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Breaking up from the more famous partner in a performance duo is a dangerous affair. Larry David did it. Likewise Musician Andrew Ridgeley. Currently, this clever and heartbreakingly sad chamber piece from screenwriter Robert Kaplow and filmmaker Richard Linklater recounts the all but unbearable tale of Broadway lyricist the lyricist Lorenz Hart shortly following his breakup from Richard Rodgers. His role is portrayed with theatrical excellence, an dreadful hairpiece and fake smallness by actor Ethan Hawke, who is frequently technologically minimized in height – but is also occasionally shot standing in an unseen pit to gaze upward sadly at more statuesque figures, facing the lyricist's stature problem as José Ferrer previously portrayed the diminutive artist Toulouse-Lautrec.

Layered Persona and Elements

Hawke gets substantial, jaded humor with Hart's humorous takes on the concealed homosexuality of the film Casablanca and the overly optimistic stage show he recently attended, with all the lasso-twirling cowboys; he acidly calls it Okla-homo. The sexuality of Hart is complex: this picture skillfully juxtaposes his queer identity with the straight persona fabricated for him in the 1948 theater piece Words and Music (with Mickey Rooney portraying Hart); it intelligently infers a kind of bisexuality from the lyricist's writings to his protege: youthful Yale attendee and budding theater artist Weiland, acted in this movie with heedless girlishness by Margaret Qualley.

As part of the renowned New York theater lyricist-composer pair with the composer Rodgers, Lorenz Hart was responsible for unparalleled tunes like The Lady Is a Tramp, the tune Manhattan, the beloved My Funny Valentine and of course Blue Moon. But frustrated by the lyricist's addiction, unreliability and depressive outbursts, Rodgers ended their partnership and teamed up with the writer Oscar Hammerstein II to compose the musical Oklahoma! and then a multitude of theater and film hits.

Psychological Complexity

The movie envisions the profoundly saddened Lorenz Hart in the musical Oklahoma!'s first-night New York audience in the year 1943, looking on with envious despair as the production unfolds, hating its insipid emotionality, abhorring the punctuation mark at the end of the title, but heartsinkingly aware of how extremely potent it is. He knows a smash when he watches it – and perceives himself sinking into failure.

Even before the break, Hart miserably ducks out and makes his way to the tavern at the venue Sardi's where the balance of the picture occurs, and anticipates the (inevitably) triumphant Oklahoma! cast to appear for their following-event gathering. He realizes it is his showbiz duty to congratulate Richard Rodgers, to act as if things are fine. With suave restraint, the performer Andrew Scott acts as Richard Rodgers, clearly embarrassed at what each understands is Hart’s humiliation; he offers a sop to his self-esteem in the appearance of a short-term gig composing fresh songs for their existing show A Connecticut Yankee, which just exacerbates the situation.

• Actor Bobby Cannavale portrays the bartender who in standard fashion hears compassionately to the character's soliloquies of acerbic misery
• Actor Patrick Kennedy acts as author EB White, to whom Lorenz Hart accidentally gives the concept for his kids' story the novel Stuart Little
• Qualley portrays the character Weiland, the impossibly gorgeous Yale attendee with whom the film envisions Lorenz Hart to be intricately and masochistically in adoration

Hart has earlier been rejected by Rodgers. Certainly the world wouldn't be that brutal as to get him jilted by Weiland as well? But Qualley ruthlessly portrays a young woman who wishes Hart to be the chuckling, non-sexual confidant to whom she can disclose her experiences with boys – as well of course the Broadway power broker who can advance her profession.

Acting Excellence

Hawke demonstrates that Hart partly takes spectator's delight in learning of these guys but he is also authentically, mournfully enamored with Weiland and the film tells us about a factor rarely touched on in movies about the realm of stage musicals or the movies: the dreadful intersection between occupational and affectionate loss. Yet at one stage, Lorenz Hart is rebelliously conscious that what he has attained will endure. It's an outstanding portrayal from Ethan Hawke. This might become a live show – but who will write the songs?

The film Blue Moon was shown at the London cinema festival; it is available on October 17 in the USA, November 14 in the UK and on the 29th of January in the Australian continent.