Full Transcript for DZ-125: Oscars One-shot - BLUE MOON

kind of need to do it in that way. This is a very good way to do it. And then, yeah, I think the interweaving storylines is really interesting, as well as the structure of that tiny little bookend and how that emotionally sets us up for these technically 14 scenes, but really one scene, which is going to culminate in that opening little sliver of a bookend. And then prompt a philosophical discussion about what does it mean? Is it sad or is it not? I don't know if that last one's a learning, but it's something that I enjoyed exploring. So welcome to our new entry. Our new format. Pre-Key Learnings. You droolah! We write together for a quarter of a century. And the first show he writes with someone else is going to be the biggest hit he ever had. Am I bitter, Larry? Yes. For over 20 years, Hart and his partner Richard Rodgers create a string of hits. I want 10 copies of that. Write me a check. Such as My Funny Valentine, The Lady is a Tramp, and Blue Moon. Your work is brilliant. That's not the problem. No, no, I'm not drinking with you, Larry. They should put my picture on that bottle. The whiskey that made Loren's heart unemployable. So, Mel, do you want to summarize Blue Moon? Blue Moon is a biopic-esque movie that follows one man who used to be half of a musicals writing team. So if you know of Rodgers and Hammerstein, before Rodgers and Hammerstein, there was Hart. Or Rodgers and Hart. Rodgers and Hart. and Rodgers then moved on to this other pairing and this movie opens, it doesn't open, this movie, there's a tiny sliver of a bookend on either side and then the rest of it is all in real time as Lorenz Hart goes to the opening of Oklahoma which was written by his ex-partner Rodgers and Hammerstein. He leaves early and he goes to the bar across the street and then he talks for 90 minutes. And that is the film. Yeah, that is a fairly accurate summary. And I knew nothing about this when we sort of whittled it down. I read the script first. Well, some was whittled for us because two of the screenplays nominated for Oscars are not in English. Yeah. And as much as I have some other languages insufficient to consider some of the other nominees. But I'm actually really excited that we stumbled on this one because... We originally did, I think it was either our first or second ever Draft Zero episode was, do the screenplay guru formats win you Oscars or get you nominated for Academy Awards? And yes, I think Academy Awards, for whatever they're worth, right? As like, you know, all the stereotypes and tropes about them and what they like and who the Academy is made up for with and what they vote for and how hard, how Harvey Weinstein and corrupted the whole thing with Shakespeare in Love. Yada, yada, yada. But look, I love Shakespeare in Love. But this film breaks nearly every format, structure, convention around screenwriting. And yet, attracted the attention. It's an original screenplay. Even though it's a spot. I don't know how it got original screenplay. It's inspired by the letters of Lorenz Hart and Elizabeth. Which we'll talk about in a second. I guess they weren't published in any way. Yeah, I guess when Whiplash is adapted from its own short film. Anyway, this film attracted Richard Linklater, it attracted Ethan Hawke, and it got made and has attracted accolades for it, despite being made on a very small budget and shot in 15 days. So, there is stuff, I think, to look at that will be of benefit, interest to listeners. But Mel, what are your... Your main topics that you'd love to having watched and then read Blue Moon. Yes what are. Your key takeaways from this. Well i think we'll talk a little bit about the structure and we'll talk a bit about about writing in real time this is just basically hey we're gonna write how many pages it's 85 pages of dialogue and it's just almost solid dialogue and then it's going to come out just about the same because it is nothing but people talking in roots and talking really fast. So I think those are probably my main two. I'm also quite interested in how it uses pop culture, especially because it's a period piece and it does a lot of pop culture that is signposted. It does also a lot of pop culture that is not. It has meta pop culture. We'll talk about the Stuart Little thing. And it's also a lot of things that contemporary audiences might be expected to not be super familiar with like it goes nitty by the way i'm so proud that Robert Kaplow has the bravery to come out in 2026 and say oklahoma's a shit musical like it's the songs are bad the performances are bad i can't say no is one of the most offensively i mean it's like non-offensive offensive songs in all of you know broadway anyway the the surrey with a fringe on top doesn't even make the song about the Surrey like a sexual connotation. It's just a guy singing about how much he loves his truck, basically. Anyway. The references are layered in and there are entire conversations that go for like five minutes that are about nothing but riffing on Casablanca and quoting Casablanca and then deconstructing Casablanca and talking about and it doesn't worry that the audience won't quote unquote get the reference it just goes we're going to be interesting enough keep up or you know just immerse yourself in it and so I really like that because I think the especially the trend the last you know, decade or so is not to trust the audience and you can't have these references. They're not going to get it. It doesn't care whether you get it or not. Worst line in Casablanca? Well, a precedent is being broken. A precedent is being broken. How can you break a goddamn precedent? Do they even speak English over there in Hollywood? It just cares, is this interesting? And the combination of those two things, the structure and the content, is how the pacing plays out. And it just kind of goes fast and hard enough that if you aren't really into what it's talking about now, it carries you along until it gets to a

scene that you are. Yeah. And so that is also obviously part technique. It's also part performance. It's also all those. But I think those are probably my main three things. So let's say them again, shorthand? The structure, the pop culture, and the pacing. Okay. I'm somewhat tied up in those as well, because I'm looking to answer the question, how did they make a 90-minute film about a songwriter? Like, it's named after his most famous song, Blue Moon. there's you know most people would know the song i saw that beck had done a cover as well as elvis presley and ella fitzgerald and so people know the song no one really knows i i believe much i certainly had never even heard of lorenz or larry hart and so how do you make and this goes back to the the episode that we did on biopics when how do you make a story compelling when the audience knows the answer from history and this one this is one of those sort of gems of history where it's set in and around world war ii and so people know oklahoma they might know rogers and hammerstein they would know of the u.s's involvement in world war ii so there's kind of enough to hang your hat on but how do you make a 90 minute period film compare that that unfurls largely in real time, other than that opening and the end title cards, in real time. And. Here are all the, you know, this is a one shot and we're going to be pulling on lessons from, I think, a whole lot of different episodes that we've done in the past. We've obviously done two Oscar episodes. We're