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Breaking up from the more prominent partner in a showbiz partnership is a hazardous endeavor. Comedian Larry David did it. Likewise Musician Andrew Ridgeley. Currently, this clever and deeply sorrowful chamber piece from screenwriter Robert Kaplow and helmer the director Richard Linklater tells the nearly intolerable story of musical theater lyricist the lyricist Lorenz Hart just after his breakup from Richard Rodgers. He is played with flamboyant genius, an unspeakable combover and artificial shortness by actor Ethan Hawke, who is often digitally shrunk in stature – but is also occasionally recorded placed in an off-camera hole to look up poignantly at more statuesque figures, facing Hart's height issue as José Ferrer once played the petite artist Toulouse-Lautrec.

Complex Character and Themes

Hawke gets large, cynical chuckles with the character's witty comments on the subtle queer themes of the classic Casablanca and the cheesily upbeat musical he’s just been to see, with all the lasso-twirling cowboys; he acidly calls it Okla-homo. The orientation of Lorenz Hart is complex: this film skillfully juxtaposes his gayness with the non-queer character invented for him in the 1948 stage show the musical Words and Music (with actor Mickey Rooney playing Lorenz Hart); it shrewdly deduces a kind of bisexuality from the lyricist's writings to his protege: youthful Yale attendee and aspiring set designer Elizabeth Weiland, portrayed in this film with carefree youthful femininity by Margaret Qualley.

As part of the legendary musical theater songwriting team with musician Richard Rodgers, Hart was in charge of incomparable songs like The Lady Is a Tramp, the number Manhattan, My Funny Valentine and of course the titular Blue Moon. But annoyed at the lyricist's addiction, inconsistency and depressive outbursts, Rodgers severed ties with him and teamed up with lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II to create Oklahoma! and then a series of live and cinematic successes.

Emotional Depth

The film envisions the deeply depressed Lorenz Hart in Oklahoma!’s first-night New York audience in the year 1943, looking on with covetous misery as the show proceeds, hating its bland sentimentality, abhorring the exclamation mark at the end of the title, but heartsinkingly aware of how devastatingly successful it is. He understands a hit when he sees one – and feels himself descending into defeat.

Prior to the break, Lorenz Hart unhappily departs and goes to the pub at the venue Sardi's where the rest of the film unfolds, and expects the (certainly) victorious Oklahoma! company to appear for their post-show celebration. He knows it is his showbiz duty to compliment Rodgers, to feign all is well. With polished control, actor Andrew Scott plays Rodgers, clearly embarrassed at what each understands is the lyricist's shame; he provides a consolation to his ego in the form of a brief assignment composing fresh songs for their existing show the show A Connecticut Yankee, which only makes it worse.

• Bobby Cannavale acts as the bartender who in conventional manner listens sympathetically to Hart’s arias of bitter despondency
• Patrick Kennedy portrays author EB White, to whom Hart inadvertently provides the idea for his kids' story Stuart Little
• Qualley acts as the character Weiland, the inaccessibly lovely Yale attendee with whom the film envisions Hart to be complexly and self-destructively in affection

Lorenz Hart has previously been abandoned by Richard Rodgers. Undoubtedly the cosmos wouldn't be that brutal as to cause him to be spurned by Elizabeth Weiland as well? But Margaret Qualley pitilessly acts a youthful female who wants Lorenz Hart to be the laughing, platonic friend to whom she can reveal her experiences with young men – as well of course the Broadway power broker who can advance her profession.

Performance Highlights

Hawke demonstrates that Hart to a degree enjoys spectator's delight in hearing about these boys but he is also genuinely, tragically besotted with Weiland and the film reveals to us something rarely touched on in pictures about the realm of stage musicals or the films: the awful convergence between occupational and affectionate loss. Nevertheless at a certain point, Hart is boldly cognizant that what he has attained will survive. It's an outstanding portrayal from Hawke. This might become a stage musical – but who shall compose the tunes?

The movie Blue Moon screened at the London cinema festival; it is available on the 17th of October in the US, the 14th of November in the UK and on January 29 in the land down under.