Director Richard Linklater obviously loves the flow and rhythm of meticulously crafted dialogue, along with the challenge of a “talking heads” premise that involves very few characters, most memorably achieved in 1995’s Before Sunrise and its two sequels.
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| Lyricist Lorenz "Larry" Hart (Ethan Hawke) is foolishly besotted with the much younger Elizabeth Weiland (Margaret Qualley), who is kinder to him than he deserves. |
The result isn’t entirely successful, in part because it’s hard to endure the first half hour spent with this unpleasant, potty-mouthed narcissist, and also because it’s impossible to get beyond Ethan Hawke’s fake hair, and the trick shots employed to depict Hart’s shorter stature. Both are distracting.
That said, the film gets more interesting during its final hour, when the story expands to include several more characters equally adept at trenchant commentary and occasional bon mots.
Events take place during the late evening of March 31, 1943, following the debut of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! (their first collaboration, and the first show the former created without Hart). The setting is the bar at the famed theater district restaurant Sardi’s, where the cast soon will gather, to await the reviews.
Production designer Susie Cullen and costume designer Consolata Boyle establish a persuasive sense of time and place.
Hart arrives first, having just watched the show. He pontificates to the mostly empty room, and also to Eddie (Bobby Cannavale, excellent as always), the tolerant, good-natured barman who will spend the next several hours trying not to serve drinks to Hart, who struggles with alcoholism.
Hart’s stream-of-consciousness commentary is alternately witty, conceited, outrageously vulgar and self-deprecating. He waxes eloquent about the overall perfection of the 20-year-old Yale student with whom he’s currently smitten.
He also rails about the new play’s “corniness” and its clichéd presentation of old-fashioned American values, but — to paraphrase Shakespeare — the gentleman doth protest too much. It quickly becomes clear that Hart is both jealous and frightened: fully aware that he’s in danger of being replaced permanently.
(As we eventually learn, Rodgers was forced to write some of the final lyrics for their most recent collaboration, By Jupiter, because Hart’s alcoholism and terrible work ethic had become completely unmanageable.)
Frankly, these early scenes are quite tedious, because Hart is so unsympathetic and self-absorbed, and because he’s talking at Eddie, rather than chatting with him.
Things improve when Hart notices noted New Yorker magazine essayist E.B. White (Patrick Kennedy) sitting quietly at a nearby table. He graciously tolerates Hart’s intrusion, and they converse .... and, that quickly, scripter Robert Kaplow’s story becomes much more interesting. His beautifully crafted dialogue becomes fun to hear.
(Unlike Hawke’s clumsy imitation of Hart, Kennedy is the spitting image of the actual White.)
The overall dynamic shifts into charged territory with the arrival of the cast and — notably — Rodgers (Andrew Scott) and Hammerstein (Simon Delaney). Rodgers, trying to mingle with his show colleagues, is constantly interrupted by Hart, too obviously trying to curry favor. Rodgers finally surrenders, and mentions that he hopes to collaborate with Hart on a revival of their earlier 1927 production of A Connecticut Yankee.
But can I rely on you, he repeatedly asks Hart, who answers evasively at best; he’d prefer to do a musical based on the life of Marco Polo.
Scott persuasively depicts Rodgers divided feelings, his expression sliding from stern to sympathetic, congenial to baffled. He genuinely admires Hart, while at the same time fearing for his friend’s health. (Details emerge in little bits.)
The third act is dominated by the luminescent arrival of Elizabeth Weiland (Margaret Qualley), the Yale student who has become Hart’s current protégé. They spar playfully among the others, then share a lengthy scene alone in the restaurant’s cloak room. At this point, we finally, genuinely feel sorry for Hart, who can’t help torturing himself. Hawke’s distracting appearance notwithstanding, he finally conveys this man’s complexity.
Qualley matches him, both in verbal delivery and expressive gestures. Our initial sense that Elizabeth is merely sexy eye candy vanishes, as Qualley displays the young woman’s sensitivity, intelligence and — yes — youthful joie de vivre.
Elizabeth is a fictional character, although Kaplow based his script on a series of letters exchanged between Hart and a similarly young muse. Kaplow also adds some droll sidebar Easter eggs to the primary drama: the notion that Hart gives White, struggling to finish his first children’s book, the title character’s name; and a fleeting appearance by a young man named George Hill (David Rawle), who hopes to become a movie director.
All of these close and brief encounters are backed by a constant stream of show tunes played on the bar’s piano by enlisted man Morty (Jonah Lees), soon to join the fighting in Europe. The songs flow one into the next — sometimes in response to a request — and often provide counterpoint or emphasis to a given discussion.
Assuming one recognizes and can identify all of them, of course, just as much of this film’s impact relies on viewers being familiar with Lorenz Hart, Richard Rodgers, E.B. White, Oscar Hammerstein and Weegee — the celebrated photographer — and, yes, George Hill. Which is to say, this film is unlikely to succeed with anybody under the age of, what, 60? 70?
Despite Linklater’s efforts to suggest otherwise, he also can’t escape the fact that his film feels like a stage play ... and I kept thinking how much better it would be, in that format, where the dialogue and performances would vibrate with greater intensity.
As a film, its reach too frequently exceeds its grasp.
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