Bruce on Broadway, My Take

I spent the day after my 56^th birthday with an old friend. There is nothing like hanging out with your wife and a friend on a Saturday night. I had not seen this friend since January 31, 2016, when another friend, Lynne from Philadelphia, called me up on a Sunday morning and told me that our mutual friend would be in New Jersey. That afternoon I took two trains to get there and have dinner with Lynne before going to see our buddy.  My old friend is currently starring on a show on Broadway. Originally slated for an eight week run, the show has now been playing for over a year.

My old friend’s name is Bruce Springsteen and yes I consider him a friend. No we have never had dinner together, nor have we been to each other’s homes. However I have seen him perform somewhere between 75 and 80 times (I have truly lost count). I’ve met him a few times, once at the after party for Saturday Night Live in 1992, where we chatted briefly. The second time was backstage after a Conan O’Brien show.

There is an old joke that goes something like this: A tourist asks a native New Yorker, “How do you get to Broadway?” The New Yorker answers, “Practice.”

For me getting these tickets didn’t take practice, it took perseverance. I registered in August, 2017. I finally got an email in March, 2018. I purposely purchased my tickets for the day after my birthday which is in October. This was a 14-month journey for me. For Bruce it’s been a 62 year journey. As he pointed out in the show, it started for him on September 9, 1956 when he first saw Elvis on the Ed Sullivan show.

The first few stories Bruce told were filled with funny and amusing facts about his life. When he got to talking about his dad and then his mom, I’m not ashamed to say that I cried. He loved his dad dearly and he absolutely worships his mother. I knew going in I would cry during “The Wish” but he also had me with “My Father’s House” and the story preceding it.

The story before “My Father’s House” reminded me of something my mother once told me. I could legally drink at 18, but it wasn’t until I was 20 or 21 when I would start going out at night. On those nights I’d go out and come in late — or early depending how you looked at it — my mother told me, “I never went looking for your father, and I’m sure as hell not going to look for you”. She then prefaced it with “If you know you’re going to be out late, call me.” My mother was tough but she still loved me.

I could probably compare quite a few stories Bruce told to my own experiences. Sitting in the theater made me realize, that everyone has a story to tell. Everyone has good and bad memories.

Here is a guy who is now 69 years old, who has traveled the world, performed before millions of people and is rich beyond his wildest dreams yet he still comes off as a regular guy that you could sit down have a beer with and talk about sports. Even with all that fame and fortune he still has his insecurities, then again don’t we all?

I took my wife to this show because I wanted her to see why I have seen him in the vicinity of 80 times. She originally told me to take my best friend and fellow Bruce fan, Dennis. When I asked Dennis he said that I should take my wife, being that it’s my  birthday. Dennis is a good man.

As we left the theater my wife asked me if is it was what I expected. I didn’t have an answer for her yet. I was kind of in awe at what I had just seen. When I asked her what she thought, her reply was “I found it depressing.”

Now my wife is highly educated and is tops in her field as a teacher. She just finished in the top five for New York State Teacher of the Year. I respect her opinions, and her review kind of floored me. However with some of the subject matter in the show, Bruce’s father’s depression, his mother Alzheimer’s, losing two friends and fellow musicians in Vietnam, I could see where she was coming from. I have listened to Darkness on the Edge of Town over 100 times and it is a depressing album. The characters are searching for something that they may never find. Yet they go about their business and continue to work, live, love and search.

Bruce took his audience on the journey that was/is his life. Being an avid Bruce fan, I saw this show as Bruce wanting to talk about that life, what has influenced him and how he got to where he is now. He was performing a love letter to his fans, his hard core fans

Obviously no one can encompass 69 years of living into a two and a half hour show, so we got the highlights: How he was influenced by his mom and dad (and Elvis); his first time leaving home never to return; his first drive across country (without a license and without knowing how to drive a stick); his Catholicism and his first encounter with Vietnam veterans as well his own story about going down to the draft board.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself as I laughed and cried and sang the words to the songs in my head. As much as I am against people going two and three times, I would like to go again! This time with a fellow Bruce fan who wouldn’t find it as depressing. With the show closing in a few months and the tickets pretty much all gone, that second show probably isn’t going to happen.

However I did see that Bryan Cranston will be starring in Network beginning in December…  now if you really want to get into something depressing let’s talk about Howard Beale!