The collaboration between Hawke and Linklater goes back over 30 years to Before Sunrise, the first of the romantic trilogy of Before Sunset and Before Midnight that were filmed nine years apart and still stand as something of a landmark in recent cinema history. So it comes as no surprise that Linklater has chosen to cast Hawke as the Broadway lyricist Lorenz (Larry) Hart despite there being no physical similarity between the diminutive and rather ugly Hart and the handsome Hawke.
The script is by Robert Kaplow, who Linklater fans will remember wrote the novel that Linklater’s 2008 film Me and Orson Welles was based on.
The witty and talented Hart together with Rodgers brought a wave of transformative shows to Broadway including Pal Joey, A Connecticut Yankee and Babes in Arms but even more important they wrote together a string of songs that have become standards including Manhattan, My Funny Valentine, The Lady is a Tramp, This Can’t Be Love, and many others including Blue Moon, which forms the title of the film.
But Hart is also an alcoholic with his best work behind him and his partner Rogers played by Andrew Scott has moved on to team up with Oscar Hammerstein played by Simon Delaney to turn out one of the most legendary all time hit shows of Broadway musicals Oklahoma!.
The entire film takes place in real time over 100 minutes in Sardi’s bar on the evening of March 31, 1943 on the night of the premiere of Oklahoma!. Linklater is a master at this kind of dialogue driven and real time unspooling of a story. The film is a meditation on friendship, art and love, and Sardi’s becomes the backdrop for famous writers, actors, musicians, their as they pass through on this fateful night.
As the witty Hart says “You know how in marriage they say ‘for better or for worse’? I think, in terms of my life, I have entered the ‘for worse’ part, and it happened so quietly I didn’t even recognize it.” While undoubtedly hugely talented he knows his career is really over. Within the year Hart will be found laying in a gutter the worse for drink and die a few days later of pneumonia at the age of 48. Much of the dialogue is between Hart and the bartender Eddie played by Bobby Cannavale.
While these days it’s historically accepted that Hart was gay or possibly bisexual his relationship with his protégé Elizabeth Weiland played by Margaret Qualley and the unhappy Hart reflects and the impossibility of finding love.
For those theatre buffs who know the history of these legendary Broadway musical personalities this will be an in-house treat for those who don’t there’s the story of a man meditating on art, success, love and friendship while he slowly unravels.
Blue Moon (USA / Ireland)
Director: Richard Linklater
Cast: Ethan Hawke, Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale, Andrew Scott