going to be looking a lot at the dialogue. When you say structure, my take on that is going to be both narrative point of view, macro narrative point of view that we've done episodes on. We did an episode on adolescence where we looked at French scenes. And those are also, you know, one hour pieces of entertainment that unfurl in real time. So there is a, I think, a connection in what both of those are trying to do. And then this is one of the three reasons that I really enjoyed this, that we stumbled on choosing this film is I think it's also foreshadowing. Like we did an episode on character driven movies or plot light movies where we looked at Amour and Happy-Go-Lucky and Chef. And this is similar, but this is very much a tragedy. And I think we will look at, oh, Mel's sighing at me. There are tragic elements. Okay. So, let's see the big one for me. I'm going to steal the runtime of this or the agenda of this exploration. To me, the opening of the film, and the film opens with Larry stumbling down an alleyway, he's singing, he sort of stumbles and slowly sinks to the ground in the rain, and then says, oh fuck. Everything happens to me. Everything happens to me. Oh, fuck. And then in voiceover, we hear a radio announcer talking about Larry's death. Mr. Hart was 48 years old. For over 20 years, Hart and his partner Richard Rodgers, Rodgers wrote the music, Hart the Words, combined their respective geniuses to create a string of musical comedy hits, often referred to as America's Gilbert and Sullivan. And when i read it i laughed at the oh fuck and when i saw it even hawk performed it like it was funny this poor guy stumbling to the ground probably having liver failure and then contracting pneumonia of which he died three days later in hospital he was only 48 years old why do i why am i connecting tragedy to this what this is my biggest thing of the whole film is i don't think this film works without that one page it's the only significant shift in narrative point of view it's the only thing that doesn't happen in real time it starts out telling us that this man is going to die a tragic death from his own consequences of his own alcoholism and then proceeds to show us 90 minutes of him constantly being presented with opportunities to choose between, and I'm not going to say his addiction to alcohol, that's part of it, but it's kind of between what made him tick as against success in life. Okay. And that's why I think it's a tragedy because- It's almost a melodrama, but not quite because Larry is, has other than, you know, you can treat an addiction, obviously an addiction means he doesn't have agency in relation to his addiction, but this isn't a melodrama where it's the world imposing upon Larry and Larry is constantly at the expense of the world, constantly having to choose to survive what is happening. Larry is appears to be relatively wealthy he despite his diminutive stature appears to be quite successfully sexually what was it ambisexual he called himself he. Said Larry make up your mind are you homosexual or heterosexual I said doc I'm ambisexual he said what the hell does that even mean I said it means I can jerk off equally well with either hand oh Larry there's a lady present, Well, women can use either hand too. And so I want you to, to me, that opening puts the audience in knowing what we're about to watch. It doesn't matter what happens. We know in seven months time, this guy is going to die alone and in a gutter. Okay. And it deliberately puts that at the beginning and not at the end. Yes. However, I think... I don't dispute. The facts are not in dispute. But what I think is really interesting is it puts it at the beginning and it shows you he essentially, right, he dies doing the three things he loves, which is singing, being drunk and swearing. And then it takes the next 90 minutes to essentially at you you say here's a 48 year old man he dies very young he dies literally in a gutter drunk it's not about the movie is not asking do you think this is a sad ending the movie is asking would he think this is a sad ending would he think this is the way is a sad ending would he think this is the way to go out and i and and and it is funny and it's funny in the script it's funny how he says delivers the fuck but would Lorenz Hart prefer to die in that way where he's singing where he's had all of these successes you know like some of the most famous songs in history multiple sinatra

hits like all these other things things that we know would he prefer to or would he prefer to live sober watching Rodgers and Hammerstein go on to great success that he predicted becoming unable to fulfill all of these other vices and things that he wants that he talks about throughout the movie because he it's quite clear that he's becoming quickly incapacitated by his inability to stop drinking by his inability to stop self-sabotaging etc and And so I think the movie sets us up to say, is this a tragic end or is it simply that he would not want to live any other way? And I think... So all the conversations that he continues to have are the answer. And I don't think there's a final answer to it. I think, however, it opens up other ways of looking at his death, which is it is factual reality, but it also is a very melodramatic, like set up to a movie, right? Like a guy, something down a dark noir alleyway in the rain. But it's it's opening up other avenues of looking at it because which ties into your narrative point of view. everything's about Hart and what Hart wants and thinks and does and how he does it. Okay here's where i'll agree with you i think you're right that Hart it might not be a tragedy in that Hart would did not want to change he was constantly presented with change and chose not to change and i think where i agree with you is that he probably would have preferred to die in the gutter than to write the types of musicals that Rodgers was wanting to write, a.k.a. Successful musicals. A.k.a. Oklahoma. Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay. I know exactly what you mean. Just tell me, what do you really want to write? What's your dream show? My dream show? Yeah. Oklahoma. I mean next. This feels, despite its setting, a very modern commentary on art and a whole lot of other things like timelessness. Art by committee and... And there's definitely... I can't... I'm trying to scroll through the script to find it, but there's definitely a discussion that Hart has where they're talking about, like, at what point do you feel like you're past your best, like your best is behind you that you that it'll be ever diminishing what is in the future. You can still think it's a tragedy and. I guess maybe that's me layering my own. Right interpretation. On it like would i have preferred Hart got clean because it's not mutually exclusive in my mind right it's not mutually exclusive that Hart could have got clean and still written. But Hart thinks it's mutually exclusive yes. You're willing to write it really write it and rewrite it and rewrite it again then you know it could work but i'm not going to beg you for this larry you know we've worked for 15 minutes you're out the door you're looking for a cigar store it drives me really crazy i don't like it i don't work like that for 24 years that's exactly what we've done for 24 years but. Hart thinks it's mutually exclusive because he's tried other ways and even rod has he yeah because he's he's tried to get sober

