A few days before Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band gathered at the Vogel Theater in Red Bank, New Jersey, to begin rehearsals for their 2023 Letter to you tour, filmmaker Thom Zimny ​​​​received a short text from Springsteen. “Bringing the band together,” it said. “You should come over.”

Over the next few months, Zimny ​​and his film crew followed Springsteen and Red Bank’s E Street Band to production rehearsals in Trenton, New Jersey, and then to arenas and stadiums around the world, where they captured intimate backstage moments, thrilling live performances, and thrilling live recorded performances. revealing interviews with every member of the 17-piece band. The result is Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Bandwhich premieres on Hulu and Disney+ on October 25.

The film marks the first time Springsteen has given fans access to rehearsals as he reconnects with old bandmates, integrates new ones into the mix and tries to put together the perfect set list. The narration is provided by Springsteen himself, but the only people interviewed on camera are members of the E Street Band. “Thom’s vision was to make it a story about the E Street Band,” says Springsteen manager Jon Landau, “and to really show and tell the story of the band’s role in a way that has never been done before told.”

In the early days of the E Street Band, little attention was paid to capturing studio sessions, concerts or backstage footage on film. What little remains from that era, including Los Angeles 1973, London 1975, Phoenix 1978, and selected moments from the Born to run And Darkness on the edge of the city sessions, is more a product of luck and chance than any long-term thinking.

“Bruce always had some kind of superstition,” Landau says. “He never wanted to show all the tricks of the trade. On the Darkness tour we did five radio broadcasts in different regions. He told us, “When I get to ‘Quarter to Three,’ turn the sound off.” He didn’t want to give away the whole show. He wanted to keep something back. That’s why we avoided music videos for a very long time. Bruce just had this ambivalence.

That ambivalence began to fade in the mid-1990s when the E Street Band first reunited. He had filmmaker Ernie Fritz take their photos Greatest hits studio sessions for the documentary Blood brothers. And when they closed their 1999/00 tour at Madison Square Garden, the cameras rolled for an HBO concert special released on DVD.

That film was directed by Chris Hilson, who brought Zimny ​​on board to complete the editing process. “There’s a great four-minute sequence in the film during ’10th Avenue Freeze-Out’ where Bruce tells this long story about the band,” says Landau. “He starts on the opposite side of the stage from Clarence, and they start walking towards each other. I remember being in the editing room and watching Thom create a spectacular version of that sequence. I said, ‘Well, okay. This guy has potential here.” However, little did I know that he would stay with us for the next 24 years.”

During that time, Zimny ​​directed numerous Springsteen concert films, music videos and documentaries about the making of Born to run, Darkness on the edge of the city, The riverAnd Letter to you. “Bruce really likes stability,” says Landau. “Stevie (Van Zandt) will be with him forever. Garry (Tallent) goes back to 1971, Max (Weinberg), Roy (Bittan) and myself go back to 1974. George Travis, who produces the tours, goes back to 1977. Once Bruce finds the right people in an area, he’s not one to wake up in the morning and say, “Let me shake this all up.” He has worked for one record company since 1973.”

Zimny ​​may be the new kid on the block with only a quarter century left in the Springsteen camp, but there was still a strong sense of comfort among him and the musicians when he showed up with a skeleton film crew on the first days of rehearsals in the Vogel in January 2023. “We were invisible. We filmed and stood in a way that didn’t hinder their natural regrouping for the first time since the world went into lockdown,” says Zimny. “I was a guest and my job was to find out as much as I could about the story in front of me and stay out of the way.”

The film’s story began to cement itself in Zimny’s mind when he saw Springsteen pull out a notebook and go through a set list that told a story about friendship, growing older, death and memory. “As a filmmaker, I tried to keep that energy and reflect some of these themes,” Zimny ​​says. “My mission in this film was to get close to something I couldn’t put into words, but it’s this moment in ‘Backstreets’ where Bruce pauses the song to talk about his relationship with George (Theiss), a (Castiles) band member from his youth. All the emotions in that speech, I wanted the movie to have a sense of that.

The first scene of the film takes place in Red Bank and Trenton, where the band rehearses its set and welcomes new members Ozzie Melendez, Anthony Almonte and Ada Dyer. Patti Scialfa is present during the rehearsal process and opening night in Tampa, but leaves the tour early. No explanation was given until she revealed to Zimny ​​on camera in 2018 that she had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma.

“That came from that trust of sitting across from her and going through so many different questions about the tour and its history,” Zimny ​​says. “In those conversations, the details emerged as to why she was not on tour. She trusted me, and trust is such a big element in the process of making these films. I wanted that in the film, but I also wanted to have the sense of strength, hope and love that she brings to the stage. That’s why I shot her performance of “Fire” in Los Angeles. It shows an intimate side of her and Bruce that is very rare.”

About 40 minutes into the film, the action shifts to Europe, where Springsteen enjoys a rabid following and headlines football stadiums. Hardcore fans in Norway, Italy and England share their stories on camera. “We spent a fair amount of time together discussing and analyzing Springsteen’s popularity in Europe,” says Landau. “And we are only now in the ‘enjoy it’ phase. Our European audience simply has a unique character. The film happens to focus on Barcelona, ​​which has one of our most inspired audiences. We have a real soft spot for them.”

Much of the film takes place in the present, but there are brief forays into the early days through the memories of Van Zandt, Tallent, Weinberg and Bittan. “I love having a choir of overlapping voices giving you experiences,” says Zimny. “They all have a musical voice. Stevie’s voice does a fantastic job of narrating some of the early days of E Street. You get Roy and his sense of humor. And then you get Garry’s dryness and his delivery. At the end, you get the poetic voice of Bruce’s voiceover, his narration, like a friend coming to you and saying, “Here’s what I think is really going on.”

During production, Zimny ​​sent Springsteen incomplete sequences that he had worked up. He responded with voice-overs inspired by what he saw. “I can put that voiceover against my image,” Zimny ​​says. “And every time it takes it to a whole different place where I rework the whole thing.”

Diary gone revolves around footage from the 2023 tour, but Zimny ​​and his crew were present in Asbury Park in September when Springsteen headlined Sea.Hear.Now in front of 35,000 fans crammed onto the beach. “Can you imagine what that night was like for Bruce?” asks Landau. “Imagine this lonely kid from Freehold and everything we know about him growing up as a kid, and then being the man of today in that same place?”

It’s unclear what will happen to that footage, but Zimny ​​hopes to make more Springsteen films in the coming years. “There isn’t a single chapter in Bruce’s world that I don’t think, ‘Oh, that would be a great story,’” he says. Born in the USA or the Other Band (1992/93 tour) as an example. I’m always looking for different stories and I find all his chapters really fascinating.”

However, there is another Springsteen film in the works that is very different from any of Zimny’s documentaries: an adaptation of the 2023 Warren Zanes book. Free Me from Nothing: The Making of Nebraska by Bruce Springsteendirected by Scott Cooper. The BearJeremy Allen White plays Springsteen, and SuccessionJeremy Strong plays Landau.

“Jeremy (Strong) and I got to know each other really well,” Landau said. “He’s a fantastic guy, just an extraordinary person to start with. And I don’t know what he calls himself, but he certainly has a bit of the method actor in him. And I told him I didn’t think it was necessary for him to go full (Robert) De Niro Furious bull route by earning the extra £35 to play with me.

Real life Springsteen will play a series of Canadian arena shows with the E Street Band in November before heading to Europe next summer. Their plans after that are unclear even to Landau. “Somehow we have to get to Australia because they are just the best, most wonderful people,” Landau says. “But I am not here with an unannounced schedule. This is what we have. Everything we have is available now.”