Walk the Line director James Mangold is "fascinated" by the idea of making a biopic about Bruce Springsteen's career struggles.
After years of striving Bruce and his E Street Band finally found chart success with their 1975 album Born to Run, however the rocker's rise to fame was marred by a legal battle with his former manager Mike Appel which prevented him from recording new material for two years.
James, whose new superhero movie Logan hit cinemas this week (end05Mar17), believes Bruce's costly falling out with his early manager could provide great material for a movie.
"I'm a lifetime Springsteen fan, and I've always been fascinated with that moment after Born To Run when he couldn't record," the 53-year-old filmmaker told Rolling Stone magazine. "You're always looking for moments like that."
Bruce, 67, released his autobiography last year (16), detailing his career and struggles with depression. However, while promoting the book in an interview with BBC 6 Music he revealed that Goodfellas filmmaker Martin Scorsese was the man he wanted to make his biopic.
Another idea James has for a rock biopic is a movie following the inter-band affairs and debauchery of British-American band Fleetwood Mac.
"Then there's the whole idea in terms of Fleetwood Mac, these people who are all getting lost in interpersonal connections with each other," James explains.
The director has already had immense success with a music biopic, as his 2005 film Walk the Line showed country legend Johnny Cash and his wife June Carter-Cash's turbulent musical and romantic relationship and gained five Oscar nominations, with Reese Witherspoon winning the Best Actress prize for her portrayal of June.
James says he has tried to get a couple of other music movies off the ground but it can be difficult to approach artists who are worried about how they will come out of a movie.
"There's been a couple of instances where I've actually approached artists," he says. "The trick is always, are they ready for that kind of treatment? And do you have something original to say? It's not good enough that they wrote great music or changed music history.
"You actually absolutely have to have a story. And there's many places where there's these stories that are fabulous, but will they ever let you make them into a movie? I don't know."
His next movie project after Logan is Seducing Ingrid Bergman, a film about the Swedish actress' romance with war photographer Robert Capa.
