Director Richard Linklater has enjoyed a remarkable year, with two excellent and distinctly different films about show business released within weeks of each other. While Nouvelle Vague explored the beginnings of French New Wave cinema, his latest work, Blue Moon, marks both a beginning and an end. This fiction-inspired-by-fact drama unfolds primarily at Sardi's restaurant during the opening night of Rodgers and Hammerstein's groundbreaking Broadway musical, Oklahoma! in 1943.
A Partnership Unravelling
Having slipped away early from the performance, lyricist Lorenz Hart, portrayed by Ethan Hawke, confronts his own obsolescence. His long and fruitful musical comedy partnership with composer Richard Rodgers, played by Andrew Scott, is nearing its conclusion. Together they created enduring standards like Falling in Love With Love and The Lady is a Tramp, including the tune that lends this film its title. Hart finds himself being replaced by Oscar Hammerstein II, embodied by Simon Delaney, who proves both more dramatically ambitious and more reliable than the alcoholic, self-destructive Hart.
The disciplined and businesslike Rodgers respects his friend's immense talent but grows increasingly frustrated by Hart's unreliability. Though Hart claims to have stopped drinking, everyone wonders how long this resolution will last. He harbors numerous criticisms of Oklahoma! – some perceptive, others born from envy and bitterness, having previously turned down the show himself.
Revealing Conversations
These sentiments and much more emerge during Hart's conversations with amiable bartender Eddie, played by Bobby Cannavale, who tries discreetly not to serve him liquor, and pianist Morty Rifkin, portrayed by Jonah Lees, an army sergeant on leave. Their interactions occur before the opening-night crowd arrives, after which Hart must pretend he adored the show.
Presumed to be exclusively homosexual – he brazenly flirts with a flower delivery boy – Hart nevertheless speaks of his infatuation with a young college student named Elizabeth Weiland, based on a real woman with whom Hart corresponded. Margaret Qualley brings this character to life, leaving the exact nature of their relationship and its potential seriousness intriguingly ambiguous.
Woody Allen Echoes
Blue Moon evokes memories of certain Woody Allen films, not only through its soundtrack of Great American Songbook standards but through its skillful blending of comedy and melancholy. Hart's character is witty and often ribald, while other characters hold their own in the verbal sparring. The film's ruminations on art also bring Allen to mind, as does the assembly of an excellent cast, many hailing from Ireland and Britain, where the film was shot.
Robert Kaplow's screenplay contains numerous "inside" jokes, some perhaps a little precious. A precocious young Stephen Sondheim makes an appearance as a protégé of Hammerstein, while more fancifully, Hart provides writer E.B. White with inspiration for his children's book Stuart Little. Future director George Roy Hill also appears, with Hart advising him to focus on stories about friendship – advice that seemingly influenced Hill's later classics Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Sting.
Hawke's Transformative Performance
Central to the entire production is Ethan Hawke's portrayal of Lorenz Hart. The methods used to make the actor appear closer to Hart's height – approximately 1.5 metres – can occasionally prove distracting, but Hawke's performance remains superb. He and Linklater waited years until Hawke aged appropriately into the role. Sporting an unflattering combover, Hawke proves utterly entrancing as a man who attempts to conceal his deep vulnerability behind a constant flow of ideas, wisecracks, and canny observations.
This film will particularly resonate with audiences who appreciate nuanced performances, rich character development, and sparkling dialogue over action-packed sequences. The music, featuring numbers by Rodgers and Hart alongside other songwriters, remains tuneful and engaging. Moreover, the underlying themes – frustration in love and life, rejection, and the complex emotions of being both happy for and envious of a friend's success – possess broad resonance.
Blue Moon represents a cinematic achievement that, while appealing strongly to aficionados of theatre and character-driven drama, holds genuine potential to reach a wider audience than Linklater's Nouvelle Vague. It stands as a testament to patience in casting and the power of a performer perfectly matched to a role at exactly the right moment in their career.
