Early in the film ‘SPRINGSTEEN ON BROADWAY’ (Director Thom Zimmy, 153 mins) Bruce Springsteen recalls the impact rock and roll had on his young life, describing it as ‘hearing a calling.’
Recorded at one of the numerous shows Springsteen performed at an intimate Broadway Theatre during a 14-month run that ended in December 2018, he conjures the moment of taking up the guitar with a reference to ‘pulling the sword from the stone.’
From any other rock performer the King Arthur/Excalibur analogy would probably sound contrived, but from Bruce Springsteen, the foremost purveyor of how liberating rock music can be, it is an engaging use of imagery – as to a large section of his devout following Springsteen and the E Street Band became a latter day Knights of the Round Table show, bringing musical salvation wherever they went.
It is one of many wistful observations, poignant musings and humorous asides on offer in this superb film. Stripped of the dynamism, interplay and occasional bombast of a gig with the E Street Band, Springsteen delivers a no less powerful performance – taking the audience on a journey through episodes from his life, the story punctuated with songs from different stages of his career performed on either acoustic guitar or piano.
His only accomplice during the two and half hours on stage is wife and E Street Band member Patti Scialfa, who joins her husband for a two song cameo.
In turn it is funny, sad, angry, vivid but always engrossing and stretching from his earliest memories right up to the present day, the film is a deeply personal reflection on his work, life and times. In Broadway terms, during what could be loosely described the prologue, Springsteen also introduces a nice line on self-deprecating humour that serves him well throughout the piece:
‘I’ve never worked five days a week, until now and don’t like it – and of working in a factory of which I’ve written many times I have absolutely no personal experience. I made it all up – that’s how good I am. And Mister ‘Born To Run’ here – he currently lives ten minutes from his hometown. Born to come back? Who’d have bought that shit?’
Springsteen begins the tale in his hometown of Freehold New Jersey, his recollections prompting the line, ‘New York was only an hours’ drive but talked about as if it was a million miles away,’ in emphasising the small town, provincial nature of his upbringing.
There are candid descriptions of the relationships shared with his parents, ‘My mother was bright, happy, optimistic, good humoured,’ but in contrast says, ‘my father was my hero and my greatest foe.’ Indeed the reconciliation between them much later in the story, occurring shortly before Springsteen becomes a father for the first time, is delivered with such emotion that not only is the audience deeply moved, but the singer himself wipes away a tear before performing the next song.
With enormous gravity he talks of the impact Vietnam had on his generation of young Americans and how close the tragic consequences of the war came to him.
But when switching back to an emerging career speaks with tremendous warmth of the circumstances in which Clarence Clemons joins the E Street Band, the charismatic saxophonist providing a crucial layer of the sound Springsteen went on to define. Springsteen put down the story of Clemons’ early days in the band in ‘Tenth Avenue Freeze Out,’ and losing nothing of its celebratory elan in being performed as a solo piano piece, this less flamboyant rendition also serves as testament to the extraordinary lyricist Springsteen had become even by 1975.
Not since the five album collection ‘Live`1975/85’ has Springsteen produced such an affirming document of his work and while two and half hours of the stripped-back yet compelling show that is ‘Springsteen On Broadway’ may be too much for the unconverted, to the faithful it will arrive as a piece of work that is both remarkable and enlightening.
Before the inevitable closer of ‘Born to Run,’ Springsteen looks back one last time over what he calls, ‘my long and noisy prayer.’ With this part of the shared journey reaching an end he states: ‘I hope I’ve been a good travelling companion.’
For tramps like us there has never been a better one.
This article was first published on 17/1/2019.
NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of MONTY’S DOUBLE – an acclaimed thriller now available as an Amazon Kindle Book.