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Breaking up from the more famous colleague in a performance double act is a risky business. Larry David experienced it. The same for Andrew Ridgeley. Now, this witty and heartbreakingly sad small-scale drama from writer the writer Robert Kaplow and helmer the director Richard Linklater narrates the almost agonizing tale of musical theater lyricist Lorenz Hart right after his split from Richard Rodgers. He is played with flamboyant genius, an unspeakable combover and simulated diminutiveness by Ethan Hawke, who is regularly digitally reduced in stature – but is also at times shot positioned in an off-camera hole to stare up wistfully at more statuesque figures, addressing Hart’s vertical challenge as José Ferrer once played the petite artist Toulouse-Lautrec.

Multifaceted Role and Motifs

Hawke gets substantial, jaded humor with Hart's humorous takes on the concealed homosexuality of the classic Casablanca and the overly optimistic theater production he’s just been to see, with all the lariat-wielding cowhands; he acidly calls it Okla-homo. The sexual identity of Lorenz Hart is complicated: this movie clearly contrasts his gayness with the non-queer character invented for him in the 1948 stage show the production Words and Music (with actor Mickey Rooney portraying Lorenz Hart); it shrewdly deduces a kind of bisexuality from Hart’s letters to his young apprentice: young Yale student and budding theater artist Elizabeth Weiland, portrayed in this film with heedless girlishness by the performer Margaret Qualley.

Being a member of the renowned New York theater composing duo with musician Richard Rodgers, Hart was responsible for incomparable songs like the song The Lady Is a Tramp, the number Manhattan, the beloved My Funny Valentine and of course the titular Blue Moon. But annoyed at the lyricist's addiction, undependability and gloomy fits, Rodgers severed ties with him and partnered with lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II to create Oklahoma! and then a raft of stage and screen smashes.

Emotional Depth

The film imagines the severely despondent Hart in Oklahoma!’s opening night NYC crowd in the year 1943, observing with covetous misery as the production unfolds, hating its bland sentimentality, abhorring the exclamation mark at the conclusion of the name, but heartsinkingly aware of how extremely potent it is. He understands a hit when he watches it – and senses himself falling into unsuccessfulness.

Even before the intermission, Lorenz Hart miserably ducks out and heads to the bar at the venue Sardi's where the remainder of the movie unfolds, and anticipates the (inevitably) triumphant Oklahoma! troupe to show up for their after-party. He knows it is his entertainment obligation to praise Richard Rodgers, to act as if all is well. With polished control, actor Andrew Scott acts as Rodgers, clearly embarrassed at what each understands is the lyricist's shame; he gives a pacifier to his pride in the guise of a short-term gig writing new numbers for their current production the musical A Connecticut Yankee, which just exacerbates the situation.

• The performer Bobby Cannavale portrays the barkeeper who in standard fashion listens sympathetically to Hart’s arias of acerbic misery
• Actor Patrick Kennedy plays EB White, to whom Lorenz Hart accidentally gives the idea for his youth literature the novel Stuart Little
• Qualley acts as Weiland, the inaccessibly lovely Yale student with whom the movie conceives Hart to be complicatedly and self-harmingly in affection

Hart has previously been abandoned by Richard Rodgers. Surely the universe can’t be so cruel as to get him jilted by Elizabeth Weiland as well? But Qualley ruthlessly portrays a youthful female who desires Hart to be the laughing, platonic friend to whom she can confide her adventures with young men – as well of course the showbiz connection who can promote her occupation.

Acting Excellence

Hawke reveals that Lorenz Hart partly takes spectator's delight in hearing about these boys but he is also genuinely, tragically besotted with Elizabeth Weiland and the film reveals to us a factor rarely touched on in pictures about the domain of theater music or the films: the dreadful intersection between career and love defeat. Yet at some level, Lorenz Hart is boldly cognizant that what he has achieved will persist. It's an outstanding portrayal from Hawke. This could be a theater production – but who shall compose the numbers?

The film Blue Moon premiered at the London cinema festival; it is released on October 17 in the United States, the 14th of November in the UK and on January 29 in Australia.