other times like that's the whole beginning dance where he's asking bobby cannavale to pour him the thing no i'm just gonna smell it no i'm just gonna this Like Rogers insinuates that he's tried this many times and it's never flown and that his work hours and like Hart, it's not about whether you think it's a tragedy. Yes. All right. So this is like, to me, this is an interesting early discussion. So the... Is it a tragedy or not? I don't know. But what is clear is that opening is so important to the structure of the film. They could have put that opening at the end of the film, but I don't, I think the entire perception of that, like how compelling we would have found that 90 minutes would have been very different had they put that at the end. And that sinking feeling we might have had, not knowing anything about Larry Hart, watching him go through those 90 minutes, giving back into his alcoholism, sounding like he's going to refuse to work with Rogers the way that Rogers wants him to work. Feeling definitely that he's the intellectual superior to Hammerstein, who is, he also knows at the same point, says it repeatedly, that Hammerstein is, and Oklahoma is going to be successful. I sat in my box seat tonight and watched Oklahoma exclamation point down there, glittering and all its pink lights and all those cowboy hats and twirling lassos. And I knew two things, absolute certainty. It was a 14-carat hit, and it was a 14-carat piece of shit. I agree with you on both points. And I love Rodgers and Hammerstein. It does give you that dramatic irony of knowing where it's going. And I think that's really crucial, whether it's to your point, I know this ends in tragedy, or whether it's to mine, because it forces you into, what would he think about knowing that that's coming would he prefer that to where he sees the potential of his life going throughout these 90 minutes. Yeah so we're talking about structure i think that decision of putting that opening there where we know like interestingly we were talking when we did the biopics episode we were talking about how do you avoid the problem that the audience knows the ending and in this film where the audience might not know the ending they've told us the ending they've chosen to do that to i think make the next hour and a half more compelling because we know what the choice is yep we know what the consequences are of him continually refusing to change whether he can or not i think is a legitimate other question whether he wants to or not yeah is a legitimate other question but the the then the structure of the 90 minutes, One of the big things I want to talk about here is narrative point of view to summarize it for our long-term listeners. They're like, we know what narrative point of view is. You talk about it every time. But to me, it's the greatest screenwriting tool is where are you positioning the audience in relation to their knowledge, to the character's knowledge. And obviously these characters all come in with a lot of knowledge that we're catching up on. We're catching up on the backstory. It's happening in real time. They're not really stopping to say. And then I wouldn't- They give you an audience surrogate slash Greek chorus who's the piano player, who doesn't know anyone. And so sometimes he and the bartender explain each other to the piano player who's kind of off in the corner. But for the most part, everyone else has established relationships, long, sometimes 20, 30 year histories with each other. Yeah and so all of that is oh like we're moving we're constantly with Larry I think there's maybe two and i won't even call them scenes there's almost only two beats in the entire film where Larry is not present and in those two beats we've got other characters talking about Larry right but for most of the film we are with Larry in his experience we're not, But we are always ahead of him because of that opening. So that is, you know, we're constantly, it's making us feel sorry for Larry in that sense, rather than if we were just with Larry in terms of that narrative point of view, where we are learning things as Larry's learning them, we are experiencing them as Larry experiences them. I don't know what your experience of watching it or reading it was I ended up sort of forgetting the opening both with the read and with. The viewing. Because the viewing is so immediate because it leans into those tools from adolescence but I couldn't imagine how different the experience of those episodes of adolescence would have been if they had started with here's how this episode is going to end and then put you into it the way that you emotionally connect with those characters is going to be completely different depending on whether you're with them or whether you're ahead of them. I do think so first of all i when i was so i watched it and then read the script and you read the script and then watched it and so i think our experiences might be different however, also i did know his story a little bit like i know a little bit about the the because Rodgers and Hammerstein being so famous and then knowing that there was this you know almost uh, sliding doors right moment like i knew that and then because the beginning is so it's shot differently to the rest of it as well in terms of like the color in terms of whatever it's quite dramatic and so i do think that watching it rather than reading it keeps it front of mind a little bit more even though yes by the end once it comes back around you're like oh right that happened like Like, it's not looming, they're not flashing back to it, and it's quite short, but it does haunt the narrative a bit more, I think, in the watching experience than the reading experience. So anyway i'm probably going to keep coming back to that opening. Because i. Think it's so important how it plays out through everything else but then should we talk about the structure. How do. You think the can you can you summarize what it

is about the structure of those 90 minutes in playing out in real time where we're largely not shifting in in narrative point of view at all we're largely in Larry's experience for 90 minutes. Well for me to talk about structure especially since we're talking about the script i'm going to talk about the technical aspects of it and i i've kind of broken this out from the script and i might put it up on my substack and link to it in the show notes because now we are also reading so what we read is the conformed script so i do think that some of these slug lines and things were added in post probably when they were having a read through with Ethan Hawke and trying to figure some things out and needed to delineate. My guess is that, especially because it essentially uses four different techniques. The first is that normal numbering. 1, 2, 3. Then you start getting number lettering. 