Blue Moon

Bluesky

They say the old tunes are the best and this one’s a romantic serenade to the bygone era of Forties NYC theatreland cut through with a melancholic counter-melody to lyricist Lorenz Hart (Ethan Hawke), whose alcoholism led to his collapse in the street after a night in a bar, in November 1943 and his subsequent death, at 48, from pneumonia days later.

Richard Linklater’s chamber piece character study opens with that night and the gutter before spinning back to a different night looking at the stars six months before when Hart’s former composing partner Richard Rodgers opened his first venture with Oscar Hammerstein II, Oklahoma!, on Broadway. Hart’s opinion of it is easy to see as he leaves his mother in the theatre early and retreats to the bar, even though he has theoretically sworn off booze.

The barman Eddie (Bobby Cannavale, perfectly cast) knows Hart - and his soon to be fatal habit - well, but when he asks for a shot (“I’m just going to look at it, Hart insists), he serves him regardless. Elsewhere in the room is a piano player (Jonah Lees) - who Hart immediately christens “Knuckles”. The pianist knows most of that period’s entries in what would go on to be known as the Great American Songbook and a few more besides and they’re used as an intermittent accompaniment to the evening, running the gamut from playful to poignant. Hart’s collaborations with Rodgers are, of course, among them, including My Funny Valentine and Blue Moon.

Hart’s battle with the bottle has done little to blunt his wit and Robet Kaplow’s script is bursting at the seams with one-liners, as Hart holds forth on life, the universe and the egregious use of apostrophes in show titles. He’s funny and acidic but, as the denseness of Kaplow’s writing makes clear, also hard work in the way that people trying too hard can often by trying. He’s also self-aware. “Am I bitter?” he asks, with a twinkling sharpness.

Hawke may not look much like Hart - and the attempts to give him the lyricist’s short stature in comparison to those around him are, on occasion, downright distracting - but he captures the essence of a man whose intelligence and humour are no longer the shield they once may have been against sadness.

That one of the things Hart is waxing lyrical about is the attractions of a young woman, Elizabeth (Margaret Qualley) may come as a surprise to many, given that it is pretty much accepted that he was gay, but as Blue Moon progresses it becomes clear that the one thing Hart really wants is to be wanted, a feeling made more acute by the fact his creative marriage to Rodgers (Anderw Scott) has come crashing down around his ears.

Linklater and his regular cinematographer Shane F Kelly use the camera in a fluid way that stops the action from feeling too static. Proximity is also a big part of this game, especially once the post-Oklahoma crowd arrives, bringing the physical hulk of Hammerstein along with the psychologically dominating Rodgers.

When Hart tries to command the attention of Elizabeth - on whose correspondence with Hart this script is based - and, particularly Rodgers, he finds his performance has much less success than it did with the bar’s employees. As Hart pitches a new musical idea increasingly desperately, Scott gives Rodgers an air that sings with the lived-in caution the composer has for his old writing partner. Respect is leavened with hesitation borne out of trying to collaborate who may or may not be able to climb out of a bottle in the morning. Their back and forths are punctuated by the reviews being phoned in, with Hawke using microexpressions to show how each lands like a blow to Hart. Meanwhile Elizabeth’s sexual shenanigans might enthrall Hart - the one time he is willing to let someone else hold sway - but the thing she is most interested in about him is his ability to introduce her to Rodgers.

All of this is enough to sustain the film so that some other asides, including the suggestion that Hart gave EB White the idea for Stuart Little, feel like gilding the lily. Casablanca is a touchstone through the film, with Hart skewering it at one point yet revealing a love for it elsewhere. It’s that sort of tension that drives the movie, between what Hart wants - whether its whisky or adoration - and what he’s lost, with little room for what he has in the middle. Kaplow and Linklater capture these love affairs of the Hart in all their complexity and no matter how things ended up, they don’t leave him standing alone but, instead, still holding court for those who want to listen.