Bruce Springsteen: Details on New Concert Documentary
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band will be the subject of a new concert documentary from Disney+ and Hulu.
Per Springsteen’s website, Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band is slated to premiere in October. The doc will contain “unprecedented, behind-the-scenes access” to The Boss’ 2023-24 tour with the E Street Band, including rehearsal footage and a look at how Springsteen crafts a setlist.
The documentary’s announcement boasts, “In this way, it serves as an essential and never-before-seen chapter in an autobiographical series spanning Springsteen’s memoir ‘Born to Run,’ ‘Springsteen on Broadway,’ and the films ‘Western Stars’ and ‘Letter to You.'”
Directing Road Diary is Thom Zimny, who has been a longtime collaborator of Springsteen’s and has also directed Springsteen on Broadway and Western Stars. As expected, the concert documentary will feature unique, professionally shot footage of Springsteen’s current tour with the E Street Band, as well as sitdown interviews and commentary from the band.
The Other Bruce Springsteen Film
Road Diary is just the latest Springsteen film in the works. In April, it was confirmed that Jeremy Allen White will be playing The Boss in the upcoming film Deliver Me From Nowhere.
As previously reported, the film is about the making of Springsteen’s 1982 album Nebraska. This film will be an adaptation of the 2023 book Deliver Me From Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska by Warren Zanes.
White, of course, is best known for his role as Carmy Berzatto in the FX series The Bear. The role has netted him a Golden Globe, SAG Award, and an Emmy Award this past awards season.
A production and release timeline for Deliver Me From Nowhere is not currently known.
News of Deliver Me From Nowhere comes five years after the release of another Springsteen film.
Released in 2019 was Blinded By The Light. The film tells the story of Javed, a British teen of Pakistani descent, growing up in England in 1987 amidst racial and economic turmoil. Javed is passionate about poetry and then his passion is turned upside down when a classmate introduces him to the music of The Boss.
Blinded By The Light was based on Sarfraz Manzoor’s memoir Greetings from Bury Parkand comes from writer/director/producer Gurinder Chadha, best known for 2002’s Bend It Like Beckham.
Manzoor told us in an August 2019 interview that Springsteen not only gave his blessing in the making of the film, but he let the small-budget film use his music in the film for free.
“He’s given 19 songs…He’s given the most valuable thing he has with his back catalog to a story about a Pakistani teenager in England in the 1980s,” said Manzoor. “Think about how much he could sell his music for; he gave it to us for nothing. It’s a British Independent film. We didn’t have a studio backing us. It was just a small-budget film, and he basically said you can have the entire back catalog.”
