Bruce Springsteen Jokes Steven Spielberg Ruined Skinny Dipping With 'Jaws' at MoMA Film Benefit

Bruce Springsteen used his stage time at the Museum of Modern Art's 18th Annual Film Benefit on Thursday night to settle an old score with Steven Spielberg, joking that the director's 1975 shark thriller "Jaws" single-handedly destroyed one of America's beloved pastimes: skinny dipping.

"One of the great pleasures on the Jersey Shore in 1975 was night swimming, preferably naked with someone you wanted to have sex with," Springsteen quipped. "Steven Spielberg fucked that up. He fucked it up good. Over the years, I asked myself, 'Why would a nice man like that, why would he do that?'"

Springsteen noted that he eventually became friends with Spielberg, but said that across 30 years of friendship, including multiple trips aboard the director's boat, he had never once seen the "Jaws" filmmaker enter the water. He joked that Spielberg owns a version of the bigger boat famously needed in the film, only much nicer, and that it is so large it has a pool on it, yet Spielberg will not go in that either.

"I'm not sure I've seen him in a bathing suit," Springsteen said, concluding that night swimming is ruined everywhere in the world because "that very nice man, Steven Spielberg, is scared of the water."

Springsteen closed out an evening packed with industry heavyweights at the benefit, presented by MoMA and Chanel to honor Spielberg's decades-spanning career. Tom Cruise, Robert De Niro, Martin Scorsese, Cate Blanchett, Drew Barrymore, Steve Martin and Stephen Colbert were among the stars in attendance. Spielberg described the evening as "a family affair," telling Variety on the red carpet, "There's nobody attending tonight who I don't know and love."

Cruise, who starred in Spielberg's "Minority Report" in 2002 and "War of the Worlds" in 2005, delivered opening remarks in what was a last-minute surprise appearance, even to Spielberg himself. "It's been an absolute privilege to make two films with you," Cruise said. Scorsese used his speech to marvel at the longevity of their careers, ending with a question for his longtime friend: "How did we get to be in our 80s?"

After guests dined on American Wagyu, the audience watched a scene from "Disclosure Day" in which Emily Blunt's character unknowingly uses a newfound mind-reading ability to dodge a speeding ticket. Taking the stage, Blunt described what it feels like when Spielberg loves a take: "You'll see him coming right out of the tent with his fists in the air and he's cheering. It's like the best damn moment of your career."

"Disclosure Day," which returned Spielberg to his fascination with alien life nearly 50 years after "Close Encounters of the Third Kind," grossed a modest $248 million worldwide this summer. The director has previously teased that he is developing a "kick-ass" Western, but he played coy about his next move, telling Variety, "I've got a lot of things in development right now. I'm trying to figure out what I'm going to make next."

Thanks to Spielberg and his famous friends, the benefit raised the most money in the event's history, funds that help the museum acquire and restore classic films for future generations. Chanel has backed the annual benefit since 2011 and has served as MoMA's lead film sponsor since 2021. Previous honorees include Sofia Coppola, Samuel L. Jackson, Guillermo del Toro, Penelope Cruz, George Clooney, Laura Dern, Martin Scorsese, Julianne Moore, Tom Hanks, Cate Blanchett, Alfonso Cuaron, Tilda Swinton, Quentin Tarantino, Pedro Almodovar, Kathryn Bigelow, Tim Burton and Baz Luhrmann.