson. What makes this the right time to come out with a film about Bruce Springsteen, after the one about Bob Dylan with Timothée Chalamet last year?
COOPER: I don’t know if there was ever a right time or a wrong time for a film to come out, I don’t really think so, I’m not result oriented. It’s the second film that I’ve made about a musician, because I happen to love music, it’s a first love of mine. Not in terms of playing music, but just how I experience it and what it has meant to me at both the lowest times of my life and also the highest. In terms of James Mangold making A Complete Unknown about Bob Dylan, that film was incredibly well rendered, but none of those things I even consider. It’s about, “Can I tell this story honestly and truthfully, and why do I want to tell the story?” The great Stanley Kubrick once said that he really finds out what the film’s about while he’s making it. And while I think I’ve made the film that I set out to make, most importantly, I’ve learned something about myself in making it. And my only hope is that other people will want to spend two hours with this story.
Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen (c) 20th Century Studios
Q. Do you hope that the movie and the release of Nebraska ’82: Expanded Edition will reach a whole younger audience, that will be connecting with these songs now?
SPRINGSTEEN: It’s funny, when I meet young fans, Nebraska is the first record that they mention, that gained them entry into my body of work. I’m not sure why that is. I listened to it a month ago, because I was interested on hearing how young my voice sounded, and it’s a young man’s record, a 30-year-old guy’s record. As far as my favorite song, I love the song “Nebraska” and, of course, “My Father’s House.”
Q. At the premiere of the movie in New York, and in recent concerts, you talked about loving this country, you’ve been outspoken about Trump while others have chose to stay silent. Why did you choose to speak out?
SPRINGSTEEN: That wasn’t a big thing for me, because I’ve written about my country for 50 years, and it just seems like a part of my job to do that right now. So, when we were going out on the road for a few shows, I felt that the country was in dire straits, and I can’t give these guys a free pass. So we constructed a set list that was based around the idea that there are people around the world who believe in an America of its highest ideals, that it still means something, that America is a country whose ideals are worth fighting for. So it was a very easy decision for me.
Italian version published in Best Movie, Italy. read at this link