EXCLUSIVE: In his first major film project since leaving as Netflix Film boss, Scott Stuber has teamed with Gotham Group’s Ellen Goldsmith Vein & Eric Robinson to make a film about The Boss. Scott Cooper is writing to direct Deliver Me From Nowhere, a narrative feature about Bruce Springsteen and the long effort to put together his seminal Nebraska album, which started to take shape as he and the E Street Band were laying down tracks for his massive hit album Born in the USA. It’s an adaptation of the Warren Zanes book published last year.
The Bear star Jeremy Allen White is top choice to play Springsteen and talks are underway with A24 to make the movie. Negotiations haven’t begun with the actor, who would head to New Jersey for a fall shoot after the Emmy-winner finishes Season 4 of The Bear in June. As we’ve learned, Springsteen’s huge stardom and status as the premiere lyricist and melody maker over decades is belied with the personal circumstances of an upbringing with a father who suffered from depression, something Springsteen has also battled and was feeling the effects in 1982. He poured a lot of that darkness into Nebraska, which many call his rawest and best album. He was in the process of dealing with becoming a global superstar, and wrote those songs not really intending to turn them into an album. He did it with a simple four track recorder alone in a bedroom in a house he rented in Colts Neck, New Jersey.
The Terrence Malick film Badlands was a major influence, addressed directly in the song Nebraska, and other hits including Atlantic City, Highway Patrolman, State Trooper and many others. Every song is a classic. This came after the big success of Born To Run, Darkness on the Edge of Town and The River. Nebraska was the followup to The River, and then came Born in the USA. Even though that tune was about a despondent Vietnam vet, but it was such an anthem its meaning for a long time was confused.
Cooper transitioned from actor to writer/director with the music-themed Crazy Heart, which won Jeff Bridges the Oscar, as well as T Bone Burnett and Ryan Bingham, with Maggie Gyllenhaal getting a nomination. He’s back full circle, with The Boss.
Springsteen and his manager Jon Landau are actively involved in the project, and more details will be forthcoming. The Boss has written or lent songs for movies that spoke to him and he won the Oscar for Best Original Song for Streets of Philadelphia in 1994. He has made movies about specific albums which he has directed with Thom Zimny. But this is new ground for the star.