4A, 4B, 4C, 4D. Then you start getting scenes that have a part 1, part 2. There's four scenes that have a part 1 and part 2. And then there's only one scene. There's one scene where it. Start specifying the position that the characters are in within the room where it's like position one and then a bunch of dialogue happens and it's like this character moves to position two and more dialogue happens this character also moves to position two more dialogue happens this character moves to position three like so it does that and i think some of that was probably done for the actor's benefit or the camera person's benefit you know depending on how they were trying to block things out just to give them a mark or a scene of like oh this is when this shifts so because we're reading the conform script you can't quite tell but i do think that when they decide to put the slug lines in and because the slug lines don't always even change like 4a and 4b well 4b 4c 4d 4e 4 they're all in the same place now 4g moves to a different location within the main bar area but like the the slug lines are they're more like guidelines as you might say um so and for those we really shouldn't we i don't believe that podcasts should be a video medium but i was very proud of the fact that i think my performance there my physicality really gave the Pirates of the Caribbean reference i was going anyway so in fact there's one part there's one scene which says part one and then the entire scene happens at part two. It just says, Hart wanders back to the bar, and then it changes slug lines to scene six. So a lot of it feels more like, I wrote this one giant scene, and now I have to figure out where it makes sense to break it. Or even, I wrote it all, and now I have to figure out where does it make narrative sense to maybe move these characters off into another corner. Because we're still following Hart the entire time. So why isn't he just in the main bar? Well, visual interest or thematic interest, there's a great scene where they go up and down steps. And so you're saying, oh, OK, well, he's talking about the ascent of his partner's career and how that has led to his downfall. You know where it'd be good to stage that? On some steps. Let's make that its own scene. And he's literally chasing him up the stairs as he's walking away from him. The mini staging of this. And there's been a lot made about Ethan Hawke's height and how they do that. And they pair him with taller actors but then they also like are clearly like you have these long dolly and or city cam shots and you're like is is he walking on are do they have do they have grips just like throwing apple boxes under his feet and then moving them out of the way like what's happening but the the staging of the stuff within these like mini scenes where he like moves to E.B. White's table or then he gets up and like walks into the is also just really great like the blocking and the the way that that's all done is really great so i think that's part of how this works and is proposed. Whether they back-engineered it, probably, but when you talk pacing, that is within the script where it decides to break things into different places. So, We're talking about French scenes and that, you know, it's a theater term, but it's where the location doesn't change, but a character may leave or enter and then the drama changes because of the new combination of characters who are in the scene. And that's how they run together and that's sort of what happened with adolescence but here we're largely following Larry Hart and what we have is initially the bar is empty and Larry is predominantly having in a relationship with the bartender Eddie and the pianist Morty, then i mean the the reveal is fantastic there's a the the writer Andy White is sitting within, two meters of Larry but they don't reveal him until they slowly slyly drift the camera to one side and then we see that there's been a person sitting there listening to this exchange between these three of them has been going on for like 20 minutes and then slowly that character slowly gets involved and they have scenes then the crew well the cast and crew from Oklahoma roll in at some point as well as Elizabeth the were. You just trying to figure out what to call her and decided to call her by her name. Her character name played by Margot as. Opposed to like do we call her the girlfriend do we call her the love interest do we call her the beard do we call her the you know all of the above. Definitely something, yet another thing that Larry is reaching for that is now beyond him. I think this is just a film of seeing Larry continuously reaching for the ineffable, which is a word that is referenced a lot throughout the script, and then, yeah, and not attaining it. Well, then you will appreciate this story because it concerns the... Ineffable. That's the perfect word. But coming back to your point, here's something that anyone who's doing this kind of structure, this real-time, be it like adolescents, adolescents at least move through different spaces. And like

you said, this does move through subtly different spaces. There's like the main bar, there's the foyer area, there's a booth that's off to one side, there's the stairway, and then there's the dressing, the coat room. There's the coat room and there's also a scene in the bathroom. Yes. Thank you. So there are different locations and but a lot of it even when they're staying in the same location and there's a French scene even when there's no change of characters they will put a slug line in there and i think that is yes good writing from a screenplay craft perspective to indicate to the reader there has been a big dramatic shift we have reached the end of a point and something is about to change and it shifts the pace it shifts. The vibe it. Shifts often. The type of dialogue exchange that's happening it's it certainly visually signals what emotionally happens when you're experiencing the film. Yeah and in a weird kind of way is using the very element that we hate about screenwriting which is formatting using it to try and replicate what that will dramatically feel like on set because this is a script and again like you said this is a conformed script so we don't know how much it resembles the shooting script or the early versions of the script that Robert Kablow wrote but there's very little, Big Print very little action lines it's very sparse, And so much of it is just in dialogue. And I think my last thing before we move to maybe continue talking about narrative point of view, but my last thing on structure is the structure and even the very little bit of action scenes that we have. It breaks so many rules. And I think the fact is the first, it breaks four major screenwriting rules in the first two pages. And by the time it does that it has set you up for the fact that it is not going to be a quote unquote regularly formatted script it's essentially using the slug lines as like emotional guideposts as opposed to formal slug lines and i think that that's all of a piece like it all it all it feels coherent within itself because it is it's it's mostly writing vibes so. What what are the four screenplay rules that it breaks in the first two pages? Well, so the first page of the script after the title page is not, it's numbered I-I. So like small lowercase I. So not page one, not page two, not the cover page. And then it just has two quotes on it. Which are essentially commentary. And these are not quotes that are meant to be subscript because on other ones are like, you know, title card, text shows, whatever. It's just two quotes that are telling you how to feel about the character. It's a quote by Oscar Hammerstein, and he was alert and dynamic and fun to be around. And then it was a quote by Mabel Mercer. He was the saddest man I ever knew. So it's just commentary flat out as well as the thing. So it does that. Then on the second page, we have multiple uses of we see. We also have an explicit camera movement as we pull slowly away from him in the

