Jeremy Allen White didn’t have a lot of musical training ahead of his role in Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere.
“I had not had a lot of experience, or any experience, singing or playing guitar, so that was daunting to say the least in the beginning,” White said.
Maron said that there were times where Springsteen “couldn’t tell the difference” between his and The Bear star’s vocals. White credited celebrity vocal coach Eric Vetro with helping him find his voice.
“He helped Austin [Butler] with the Elvis movie, he helped Timothée Chalamet with the [Bob] Dylan movie, he’s kind of the go-to, and he works with a lot of vocalists and real singers and performers,” White said.
Still, the Iron Claw actor said “the singing was a gamble.” He said the phrasing on the central record of the film, 1982’s Nebraska, was tough to nail.
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At times, White said he got too “worked up” about sounding like Springsteen that Vetro noticed he wasn’t connecting to the music. Once he did that, the actor said it was a “breakthrough” in playing the role.
“I remember Bruce was great the first time he heard one of my pre-records ’cause he was like, ‘You sound like me, but you’re singing the song, you’re making the song your own. You’ve got your connection to the song,'” White said. “And I think once he gave me that permission, not just with the music, but in a sense the entirety of the film, I feel like that released me a little bit from the anxiety.”
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