Richard Linklater and Ethan Hawke are up there with Martin Scorsese and De Niro, even Alfred Hitchcock and James Stewart, as certainly one of cinema’s iconic perennial pairings. From the “Earlier than” movies and “Waking Life” to “Boyhood” (which earned Hawke an Oscar nomination) and even the underseen motel-room-only DV thriller “Tape,” they’re working on an alchemy uncommon for onscreen director-actor collaborators.
Their newest mission collectively is “Blue Moon,” which can distract at first for the bald cap Hawke wears to play determined, boozing songwriter Lorenz Hart. However beneath that feat of film make-up magic is certainly one of Hawke’s most wistful, poignant performances, right here as the nice American lyricist who was one half of Rodgers and Hart earlier than a inventive break up.
“Blue Moon” is ready over the course of 1 night time, within the iconic New York bar Sardi’s, on the after-party for the 1943 premiere of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein’s stage musical “Oklahoma!” Hart’s private {and professional} lives dovetail and unravel as jealousy seethes over his former inventive companion’s success, his personal sexuality will get a bit wobbly, and he bonds with a bright-spirited protégé (Margaret Qualley, who performs her character like a tragic starlet of the Jazz Age). The solid contains Andrew Scott as Richard Rodgers, Simon Delaney as Oscar Hammerstein, Cillian Sullivan as Stephen Sondheim, and Bobby Cannavale because the charming barkeep attempting to not serve Lorenz an excessive amount of, or in any respect.
Sony Photos Classics opens the movie in New York and Los Angeles on October 17, with extra places to comply with on October 24. “Blue Moon” first premiered on the 2025 Berlin Movie Pageant, the place Scott received the supporting actor Silver Bear for his efficiency as Rodgers.
Learn IndieWire’s “Blue Moon” overview right here. The movie has but to point out up on any fall pageant lineups, however we’re betting it exhibits up in Telluride to assist launch the awards runs for Hawke and Scott. Robert Kaplow, who wrote the e book that impressed Linklater’s biopic “Me and Orson Welles,” wrote the script.
“You put together for a component like this by taking part in Macbeth,” Hawke stated on the Berlin Movie Pageant press convention. “What Robert Kaplow wrote for us, this positively stunning script, that if accomplished proper is principally a movie that’s one scene… I may say I ready by shaving my head or getting ready Lorenz Hart songs. That’s probably not true. It’s a very long time determining the right way to stage scenes and the right way to make a seven- or 11-page scene dynamic sufficient so that you can watch it.”
Watch the trailer under.