alley. We have a radio announcer, which is not technically a rule, but it's the first thing they tell you right in screenplay run-to-one is you don't have, you don't start your movie with a radio announcer telling you the details of this person's life. That's such a lazy way to write a screenplay. like, well, it right there does it. It also has, it just says opening credit sequence. It doesn't say, it just, a mini slug that just yells opening credit sequence and moves on. And so it's just, it also does the thing, which I might not actually do it in the very first. Oh, it does. The way that it uses parentheticals and underlines is very unusual because a lot of scripts use parentheticals to say like, oh, the character, it's an aside or what the character's doing, like an action and this one sometimes uses parentheticals for a character's action and sometimes uses parentheticals to signal that the writer is going off on a tangent and then comes back and it's sometimes so in the flow that it's kind of hard to tell what it's doing but it's working I think that for the most part it's attempting to write on vibes Mm-hmm. Look, I'm a little bit reluctant to call those broken screenwriting rules when, you know, I can feel Craig Mazin yelling at us. No, no, no. But this is what I mean. I agree with Mazin. When I say rules, I mean the prescriptive rules of when someone posts something on screenwriting and everyone goes, oh, you broke all the rules. I'm saying this is good. I'm saying most of those rules are suggestions or most of those rules are given to you when you are learning how to write for a reason. But that they are not but a lot of people get oh you can't sell a script like that you have to format the script this way if you want it to sell that's how i mean rules and it should break them because it does it well and it's a well-written screenplay and you can follow it and that's what matters and it gives you the emotionality of what the end product will but i'm saying that a lot of people would look at this and say oh you have to fix that before you can send it you before you can have it sold or read or you know nominated for an oscar. All right, so we've covered narrative point of view, including the opening. We've covered French scenes somewhat because that's how it keeps this very contained story moving. It's just characters coming and moving. But I also think, you know, somewhat clichédly, there are three plot lines running through or three main relationships. There's obviously Larry's relationship with Rogers will because Rogers comes in and seeks out Larry and tells Larry gives Larry a proposal a business proposal for them to work together again and then Larry pitches Rogers back an idea for a big show and Rogers it's it's so it's so great writing the way that the those beats are structured Rogers is actually intrigued and then And they have back and forth. And Larry keeps accidentally offending Rogers by saying, essentially saying, not like Oklahoma. Not shit like Oklahoma. Not commercially successful drivel. Yes. Gods forbid. I don't know. With a war on, do audiences really want to watch Cannibals singing Porgy and Bess? What do audiences want to watch? Cowboys hooping it up at the box social? Well, yes. Apparently. Oh, that's right. I forgot. Oklahoma! Exclamation point. addresses the urgency of a nation at war. I think every serviceman in that audience tonight thought about what we're fighting for, even if we're a second or two, and he thought about it. What is it we're fighting for, exactly? Feisty little girls in gingham dresses who can't say no. Okay, all right. Dick, dick, dick. Come on, just... Those characters are unrecognizable as human beings. I think plenty of people recognize them. They recognize love. He needs rescuing big time. They recognize family. They recognize pride in their country. You're starting to sound like Yankee Doodle Dandy. But Larry keeps pushing back on wins Rogers back over intellectually by appealing to his... He's a charming guy. He's quick. He's funny. He's erudite. Yeah, you understand why people are drawn to him, even as you understand why people cannot continue to work with him. Yeah. And you've got all of that, that storyline culminates in Larry has, I don't know why, but he's trying to organize a party that when he should know that everyone he knows is going to be going to the Oklahoma after party. That's a very that okay look let's let's get to your other two storylines i think that's. A really interesting. Emotional beat but the other two so yes the the main. One which is hanging over the whole thing which we don't. See first but it it you know it hangs over the narrative because he's coming from oklahoma so that's the first relationship is hart and rogers. Yeah then you've got larry hart and elizabeth he's trying to win this ephemeral beauty over and i think it's fairly explicit that he sees winning as sex like he wants to have sex with her and sees that as this thing that i mean it's not just him that they're having a running conversation behind his back at the bar about whether he's slept with her or not so. Do you fuck or not he thinks tonight might be the night larry larry larry what do you think she sees in him i think she sees a rich and famous guy who can help her career. I think she recognizes she's being adored by one of the great appreciators of beauty. Okay, we're tabling this along with the party because I think that they are actually related and that they are similar emotionally. So yes, those two relationships. And then the third one is with, I know that they're distinct, like it's Larry's relationship with the bar regulars. So it's with the bartender, with Morty the pianist, and with Andy the writer. And I know that they have different moments individually within those three relationships, but I feel they are the audience surrogates. They are the ones that Larry can truly be himself around. They're the ones that he will

openly say Oklahoma is a piece of shit to, that he will elaborate on how he feels about Casablanca, about other movies, about his own music. And they come back and forth with him. And even though he's only met White, the writer of Stuart Little, the first time that evening, they immediately connect. And they know who each other are. Yes. Unlike Morty. So Morty is the, I don't know, who are you? Oh, right. But, you know, they run in the same circles, White and Hart. So, like, they know who each other are. And then he's old friends with Eddie. So, like, you have these three different relationships. Yeah. But to me it felt like a plot line where it's like yeah how these people feel about larry is how the audience is meant to feel about larry yep complicated yeah all right so that's so not only do you have these french scenes larry is bouncing continually between those three plot lines so to somewhat of a guru ish they've got an a plot line and a b plot line and a c between those yep, Because it's also the, because Larry is so clearly performing for Hart and for Hammerstein and all the people from the Oklahoma cast and crew, he's truly himself, and he's putting on a different performance for Elizabeth. I feel it's only with Morty, Eddie, and is it Andy White, the writer? Yeah, yeah. I still think he's performing for them. It's just that Eddie is aware of the performance and the other two are much less so. But he allows himself to be much more vulnerable or self-reflective, certainly bordering on morose on occasions. Yeah. Even sometimes when he's being true, he's still doing it as a performance because he wants something from that. Extension of his actual self to be lauded to be. Worshipped to be appreciated for his wit. And talent yeah so those i i think those