Producers: Mike Blizzard, John Sloss and Richard Linklater   Director: Richard Linklater   Screenplay: Robert Kaplow   Cast: Ethan Hawke, Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale, Andrew Scott, Patrick Kennedy, Jonah Lees, Simon Delaney, Cillian Sullivan, John Doran and Anne Brogan   Distributor: Sony Pictures Classics

Grade: B+

Few directors are more adept in making films that are all talk so utterly fascinating as Richard Linklater.  It’s a feat he showed mastery over as long ago as his first film, “Slackers” (1991), and the facility is on full display again in this sad and funny portrait of Broadway librettist Lorenz Hart as he wrestles with the enormous success of his former colleague, composer Richard Rodgers, on March 31, 1943, the opening night of “Oklahoma!,” which Rodgers had written in collaboration with Oscar Hammerstein II.

Except for a glimpse of Hart watching the show in increasing distaste from a box in the St. James Theatre at the start, the film is set entirely at the bar inside Sardi’s Restaurant, where the post-opening party will occur as the reviews roll in.  Leaving the theatre early, Hart arrives before anyone else, trading quotes from “Casablanca” with his friend, Eddie the bartender (Bobby Cannavale) before turning to other topics in what amounts to virtual monologue addressed to Eddie and soldier-turned-piano player Morty Rifkin (Jonah Lees). 

He alternately expresses barbed praise for the new musical’s obvious audience appeal and irritation at its pandering to it (he keeps emphasizing that exclamation point) while pining for the arrival of his beautiful friend Elizabeth Weiland (Margaret Qualley), with whom he hopes to cement a relationship despite his being a closeted gay man (though he calls himself omnisexual).  She’s a statuesque twenty-year old Yale student and aspiring production designer who longs for an introduction to Rodgers (her surviving correspondence was one of the sources for screenwriter Robert Kaplow); he’s short and forty-seven, with a glossy comb-over to conceal—unsuccessfully, of course—his balding pate.  To Eddie, and us, his chances appear dim.  

Larry, as he’s known, also has hope of reconnecting with Rodgers (Andrew Scott) and arranging to work with him again, on a musical of representing the sophisticated cynicism that’s his stock-in-trade.  No wonder that he’s annoyed that most people know him best for the eponymous title tune, whose sappy lyric he considers among his worst, though its first stanza (“me standing alone/without a dream in my heart/without a love of my own”) could apply to him.

Hart’s also in a tug-of-war between his attempt to tear himself away from addiction to booze and drugs and his obvious desire to give in to it.  That’s tested first when he falls into conversation with the bar’s only other patron, witty New Yorker contributor E.B. White (Patrick Kennedy), who also feels at a low point (though he’ll go on to become the author of successful children’s books).  Hart’s delighted to trade drinks as well as banter with him—he’s especially taken with White’s description of himself as “superannuated”—and though Eddie tries to moderate his friend’s intake, eventually he gives up.

The upshot is that all of Larry’s impossible dreams dissipate over the course of the evening.  His struggle for sobriety ends, and by the evening’s close he’s inebriated as he goes off to a party he’s planning at his place knowing few will attend; less than a year later, he’ll die of pneumonia after collapsing on a New York street. One of those who doubtlessly won’t be coming is Elizabeth, who, in a beautifully modulated scene in the restaurant cloakroom, lets him down with the familiar line that she only wants to be friends (to make matters worse, she’s smitten with a handsome classmate who’s dumped her) before accepting Rodgers’ invitation to his after-party.  As for Rodgers, he’s open to renewing their collaboration only if Hart proves a reliable partner, and, rejecting his ludicrous idea for a musical about cannibals, offers what amounts to a test—writing some new numbers for a revival of one of their old shows.  But it’s clearly a sop: their temperaments are so different, with Rodgers the stable, practical businessman attuned to the soft-hearted temper of the times and Hart the incorrigibly brittle satirist—that a permanent reunion would be an implausibility.

No, Rodgers’ future lies with Hammerstein (Simon Delaney), as Hart ruefully recognizes.  In a brief meeting with the new lyricist, Hart keeps the venom in check and dishes out some insincere praise, but Oscar’s guest, an obnoxiously supercilious boy named Stephen (Cillian Sullivan), snorts derisively over a bit of Hart’s wordplay.  One of the best jokes in a screenplay that’s replete with them is that the kid, who will have a storied career in Broadway history himself, will appropriate Hart’s quip later, when he’s writing the opening number that will save his first solo musical during its tryout on the road. It’s far from the only moment here that Broadway aficionados will eat up.

Linklater and Hawke do an exceptional job in teasing out every nuance and witticism in the script, which is rather like a one-act play.  They also work wonders turning Hawke into a credible Hart.  The main effort is the actor’s: his squeaky voice, his affected mannerisms, his combination of pride and desperation, are all impeccably done; it’s another in what’s becoming a long line of extraordinary performances from Hawke.  But the two long-time collaborators—this is their ninth film together—work in tandem to transform the lanky, five-foot-ten star into a reasonable approximation of the diminutive, aging, rather prissy songwriter.  (In the 1948 fantasy biopic “Words and Music” Mickey Rooney got the height right, but little else.)  In that regard credit has to be shared with cinematographer Shane F. Kelly and production designer Susie Cullen, but Linklater’s employment of careful composition and framing to make Hawke appear to be five foot or less is both amusing and persuasive.  All the cast—easygoing Cannavale, scrumptious Qualley, rigorous Scott, subtle Kennedy, and the rest—do expert work, but in the end they’re like a talented chorus to Hawke’s triumphant tour de force.

The movie looks and moves well, with Kelly’s supple camerawork taking full advantage of Cullen’s glamorous production design and Consolata Boyle’s equally attractive costumes, with Sandra Adair’s smooth editing adding punch to the stream of dialogue.  Graham Reynolds’ background score contributes to the period detail provided by Rifkin’s keyboard doodling.

“Blue Moon” can be thought of as a sibling to Linklater’s underrated 2008 “Me and Orson Welles” (adapted from a novel by Kaplow), in which Christian McKay gave a performance as Broadway’s 1930s wunderkind every bit as remarkable as Hawke’s is here.  Like that film, and so many of Linklater’s others (think “Boyhood,” for example), it’s basically a stunt, but there are few things more exhilarating than a stunt that’s executed with absolute precision and panache, as this one is.  Moviegoers looking for bombastic action must look elsewhere, but anyone searching for action of the mind with a side order of poignancy should hasten to visit this delicious reimagining of Broadway’s golden age.