🔗 Share this article Blue Moon Film Critique: Ethan Hawke Delivers in Director Richard Linklater's Poignant Broadway Breakup Drama Parting ways from the better-known colleague in a showbiz partnership is a hazardous business. Comedian Larry David did it. So did Musician Andrew Ridgeley. Presently, this witty and deeply sorrowful small-scale drama from screenwriter Robert Kaplow and filmmaker Richard Linklater tells the nearly intolerable story of Broadway lyricist the lyricist Lorenz Hart just after his separation from composer Richard Rodgers. His role is portrayed with flamboyant genius, an unspeakable combover and fake smallness by Ethan Hawke, who is often technologically minimized in size – but is also occasionally recorded placed in an unseen pit to gaze upward sadly at taller characters, confronting Hart’s vertical challenge as actor José Ferrer once played the small-statured artist Toulouse-Lautrec. Complex Character and Elements Hawke gets substantial, jaded humor with Hart's humorous takes on the subtle queer themes of the movie Casablanca and the cheesily upbeat stage show he’s just been to see, with all the lasso-twirling cowboys; he bitingly labels it Okla-queer. The sexuality of Lorenz Hart is multifaceted: this picture clearly contrasts his gayness with the non-queer character invented for him in the 1948 theater piece Words and Music (with actor Mickey Rooney acting as Lorenz Hart); it cleverly extrapolates a kind of bisexuality from the lyricist's writings to his protege: young Yale student and would-be stage designer Elizabeth Weiland, played here with heedless girlishness by actress Margaret Qualley. Being a member of the legendary New York theater songwriting team with musician Richard Rodgers, Hart was responsible for unparalleled tunes like the classic The Lady Is a Tramp, the number Manhattan, the standard My Funny Valentine and of course the titular Blue Moon. But frustrated by Hart’s alcoholism, undependability and gloomy fits, Rodgers ended their partnership and joined forces with the writer Oscar Hammerstein II to write the show Oklahoma! and then a multitude of stage and screen smashes. Sentimental Layers The picture conceives the severely despondent Lorenz Hart in the show Oklahoma!'s opening night NYC crowd in 1943, observing with jealous anguish as the performance continues, hating its bland sentimentality, detesting the exclamation mark at the end of the title, but heartsinkingly aware of how devastatingly successful it is. He knows a success when he sees one – and perceives himself sinking into failure. Prior to the interval, Lorenz Hart miserably ducks out and heads to the pub at Sardi’s where the balance of the picture occurs, and anticipates the (certainly) victorious Oklahoma! cast to appear for their post-show celebration. He is aware it is his entertainment obligation to congratulate Richard Rodgers, to feign things are fine. With polished control, the performer Andrew Scott portrays Rodgers, obviously uncomfortable at what each understands is the lyricist's shame; he offers a sop to his self-esteem in the form of a short-term gig composing fresh songs for their existing show the musical A Connecticut Yankee, which simply intensifies the pain. Actor Bobby Cannavale portrays the barman who in standard fashion listens sympathetically to Hart's monologues of bitter despondency Actor Patrick Kennedy acts as EB White, to whom Lorenz Hart accidentally gives the concept for his children’s book Stuart Little Margaret Qualley plays the character Weiland, the unattainably beautiful Ivy League pupil with whom the picture imagines Hart to be complexly and self-destructively in affection Lorenz Hart has already been jilted by Richard Rodgers. Surely the world couldn't be that harsh as to have him dumped by Elizabeth Weiland as well? But Margaret Qualley mercilessly depicts a girl who wishes Lorenz Hart to be the laughing, platonic friend to whom she can confide her exploits with guys – as well of course the Broadway power broker who can advance her profession. Performance Highlights Hawke demonstrates that Lorenz Hart somewhat derives spectator's delight in learning of these boys but he is also genuinely, tragically besotted with Weiland and the film informs us of something rarely touched on in films about the domain of theater music or the movies: the awful convergence between professional and romantic failure. Nevertheless at a certain point, Lorenz Hart is boldly cognizant that what he has attained will endure. It's an outstanding portrayal from Hawke. This might become a theater production – but who will write the tunes? Blue Moon premiered at the London film festival; it is released on October 17 in the United States, the 14th of November in the United Kingdom and on 29 January in the land down under.