three are really great okay. That's another way that has made it compelling but now you tell me why i'm wrong in my emotional. Read of them i'm look the thing with the party and elizabeth right and i don't think there is a flat answer and i think that's part of the point but both of those are things where he of course he knows that the after party is going to like they have a planned after party where there's going to be an open bar there's going to be this of course he knows that like even if he could have had sex with elizabeth three months ago like the way that he's let this go on and the way that he's had all these other you know things and and he knows that it's not going to happen what he wants is to say oh of course i could have but there were these other insurmountable obstacles so none of it lands on me but i can again in the future i could have thrown this giant party everyone would come to my house whatever but oh there was this other thing i could have had sex with her but like you know the timing wasn't exactly right and blah blah blah but like you know next week we'll meet up again but he wants everyone to think he to know he has in the past but thrown these parties had this sex

done these things wooed these you know young beauties etc and could now if he wanted to and there weren't this other previous engagement that everyone else was obligated to and will again in the future like that's it's it's an easy out for him to be able to still say on the center of this i can still i can still get it but you know just not does he think he can. Though i feel like he's got commentary. He's performing for himself as much as everyone else sure. There's one speech that i found and there's a moment that is in my brain that i think i saw that i can't find in the script so i don't know if my brain is just playing tricks on me or if it's genuinely just not in the script that it that it might have been in the film and it's not in the script that we have but it's on for the from the version we have it's on page 58 and it's in the he's talking to eddie, White has left. It's just after Larry's had his first big interaction with Rodgers after he's come in from the show. And he starts talking about. Somewhat morosely, They should put my picture on that bottle. The whiskey that made Lorenz Hart unemployable. Buy war bonds. You know, I've started to hear things wrong. The other night, I was listening to this singer go on about her cigarette heart. And I thought, now that is an original metaphor. My cigarette heart. Then I realized she was singing my secret heart. I can't remember anything anymore either. That should be the title of my autobiography. Stop me if I've told you this already. And we'll print the entire text twice. He ends it on a gag because he's funny but the i feel like he is aware that he is somewhat done even as he's pitching this incredible marco polo even if he is trying to seduce either physically or emotionally or intellectually trying to seduce elizabeth here's why so he earlier you know we'll we'll get into the dialogue and how delicious it is and the tools that it uses in terms of repetition. But this is why I got to the point where I feel like his relationship with Elizabeth feels like he's lost whatever it was that he was yearning for is early on. He's in the, that one scene in the bathroom with the piano player. He's talking about how he proposed to a famous singer. And she said, she said. I love you, darling. Just not that way. Not that way. Three little words, ten little letters that mean game over, schmuck. And then Elizabeth uses that exact phrase back to him. You know I love you, Larry. You do? Just not that way. So he's told us earlier in the script in the film in the story he's told us that when you hear those words it means game over schmuck. Do you think the story that he tells in the bathroom that he is that he is referring to a woman or a man oh. I thought it was a woman. Not what he says who he's actually referring to do you think that it was a man that he fell in love with who then said i don't love you that way whether he was gay and was using that as an excuse because oh i don't want to be with you or whether it was because he fell you know who who amongst us has not fallen for the straightest of people you know and um because that was the interpretation that I took from it. And I do agree with you that the line repeating is meant to be that, but he's, in my mind, the strength is even firmer because it is from all genders, essentially. Like, it's from, he's getting it from all sides, and now when he can't even get it from, you know, here, he's really sunk. But he can't openly admit that, obviously, especially not without landing on a joke. But I think he's known for a while. But they come out of that, of the coat room, and then immediately he's invited Elizabeth to his party, and immediately he introduces Elizabeth to Rogers, and Rogers is so smitten with her, and she appears so smitten with him that Larry deliberately brings up, where's your wife, to Rogers? And Rogers invites Elizabeth to the after party, and she not only says she's going to go, she goes with him, leaves with him. Like it's such a, it's a, it's a meeting point of those two plot lines where it feels like Larry is losing both. Rogers is leaving without him. And so is Elizabeth. And Elizabeth is leaving with Rogers, not necessarily because she wants to sleep with him, because I don't think she actually does. It's because of the proximity to the theater and his success with Oklahoma. And so I think that stings Hart much more than the sexual rejection. Yeah. and. Yeah all the plot lines sort of converge right there at the end which is really great because they they pop in and out of each other speaking of sexual metaphors throughout earlier and then they sort of at that very last scene they just all start crashing into each other in these really horrible wonderful ways. And look where i agree with you is i think andy that one of the very few moments i mean larry's very much there he's looking at himself in the mirror like Preparing for the Oklahoma people to come in And Eddie asks Andy White Did he fuck her or not And Andy replies he thinks Tonight might be the night And, Andy asks Eddie, what do you think she sees in him? Eddie responds, I think she sees a rich and famous guy who can help her career. Andy responds, I think she recognizes she's being adored by one of the great appreciators of beauty. And look, they've hung a hat on her. Great line. They've broken the audience POV or certainly who's driving the scene just for a moment to get that line out. To get a character talking about Larry in a way that he wouldn't talk to Larry's face, perhaps. And to explain to us, I do think that is what, like, I think Elizabeth intellectually, like, shares with Larry. He knows that he is open to her in a way... It ends with him, you know, picking up his cards off the floor. He's dropped his cards on the floor of the bar. And he's like, maybe one day she'll actually ask me a question. Maybe one day she'll actually be interested in me. But he knows that if he's as interested in her as he

