Richard Linklater and Ethan Hawke are up there with Martin Scorsese and De Niro, even Alfred Hitchcock and James Stewart, as one of cinema’s iconic perennial pairings. From the “Before” films and “Waking Life” to “Boyhood” (which earned Hawke an Oscar nomination) and even the underseen motel-room-only DV thriller “Tape,” they’re operating on an alchemy rare for onscreen director-actor collaborators.
Their latest project together is “Blue Moon,” which may distract at first for the bald cap Hawke wears to play desperate, boozing songwriter Lorenz Hart. But underneath that feat of movie makeup magic is one of Hawke’s most wistful, poignant performances, here as the great American lyricist who was one half of Rodgers and Hart before a creative split.
“Blue Moon” is set over the course of one night, in the iconic New York bar Sardi’s, at the after-party for the 1943 premiere of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein’s stage musical “Oklahoma!” Hart’s personal and professional lives dovetail and unravel as jealousy seethes over his former creative partner’s success, his own sexuality gets a bit wobbly, and he bonds with a bright-spirited protégé (Margaret Qualley, who plays her character like a sad starlet of the Jazz Age). The cast includes Andrew Scott as Richard Rodgers, Simon Delaney as Oscar Hammerstein, Cillian Sullivan as Stephen Sondheim, and Bobby Cannavale as the charming barkeep trying not to serve Lorenz too much, or at all.
Sony Pictures Classics opens the film in New York and Los Angeles on October 17, with more locations to follow on October 24. “Blue Moon” first premiered at the 2025 Berlin Film Festival, where Scott won the supporting actor Silver Bear for his performance as Rodgers.
Read IndieWire’s “Blue Moon” review here. The film has yet to show up on any fall festival lineups, but we’re betting it shows up in Telluride to help launch the awards runs for Hawke and Scott. Robert Kaplow, who wrote the book that inspired Linklater’s biopic “Me and Orson Welles,” wrote the script.
“You prepare for a part like this by playing Macbeth,” Hawke said at the Berlin Film Festival press conference. “What Robert Kaplow wrote for us, this absolutely beautiful script, that if done right is basically a film that’s one scene… I could say I prepared by shaving my head or preparing Lorenz Hart songs. That’s not really true. It’s a long time figuring out how to stage scenes and how to make a seven- or 11-page scene dynamic enough for you to watch it.”
Watch the trailer below.