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

It is, in the end, the creation of this album that provides the focus for Scott Cooper’s new film Deliver Me From Nowhere, which sees White as Springsteen at a decisive juncture in the singer’s life and career. Much of the evening’s talk, steered by Edith Bowman, focused on the detailed approach of embodying Springsteen, and the inescapable oddity of performance blending with truth.

Springsteen – consistently, a portrait of reptilian poise – recalled first spotting White during a rehearsal at Wembley Stadium, in the summer of 2024. “Jeremy was dressed in white attire, so he was easy to spot,” he remembered. “I just kind of waved him to the stage and we said hi.” White was already thoroughly versed in Springsteen’s music, had watched hours of concert videos, and consumed numerous interviews and biographies. The Wembley show was an chance for a enhanced comprehension of Springsteen as a concert act, and to discuss some of the specifics of the Nebraska period with the singer himself. Springsteen recalled bracing himself for an inquiry that never arrived: “I thought this guy is really gonna be interested in me …” he said. In the end, however, “Jeremy was so thoroughly briefed, he really asked hardly any queries.”

It was an intimidating role to take on, White said. He spoke frequently to the sheer weight of Springsteen information available, the amount of study he had to take on, and mentioned “the pressure I was putting on myself. Bruce called it ‘focus’. I called it ‘worry that solidified, maybe, into focus.’”

“A lot of energy was going into the sonic element 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 songs that he really related to the part. “A lot of my concentration was going into the audio dimension of the film,” he said. “[Scott] asked me to sing and play the guitar, and I said, ‘I don’t do those things … are you sure?’” Cooper was firm. White accordingly recorded his own interpretations of Springsteen’s songs. “I remember being in Nashville, at RCA [studio], in the recording space, singing Nebraska, and building self-belief … relating strongly to Bruce, in a way,” he said. “When you’re studying a great script, your job is straightforward,” he said. “And when you’re reading Bruce’s lyrics, it’s the same. It’s all right there.”

Springsteen also sent White a 1955 Gibson J-200 – the nearest he could find to the guitar used for Nebraska, and “just about the best guitar you can learn on,” White says. He began guitar lessons, via Zoom, with professional musician JD Simo. “Hey, I’m so eager to learn guitar with you,” White noted expressing on their first meeting. “We lack the time to learn the guitar,” Simo responded. “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 sentiments about the film were originally less complicated. “I figured 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 embrace more chances, in your work and in your life in general.” It aided 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 character-driven drama with music.”

As the project moved forward, it maybe became odder. Springsteen visited the set often, apologising to White each time he arrived. “It’s must be really odd with the guy’s foolish self standing there,” he said. But he liked what he saw: “I’ve stated this earlier, but I kept thinking ‘Damn, when did I get that attractive?’” In the seat beside him, White wags his finger and expresses denial.

Springsteen had few doubts about White’s casting; he was aware 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 internal life,” he said. “And if you see him in a film, it’s a cliche, but he’s a music icon.”

When he first saw White playing him, he was affected by the actor’s approach. “His performance was completely from the inner self outward, not just selecting traits and adopting them superficially,” he said. “It’s a original performance, but nevertheless it deeply corresponds to my story and myself.” He considered it something like his own method to songwriting – to writing about people whose lives differ so greatly from his own. “You have to find the part of them that is part of you.”

More disturbing was the way the film pushed him to return to 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 strange; Springsteen explained how often he visited 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 unpredictable early years, when he suffered undiagnosed mental health issues and had a drinking problem, and the vulnerability and kindness of his later years.

Springsteen told of watching an early viewing 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 marvelous that we have that?”

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