possibly can be, that's his way to keep her attention. And she does enjoy it, I feel. Reading the script, I loved the coat room scene between him and Elizabeth, where Elizabeth is regaling Larry with a... The night of her 20th birthday and an embarrassing series of sexual liaisons with Cooper, a frat boy from Yale. Which also makes it apparent why she would be interested in an older man because at least he would know his way around. Because that story is great, but obviously it's like, oh yeah, frat boys have no fucking idea what they're doing. But it very much feels that Larry, watching the scene, I felt so much more uncomfortable than when I was reading it. Like it felt, Larry felt so much more lecherous, to use a word, so much more needy, desperate, never going to get this, and thirsty, I guess, is another term that the kids allegedly use. yeah. Because i obviously already had that sort of fresh in my. Mind as i was reading the the page and so i felt the i felt the pace dip in that scene watching it in a way that i did not feel reading the script which i found really interesting because she's not talking slowly the the pauses are not necessarily elongated but it is a long french scene in comparison to the others and it is quiet and it is intense and it is Margaret Qualley's Elizabeth telling us a story. Did you feel the same thing? In terms of the lecherousness, no. Okay, lecherousness or pace drop? Yeah, well, I think reading it felt a lot faster than watching it, yes. I agree with that. I agree with that in a lot of the script, but particularly that scene. Partly because it's long, partly because it's the scene where the majority of it, it's not Margaret Qualley's fault, but the majority of it is telling somebody something that happened, in pretty dramatic detail and we never flash to it and there's no there's very few cuts and there's nothing else happening and so it is going to drag and i think it's meant to but for me i was a little bit like yeah okay i get it especially because in contrast to a lot of the rest of the scenes where you've got snappy repartee and all these other pop cultures and other people interjecting and the music in the background and like all this other movement and it does skid to a halt which is fine, but it definitely skidded to a halt. Hmm. And I'm not being critical. I think I'm just, you know, what I'm trying to dig into here is how could we write a script about a, you know, happening in real time, contain single, largely single location, 90 minutes, something that we could, any of us could shoot in 15 days. Like that is the challenge that I'm kind of setting myself with the current project that I'm working on. Well, try to get someone who's as good at delivering dialogue as Ethan Hawke. That's easy. Yeah. Cast Ethan Hawke and Margaret Qualley. Because a lot of this is dependent on, in my opinion, the Bobby Cannavale character more than almost anyone else. Who's the bartender. The bartender, because he is the person who does connect a lot of people. And he's the person who everything has to bounce off of. And we don't really get to know anything about him the way that we get to know stuff about Hart. Like, you don't know about his life, really, other than experiences he's had with Hart. But you still have to care about him and think he's funny and think he's whatever. Like he's not a historical character or anything like that but yeah the the dialogue of this demands performers who can keep up because the the repartee the pop culture references and right off the bat within the first certainly within the first 10 pages it has Hart make a big deal about rhyme schemes internal rhymes feminine rhymes all these other bits if you're going to have a character make a big deal about the verbosity of people talking on stage and screen then you have to deliver on that and that the writing only gets you so far does the writing have to be good yes if the writing is good can the whole thing still fall over yes sure. I was lucky enough to read this before I watched it. And look, I knew Ethan Hawke was Larry Hart, but I didn't know the casting of anyone else. And I still found this river thing to read. I think it's a great read. And so let's talk a little bit about that how do they keep it compelling well you've got the the french scenes that's one way we've got the interweaving storylines bouncing off one another that's another way we know how the story is going to end so we got that sense of, inevitability fate we're ahead of larry to an extent and i think you know use you say pop culture references we are talking about 1940s pop culture references not uh contemporary yeah. But they're still funny and interesting and and they use mostly big ones i will also say i think one thing that it does that helps keep it compelling is the continued use of we not just. We see. We are in a box seat with we are with and and it it doesn't it keeps the reader engaged and with the characters a bit and it's there's not a lot of action lines but when there. Are action. Lines it often uses we and i think it helps carry us along through the scenes. Yeah and the let's talk a little bit about the dialogue in particular because it is very repetitive but repetitive in an amazing way we've already talked about the the foreshadowing of the the line about just not that way. Everything Hart says gets repeated three or four times at a minimum. It's very lyrical in that way. A lot of music repeats things. Absolutely. It's almost like there's bridges within the dialogue that repeat. He keeps the first kind of opening scene. So not the very opening, sorry. Let me be clear. Larry in the alleyway is the opening scene. Larry walking out of Oklahoma after clearly not enjoying it is the next scene. But then when he arrives at the bar, that first sort of interaction before Elizabeth arrives and then before the Oklahoma crew arrive. He's constantly trying to tell them about Elizabeth. And he keeps

sidetracking himself, talking about Casablanca, talking about music, talking about the lyrics of Oklahoma. But he keeps trying to talk about Elizabeth and coming back to her and even after she comes in so there's so much repetition of and really great lines like that line I mentioned about cigarette heart that ends up coming back in a beautiful way as a callback almost every piece of dialogue is a hook is a play on words is repeated like you say in the same way that music is so the amount of talent and craft that has gone into these half-page speeches to make them to make you be able to hear them i could hear the what do you call it the mid-atlantic, american uh newsreader sort of patter and the pace of it it felt like you know screwball comedies reading it off the page i mean there's there's there's jokes in there like. What do you call a tireless relentless homosexual. Indefatigable and then Eddie tries to do it later and he forgets the punchline right oh i. Forget and it kind of still. Works right as you're. Actually trying to figure out yeah. Elizabeth you know tantalizes and their first in her first appearance tantalizes larry with the story that she's later going to tell near the end of the script and says I. Demand to know the shorthand version now the shorthand version okay, the skin on his back was flawless. The the tantalizing line is the skin on his back was flawless and that line gets repeated throughout in many different contexts recontextualized I'm. Writing an entire musical about her it's inspired by those Frank Capra war pictures why we fight? This one will be called Why? There's a little bit of a cheat code in terms of they don't just reference pop culture, they quote it quite a bit. And when you're quoting very famous lines, like you do have to be careful with it, obviously. But even when you're quoting bad songs from Oklahoma, even when he's like riffing on, you are, some of that stuff reads better than it sings or it, you know, there's an interesting way of, you know, that rule of threes where even if the line is really done by the third time you repeat it with a slightly different like intonation, it's funny and it's rhythmic and you're still like, you're carrying a lot of things. And so, yeah, they're quoting bits. They're quoting his own songs. They're quoting, you know, Blue Moon is quoted multiple times. And there's a lot of music going on in the background that accentuates that, which is not in the script. I mean, it is because every time Hart says, like, something occurs to him. It doesn't have the same effect in the script. Like that line that someone says. He throws to Morty the piano player. Do you know this person? Do you know that song? And Morty will nearly every time start playing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it says talk, sings. Like it notes when characters are singing or talking or quoting things, but it doesn't have the same effect. Like you're not necessarily hearing them or hearing both of them at the same time

