American actor Jeremy Allen White, known especially for his work in Shameless and The Bear, and winner of two Golden Globes and an Emmy Award, among other awards, will play Bruce Springsteen in the biopic Deliver Me From Nowhere, a film about the life of The Boss.
This was confirmed this past Monday after several days of rumors by the specialized media Deadline, which also confirmed that the project, from 20th Century Studios and Disney, will be directed and written by Scott Cooper, who two years ago already wrote and directed The Crimes of the academy, an adaptation of Louis Bayard’s 2003 novel of the same name.
According to Deadline, the film will focus on a “pivotal moment” for Bruce Springsteen and will be based on the book Deliver Me from Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska, by writer and musician Warren Zanes, published in 2023 and which uncovers “the fascinating story” behind the creation of the New Jersey artist’s “most surprising” album: Nebraska.
It is an album released in 1982, just two years after the successful The River was released and with Springsteen already established in the US and some European countries, and for many it is one of the best albums of all time although, curiously, Springsteen rarely uses it in his concerts – Atlantic City and Johnny 99 are, surely, his most recognizable songs.
It is, without a doubt, an album marked by a strong social denunciation, with much more personal, honest but at the same time dark lyrics from Springsteen, who even decided to dispense with the E Street Band in the recording of this and personally took charge of all the songs, based on synthesizers. It is an album that is far from the next one, Born in the USA, which was more commercial and earned him almost unanimous international recognition.
According to what has emerged, Deliver Me From Nowhere will feature the participation of Bruce Springsteen himself and his historic manager, Jon Landau, which will facilitate access to the rights to the singer’s music, whose catalog was sold to Sony for the amount of 500 millions of dollars.
At the moment it is unknown when to start filming this film about the life of The Boss although, also according to Deadline, Jeremy Allen White will finish filming the fourth season of The Bear in June. This way, he would have the entire summer to focus on this biopic.
Currently, Springsteen is immersed in his tour of the United States after recovering from a peptic ulcer that made him suspend some concerts last year – in June he will return to Spain with a triple in Madrid and a double in Barcelona – and as it has emerged, David Greenbaum and Steve Asbell, directors of 20th Century Studios, were present at the concert that the New Jersey native offered at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles last Sunday. Therefore, the project is taking shape and will soon be a reality.
In fact, the fact that this movie is coming now makes sense. For a few years now, especially since the publication of his autobiography, Born to Run, Springsteen tends to look back and take stock of his life and his career. This is what he did between 2017 and 2021 in his show Springsteen on Broadway, available on Netflix, in which he combined guitar and piano songs with anecdotes and personal stories. And the same thing is happening on his current tour, in which he does not hesitate to pay tribute to those who are no longer here and to talk more about yesterday than about tomorrow.
