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Marketed as a discussion with Jeremy Allen White, and offering “a special guest”, there was hardly any shock when Bruce Springsteen appeared on the small stage at Spotify’s London offices on Tuesday evening. The actor and the rock star walked on separately, but to the identical excerpt of opening tune: the initial lyrics of Atlantic City, from Springsteen’s 1982 album Nebraska.

It is, ultimately, the making of this LP that provides the focus for Scott Cooper’s new film Deliver Me From Nowhere, which casts White as Springsteen at a decisive juncture in the singer’s personal and professional journey. Much of the evening’s exchange, moderated by Edith Bowman, revolved around the detailed approach of transforming into the star, and the inevitable strangeness of art meeting life.

Springsteen – the whole time, a portrait of reptilian poise – spoke of first catching a glimpse of White during a sound check at Wembley Stadium, in the summer of 2024. “Jeremy was dressed in white attire, so he was simple to notice,” he remembered. “I just casually gestured him to the stage and we greeted each other.” White was already thoroughly versed in Springsteen’s music, had studied countless recordings of concert material, and consumed numerous interviews and biographies. The Wembley show was an chance for a greater understanding of Springsteen as a onstage artist, and to explore some of the specifics of the Nebraska period with the singer himself. Springsteen remembered preparing himself for an inquiry that did not come: “I thought this guy is really gonna be interested in me …” he said. In the end, however, “Jeremy was so prepared, he really asked hardly any queries.”

It was an intimidating role to undertake, White said. He spoke frequently to the immense volume of Springsteen information out there, the amount of study he had to acquire, and discussed “the pressure I was putting on myself. Bruce called it ‘focus’. I called it ‘anxiety that hardened, maybe, into focus.’”

“A lot of effort was going into the musical component of the film” … Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen in Deliver Me From Nowhere.

For all the learning he engaged in, it was through the tunes that he really connected to the part. “A lot of my concentration was going into the musical component of the film,” he said. “[Scott] asked me to sing and play the guitar, and I said, ‘I can’t do those things … are you sure?’” Cooper was insistent. White promptly recorded his own interpretations of Springsteen’s songs. “I remember being in Nashville, at RCA [studio], in the booth, singing Nebraska, and finding some confidence … feeling close to Bruce, in a way,” he said. “When you’re reading a great script, your job is quite simple,” he said. “And when you’re absorbing Bruce’s lyrics, it’s the same. All the elements are right there.”

Springsteen also sent White a 1955 Gibson J-200 – the closest he could find to the guitar used for Nebraska, and “just about the finest guitar you can learn on,” White says. He started guitar lessons, via Zoom, with touring guitarist JD Simo. “Hey, I’m so excited to learn guitar with you,” White remembered stating on their first meeting. “We lack the time to learn the guitar,” Simo answered. “We have time to learn these five Bruce songs.”

Jeremy Allen White and Bruce Springsteen on the set of Deliver Me From Nowhere in 2024.

Springsteen’s own feelings about the film were initially simpler. “I reasoned I’m 76 years old, I don’t really care what the fuck I do any more,” he said. “Yeah, go ahead. At my age you accept greater hazards, in your work and in your life in general.” It helped that Cooper was “a true blue-collar film-maker” making “the kind of film I would be intrigued by,” he said. “Not your standard musical biopic, but more of a individual-centered narrative with music.”

As the project moved forward, it possibly became odder. Springsteen appeared on location often, expressing regret to White each time he showed up. “It’s must be really odd with the guy’s foolish self standing there,” he said. But he appreciated what he saw: “I’ve stated this earlier, but I kept thinking ‘Damn, when did I get that good-looking?’” In the seat beside him, White shakes his head and shakes his head.

Springsteen had minimal hesitation about White’s casting; he understood that the actor was equipped to portray the most introspective time in his recording career. “I’d watched The Bear, and how the camera captured his personal thoughts,” he said. “And if you see him in a film, it’s a cliche, but he’s a rock star.”

When he first saw White acting as him, he was struck by the actor’s method. “His performance was entirely from the inside out, not just picking elements and wearing them like clothes,” he said. “It’s a non-copycat performance, but in some way it greatly relates to my story and myself.” He saw it as something akin to his own way to songwriting – to writing about people whose lives vary significantly from his own. “You have to discover the part of them that is part of you.”

More disconcerting was the way the film compelled him to reexamine challenging times in his own life. The recreation of his grandparents’ home in Freehold, New Jersey – a house he once described as “the greatest and saddest sanctuary I’ve ever known” was eerie; Springsteen recounted how often he returned to the home in his dreams. “So, to be in that house again … it was truly wondrous, and quite wonderful.”

Similarly, it was “a very impactful thing” to see Stephen Graham as his father – portraying his volatile early years, when he suffered unidentified mental health issues and consumed alcohol excessively, and the vulnerability and sweetness of his later years.

Springsteen told of watching an early showing in the company of his sister, who held his hand throughout. Just a year younger than her brother, “she recalled all details”. At the end, she turned to him and said: “Isn’t it amazing that we have that?”

There was an echo, possibly, of the emotion Springsteen hopes to give his own audiences through his live shows. “You build an perfect realm for three hours,” he told the select group before him last night. “It’s not a imaginary place. It’s a very credible world. It has all the joyful and painful parts of life … But hopefully there’s an element of uplift that my audience takes with them. And with luck it stays with them for as long as they need it.”