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For Broadway People

 Ethan Hawke is outstanding as Lorenz Hart; Andrew Scott is his equal as Richard Rodgers. Unfortunately, the movie "Blue Moon" doesn't have a plot. This might not bother you--because you get to spend two hours with Ethan Hawke.


It's widely known that the alcoholic, unreliable Lorenz Hart was a better writer than Oscar Hammerstein. But Hammerstein was reasonably mature. So Rodgers dumped Hart for Hammerstein. Then Hart had to put on a brave face. A terrific idea for a movie. (It's just that, as I've mentioned, the movie doesn't have a plot.)

My favorite Hart tune is "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered"--because the speaker is so obviously human. She is in middle age; recently, she started shtupping a younger man. This is delightful to her, though she recognizes that the guy is intellectually deep as a sidewalk puddle. Laughing at herself, the speaker is nevertheless hopeful, moved, a little scared. It's a tour de force.

I'm wild again--
Beguiled again.
A simpering, whimpering child again.
Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I...

Couldn't sleep--
And wouldn't sleep--
Until I could sleep where I shouldn't sleep...
Bewitched, bothered, and bewildered am I....

The self-deprecation is charming. In my (controversial) opinion, there is really only one version of this song--and it belongs to Marin Mazzie.

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