Blue Moon is clever and funny – but also often stagey

There are some styles American filmmaker Richard Linklater Haven’t sunk your teeth in. he is made Romantic drama as the Before TrilogySurreal animated movies for adults like waking life And a scanner darklyAnd among them are some of the most immortal films in recent memory. dazed and Confused, Lazy, boyhood And rock school, blue moonHowever, this is a very minor effort in the Linklater canon. The Texan auteur’s new film – his 22nd – promises to be a classic, strange and daring Ethan Hawke’s performanceBut it’s a stage affair that gets very dull at times.

Hawke plays famed Broadway songwriter Lorenz Hart, author of classic songs such as “Blue Moon” and “My Funny Valentine.” We meet him in 1943, his glory days behind him: the story begins with Hart collapsing in a rain-soaked New York street, washed out at the age of 47 and in the final days of his life. We are then taken back seven months to the premiere of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical Oka Oklahoma!A show that revolutionized musical theater with its explosive blend of song, dance and comedy. Hart is in the audience but leaves quietly. He goes to his favorite watering hole, Sardi’s Bar, where he cuts a pathetic figure: he’s effortlessly funny, but the more he jokes with the friendly barman (Bobby Cannavale), the sadder he seems. He is a bisexual alcoholic who likes to think of himself as “drunk on beauty”, but we soon learn that he is deeply disappointed both professionally and romantically. His latest passion is the beautiful young Elizabeth (Margaret Qualley), a would-be Broadway writer, but she is too wise and old for him.

Hawke has now worked with Linklater on several projects – including Before Trilogy and Oscar winners boyhood – But he has never played this kind of role for them. Through clever effects and camera work, Hawk has been reduced by several inches from his normal height. He is now the shortest man in the room. His hair is thinning (he tries to hide the baldness by combing it) and his skin has become wrinkled. One moment he will be very sweet natured and the next moment he will be completely harsh. Hart is overtaken by friends and rivals who looked up to him, especially the younger and far more dynamic Richard Rodgers (a dashing Andrew Scott). He is consumed by self-pity. It’s a testament to Hawke’s skill as an actor that he makes us care about the character.

At times, the mood here hews closer to one of playwright Eugene O’Neill’s cautionary barroom stories about destructive alcoholics than to the exuberant world of that era’s Broadway musicals. We listen as Hart swaps stories New Yorker Writer EB White (Patrick Kennedy), whom he admires, or talks about his love for casablanca With Burman. But Hart is no Bogart, and Elizabeth is refusing to be her Ingrid Bergman.

The impressive Qualley gets the film’s best monologue, telling a long, sad tale about a sexual misadventure with a young jock. Hart is fascinated by him, but she only regards him as someone to gossip to and confide in, not as a potential lover. Plus, she has her eyes on the main prize, and is only using Hart to further her career.

Linklater skillfully captures the 1940s Broadway setting in all its wit and grandeur. The film also has a lot of clever dialogue, with sharp jokes about everything from Frank Sinatra to Stuart LittleThe problem, however, is that the more time we spend with Hart at the bar, the more disgusting and depressing the storytelling becomes,

Director: Richard Linklater; Starring: Ethan Hawke, Margaret Qualley, Andrew Scott; Certificate 15, 100 minutes.

‘Blue Moon’ is in theaters