Bruce Springsteen makes solo red carpet appearance after revelation about family life

Bruce Springsteen is on the road to promote his brand new documentary film Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, taking viewers inside the formation of their iconic live shows.

Per the band’s official website, the feature is described as offering “the most in-depth look ever at the creation of the band’s legendary live performances, including footage of rehearsals, backstage moments, rare archival clips and personal reflections from Springsteen himself.”

The singer, affectionately known as “The Boss,” made an appearance at the Los Angeles premiere of the documentary at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures on Monday, October 21.

Bruce was joined by longtime bandmate Steven Van Zandt, filmmaker Thom Zimny, and producer Jon Landau, plus other stars like Brandi Carlile, Catherine O’Hara, Danny DeVito and more.

However, he wasn’t joined by his wife and E Street Band bandmate Patti Scialfa, nor his and Patti’s three children, Evan, Samuel and Jessica.

The family-of-five is quite close, although Evan (a music content editor) and Samuel (a firefighter) maintain more of a life away from the spotlight. Jessica is a professional equestrian who continues to show jump professionally, while Patti is likely at home, healing from multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer.

In a recent interview with The Times, the “Born in the U.S.A.” hitmaker spoke about splitting his time raising his kids in California and then in their massive ranch home in Colts Neck, New Jersey, which has always been a favorite for him and Patti.

“It’s certainly not Los Angeles,” he says of their expansive estate. “I feel safe here. This is where my people are, where the folks I wrote about are. I was never a worldly young man.”

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He mentions never feeling “comfortable” living in LA or New York. “I don’t think you can find photographs of me falling out of nightclubs in either of them. And when Patti and I had children, we were not comfortable about them growing up in Los Angeles.” 

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“I grew up on a block that had six houses with my relatives in them, so we came back here. The kids had aunts and uncles nearby and it was a good payoff for not being where the industry is: normal life.” 

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He continued: “You know, it’s funny. You grow up in a place that you weren’t so sure about for a variety of reasons. Then, whether for nostalgia or the feeling that you’re on solid ground, you find yourself returning. Now I love my home town.”

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Bruce also talks about making the conscious decision with Patti to not “expose” their kids to the level of fame they were experiencing. “When they were little, if they heard me on the radio they would go, ‘Bruce Springsteen!’ It was their way of separating their dad from this abstract character who also seemed to be a part of their lives.”

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“A lot of times, we just didn’t expose them to it,” he continued. “They came to concerts a few times before going back to their rooms to play video games, and didn’t know much about it beyond what they may have read.” 

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“When they were older they wanted to bring their friends to the show, but apart from that they chose their own lives, developed their own work, found their own partners and families, all at a nice distance from the strangeness of my job.”