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Separating from the better-known collaborator in a showbiz duo is a risky endeavor. Larry David went through it. So did Andrew Ridgeley. Now, this clever and deeply sorrowful intimate film from writer the writer Robert Kaplow and filmmaker the director Richard Linklater tells the nearly intolerable tale of songwriter for Broadway Lorenz Hart shortly following his split 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 size – but is also at times shot placed in an hidden depression to gaze upward sadly at heightened personas, addressing the lyricist's stature problem as actor José Ferrer in the past acted the small-statured artist Toulouse-Lautrec.

Complex Character and Themes

Hawke gets substantial, jaded humor with Hart's humorous takes on the hidden gayness of the movie Casablanca and the overly optimistic stage show he just watched, with all the rope-spinning ranch hands; he bitingly labels it Okla-queer. The sexuality of Hart is complicated: this film skillfully juxtaposes his homosexuality with the straight persona fabricated for him in the 1948 stage show the musical Words and Music (with actor Mickey Rooney playing Hart); it intelligently infers a kind of bisexuality from Hart’s letters to his protege: youthful Yale attendee and aspiring set designer the character Elizabeth Weiland, played here with carefree youthful femininity by actress Margaret Qualley.

Being a member of the famous New York theater composing duo with the composer Rodgers, Hart was accountable for unparalleled tunes like the classic The Lady Is a Tramp, the tune Manhattan, the beloved My Funny Valentine and of course Blue Moon. But exasperated with Hart's drinking problem, undependability and depressive outbursts, Richard Rodgers severed ties with him and joined forces with the writer Oscar Hammerstein II to create the show Oklahoma! and then a multitude of live and cinematic successes.

Psychological Complexity

The movie imagines the deeply depressed Hart in the musical Oklahoma!'s opening night NYC crowd in the year 1943, looking on with jealous anguish as the show proceeds, despising its mild sappiness, detesting the exclamation mark at the finish of the heading, but soul-crushingly cognizant of how devastatingly successful it is. He understands a smash when he watches it – and senses himself falling into defeat.

Even before the break, Lorenz Hart miserably ducks out and heads to the tavern at Sardi’s where the balance of the picture occurs, and anticipates the (certainly) victorious Oklahoma! cast to appear for their post-show celebration. He realizes it is his entertainment obligation to congratulate Richard Rodgers, to pretend all is well. With smooth moderation, actor Andrew Scott acts as Rodgers, clearly embarrassed at what they both know is the lyricist's shame; he provides a consolation to his ego in the guise of a short-term gig creating additional tunes for their ongoing performance A Connecticut Yankee, which simply intensifies the pain.

• Bobby Cannavale portrays the barman who in traditional style hears compassionately to Hart's monologues of acerbic misery
• Actor Patrick Kennedy acts as EB White, to whom Lorenz Hart accidentally gives the idea for his kids' story the book Stuart Little
• The actress Qualley plays the character Weiland, the inaccessibly lovely Yale attendee with whom the picture envisions Lorenz Hart to be intricately and masochistically in love

Lorenz Hart has previously been abandoned by Rodgers. Certainly the universe couldn't be that harsh as to have him dumped by Weiland as well? But Margaret Qualley pitilessly acts a girl who wants Hart to be the giggly, sexually unthreatening intimate to whom she can reveal her experiences with young men – as well of course the Broadway power broker who can promote her occupation.

Acting Excellence

Hawke demonstrates that Lorenz Hart to a degree enjoys voyeuristic pleasure in learning of these young men but he is also truly, sadly infatuated with Elizabeth Weiland and the picture informs us of a factor infrequently explored in pictures about the realm of stage musicals or the cinema: the terrible overlap between occupational and affectionate loss. However at some level, Hart is defiantly aware that what he has achieved will survive. It's an outstanding portrayal from Hawke. This could be a stage musical – but who shall compose the songs?

Blue Moon screened at the London movie festival; it is available on 17 October in the USA, the 14th of November in the Britain and on the 29th of January in the Australian continent.