Ethan Hawke, Bobby Cannavale, Andrew Scott and director Richard Linklater stop by THR's TIFF suite at the 1 Hotel in Toronto to talk about their film 'Blue Moon,' a biographical film about Lorenz Hart, an American lyricist and half of the Broadway songwriting team Rodgers and Hart. The film sees Hawke play Hart, while Scott portrays Richard Rodgers.
00:00When I got my first, you know, I was telling you about it yesterday, when I, my first Broadway show, there was a poster shop on 16th Street that had a big, beautiful old poster of Contempt, Bardot, it was a big, beautiful watercolor of Bridget Bardot, and I loved that poster, I loved that movie, and I was like, I'm buying a movie poster, and I hung it in my kitchen.
00:24It's still there. It's still there, yeah, yeah, but I, yeah, and I got it cheap because they'd, they'd framed it wrong, it was kind of crooked, and so the guy gave me a deal, and I was like, I'm getting this, it was expensive, you know, from, yeah, it's really expensive, but I'd walked by it for a couple years, and I was like, I want that poster, and I got it.
00:42That's really cool. That's classy.
00:42So when you first had the idea to make this, and you knew you wanted Ethan, but you, you were too young, right? Was that what it was?
00:55It was.
00:56Still too young.
00:57Technically, he, he was young when he first read what I sent him, but.
01:03But what he sent me wasn't really a movie.
01:05Too handsome, I was too handsome.
01:06Yeah.
01:06I was too, I was too good looking for the part.
01:08Far too good.
01:08Yeah.
01:09It's something I just have to suffer with.
01:11But it wasn't even, it wasn't just me, it was developing the material, you know, and developing it into, what is, is this a movie?
01:18Could it be a movie?
01:19Right?
01:20Am I?
01:20Right.
01:21Yeah, it was kind of a long, just a lot of writing about Loren's heart, which we loved.
01:26Everything in the movie was kind of there.
01:28I grew up in Texas.
01:29I never went to a lot of live performances, but my mom loved musicals, so it was just listening to Rodgers and Hammerstein soundtracks in my living room my entire youth.
01:41My mother was the same way.
01:43Really?
01:43Yeah, Oklahoma, South Pacific, Carousel, you know.
01:49Sound of music.
01:50Yeah, just, just the LPs.
01:53Yeah.
01:54She'd just play them and sing and sing her heart out.
01:57Sound of Music was my sexual awakening.
02:00I was just in love, that girl sings, you know, I'm 16 going, oh my gosh.
02:05Oh, yeah.
02:06Oh my, I just loved her.
02:08I loved, Liesl.
02:09I was in love with Julie Andrews.
02:10Yeah.
02:11Christopher Plummer always called that movie S&M.
02:13He does?
02:14I'm not really into S&M.
02:17Sorry, it's going to be your epitaph.
02:19You know, when I got into Lorenz Hart in my 20s, and, you know, Rodgers and Hart kind of through this Ella Fitzgerald album, you know, the songbooks, it took me a while to realize it was the same Rodgers that I'd grown up with with Hammerstein, that there was this earlier period with Lorenz Hart lyrics.
02:37I couldn't believe it was the same guy, and I was like, wow, what a career.
02:41It's two legendary careers.
02:43Two distinct careers.
02:44There's my, he's really stunning.
02:46I think he's one of the greatest composers of the 20th century.
02:50What felt most different for you three about making this movie compared to other productions?
02:56Well, it's a film about the theater in some ways.
03:01And so, yeah, it was really exciting to, sometimes the obstacle of not having a huge amount of time can be, make it really exciting and dynamic.
03:09And we just thought to, Ethan and I had to establish this feeling of a long, complex relationship.
03:17Friendship in movies is something that I think is really captivating to watch.
03:22Yeah, it's kind of a full circle moment for me, because Ethan and I really got to know each other making a play.
03:27What play was it?
03:28Hurley Burley.
03:29Oh, was it?
03:30Yeah, yeah.
03:31And, you know, it was a really unique moment in our lives that we've shared, and that's how I met Rick.
03:37I met Rick because he came to see the play a couple times, and so here we are now making a play about the theater and theater people.
03:47And, you know, very few directors like to rehearse, and it's hard for them to get actors to come and rehearse.
03:53It's hard for, there aren't many directors who do like to rehearse.
03:56And so there was that process, you know, coming to Dublin early and rehearsing the scenes, and it felt just really special in that way.
04:04And I think for me, what's different about it is kind of the evolution of my experience acting for Rick.
04:11You know, it's just, we were taking something, a kind of style and a kind of thought methodology, and we're pushing it even further than we'd ever done before.
04:22Something I loved about the movie was just like thinking about what it would be like to be in that time, go to Sardi's afterwards, be, you know, hobnobbing.
04:30And that doesn't, people don't really do that anymore, or do they?
04:33Yeah, I think so, yeah.
04:34At that premiere, isn't it?
04:36Yeah, after premiere.
04:38We still have opening night premieres, opening night parties at Sardi's, and yeah, that whole world of, you know, having people backstage and...
04:49I had just been to an opening night at Sardi's.
04:53My daughter Maya had an opening of Wes Anderson's film that was at Sardi's.
04:56Oh, was it really?
04:57And, you know, he's so interested in the period that I almost felt like I was going back in time at that opening.
05:02So it, for real, still happens.
05:04Yeah, we go, you know, we're still at the theater haunts.
05:07We went there, we went there for a drink before we flew to Ireland.
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