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Separating from the more famous partner in a performance partnership is a dangerous endeavor. Comedian Larry David went through it. Likewise Musician Andrew Ridgeley. Now, this humorous and deeply sorrowful chamber piece from writer the writer Robert Kaplow and filmmaker the director Richard Linklater tells the nearly intolerable story of musical theater lyricist the lyricist Lorenz Hart shortly following his separation from Richard Rodgers. He is played with flamboyant genius, an notable toupee and simulated diminutiveness by actor Ethan Hawke, who is often digitally shrunk in stature – but is also occasionally recorded standing in an unseen pit to look up poignantly at taller characters, facing the lyricist's stature problem as actor José Ferrer once played the diminutive Toulouse-Lautrec.

Layered Persona and Elements

Hawke achieves substantial, jaded humor with Hart's humorous takes on the subtle queer themes of the classic Casablanca and the cheesily upbeat theater production he recently attended, with all the lariat-wielding cowhands; he acidly calls it Okla-queer. The orientation of Lorenz Hart is multifaceted: this picture effectively triangulates his gayness with the non-queer character invented for him in the 1948 stage show Words and Music (with actor Mickey Rooney portraying Lorenz Hart); it cleverly extrapolates a kind of dual attraction from the lyricist's writings to his protege: college student at Yale and aspiring set designer the character Elizabeth Weiland, portrayed in this film with carefree youthful femininity by Margaret Qualley.

As part of the renowned musical theater lyricist-composer pair with composer Rodgers, Lorenz Hart was accountable for incomparable songs like The Lady Is a Tramp, the tune Manhattan, My Funny Valentine and of course Blue Moon. But frustrated by Hart's drinking problem, undependability and depressive outbursts, Rodgers severed ties with him and partnered with Oscar Hammerstein II to write the show Oklahoma! and then a multitude of stage and screen smashes.

Emotional Depth

The film imagines the deeply depressed Lorenz Hart in the musical Oklahoma!'s opening night Manhattan spectators in the year 1943, looking on with envious despair as the show proceeds, hating its bland sentimentality, hating the exclamation mark at the finish of the heading, but heartsinkingly aware of how devastatingly successful it is. He understands a smash when he views it – and feels himself descending into failure.

Before the interval, Hart miserably ducks out and makes his way to the tavern at Sardi’s where the rest of the film occurs, and waits for the (unavoidably) successful Oklahoma! company to appear for their post-show celebration. He is aware it is his entertainment obligation to congratulate Rodgers, to pretend things are fine. With polished control, the performer Andrew Scott plays Richard Rodgers, obviously uncomfortable at what both are aware is the lyricist's shame; he gives a pacifier to his pride in the guise of a temporary job writing new numbers for their current production the show A Connecticut Yankee, which only makes it worse.

• The performer Bobby Cannavale plays the bartender who in conventional manner attends empathetically to the character's soliloquies of acerbic misery
• Actor Patrick Kennedy portrays EB White, to whom Lorenz Hart accidentally gives the idea for his children’s book Stuart Little
• Qualley portrays the character Weiland, the inaccessibly lovely Yale student with whom the picture conceives Lorenz Hart to be intricately and masochistically in adoration

Hart has previously been abandoned by Richard Rodgers. Certainly the universe can’t be so cruel as to cause him to be spurned by Elizabeth Weiland as well? But Margaret Qualley ruthlessly portrays a young woman who wants Hart to be the laughing, platonic friend to whom she can confide her adventures with boys – as well of course the theater industry influencer who can advance her profession.

Acting Excellence

Hawke demonstrates that Hart to a degree enjoys voyeuristic pleasure in learning of these boys but he is also genuinely, tragically besotted with Weiland and the movie reveals to us an aspect rarely touched on in films about the realm of stage musicals or the cinema: the awful convergence between career and love defeat. Yet at one stage, Hart is boldly cognizant that what he has accomplished will persist. It's a magnificent acting job from Ethan Hawke. This may turn into a live show – but who shall compose the numbers?

Blue Moon premiered at the London film festival; it is available on the 17th of October in the US, 14 November in the Britain and on January 29 in the land down under.