as you're reading. So, have we got, are there any other elements of the script that make, that you want to tell someone you want to write a cheap script that will attract Academy Award winning talent that will in turn, you know, get made and can be shot in 15 days and then receive massive accolades? Well, all right. I think the first thing is it did take 12 years for this script to get, you know, actually made. So, you know, be prepared for that. Okay, so here's a line. This is not a line, right, that in and of itself is particularly clever or particularly whatever. And later, I'm going to teach you boys my own card game, cocksuckers rummy. Larry, language. Oh, you're offended by the word cocksucker. All right, I won't use it. I give you my word as a cocksucker. But the context and the fact that it's surrounded by all these other long scenes that are very clever and have very complex wordplay and very whatever, like makes that sing and you you could not write a script that i shouldn't say you could not write this script and have it all be dialogue like that but you also need to have those cheap easy jokes that kind of break up some of the more like esoteric patter and dissection of words and long stories about things like the variety of the dialogue and the variety of the words and what they're using also allows you to have, you know, regular, easy toss-off jokes, and it all works together. The craft that goes into, I mean, we already spoke back about how that bit where he's really morose, he does end it with a joke. You've mentioned those two opening quotes, which are title cards in the actual movie as well. How he was both, you know, a delight to be with and the saddest human being that they've ever met. This whole movie is about that. like at the end of this story he's been rejected by Rogers he has rejected himself the path to success or a path to success not knowing how to be any different than he is he's been rejected by Elizabeth and he's picking his cards up talking to himself off the floor of the bar and that's when Morty starts playing Blue Moon and that's when Larry decides not to go to his party that he's going to throw it just sits there at the bar regaling them with stories being both the dynamic and fun to be around but also the saddest man we ever know it. Comes full circle. And you know he did so he does in the title cards it tells you he does end up taking Rogers up on that opportunity that Rogers was offering him to to write five new songs for an existing show that they did to do a reprisal and but presumably his drinking got in the way. Also, just on a little bit of a craft note, I do find it really interesting that there's no scene break or slug line for it when it fades. It's just the camera pans across and then it says super. But it doesn't actually give you a scene break because it's not breaking. It's just like, well, this story, you know where it ends and it's just going to kind of drift off ethereally into the ends. And

so, again, I think that by not doing that, which is which a quote unquote rule would say that's a new scene, it's giving you the feeling that it's meant to evoke. And I just I think that's very effective. Yeah. All right, Mel. Shall we do a summary of our key learnings? Some key learnings. I think there is certainly something to be said for when you are trying to compel a reader through a script, when you know that it is going to be very helter-skelter and go, go, go, that using, especially when your action lines are scarce and you are scarcely using that we see, we are in, we go, we move, is actually very helpful. It would get really tiresome if there were a lot of action scenes and you continued to do it. I think it would feel very sloppy. But when it's used sparingly and in a script that is essentially in real time, it really does help. Yes. I think that using slug lines in a way that suits your needs as opposed to a way that is necessarily conforming to how screenwriting 101 teaches you is can be good yeah if you have a good reason for it to. Your to your benefit. Yeah you have to have your own theory you have to have a reason but it can be very helpful especially once you get into the room with the actors and start figuring out where those emotional breaks are essentially they are looking at where are the emotional breaks what feels like a complete scene versus where we have to move on etc and then labeling it accordingly And I think, yeah, I really loved what you said about how you have essentially three main relationships or three main plot lines. And one of them is comprised of three people, but that still essentially works as your A plot line, B plot line, C plot line, but your quote unquote plot lines are just relationships. I think that is a really great way of, if you were to break it down, reading the script and seeing how those plot lines come in and out. Awesome. My learnings, I think a lot of people would take the headlines from this script that like, oh, it's happening in real time in one location. That's what I need to write real time in one location. And while I'm absolutely A, trying to do that myself and B, this shows that it's how possible it is i think this analysis hopefully has shown the amount of work that's still going on under the hood of that so yes it's real time but you have narrative point of view you have the the french scenes you have the incredible dialogue and it's all feeding into one another without, I mean, I did come out of this movie as I sometimes do going, I wonder what that was all about without a firm idea for myself, what it was all about. Like, why was I watching this? Was it a tragedy or not? Should I have enjoyed hanging with Larry or should I, I feel like I'm possibly as conflicted as the opening titles suggest on an emotional experience. I think one more thing, though, that fits in with that is the pacing, that you do need scenes that are slower and scenes where you take your foot off the throttle just a little bit. This is not Uncut Gems. It has variability, and it builds that into the script, even though it's real time. It is very aware that it needs to move at different paces at different times. Indeed all right well thank you mel hopefully our listeners get something from that it's definitely not a waste of 90 minutes of your time that the script is a great read and shows what is available to you i mean one of the you talk about pop culture references one of the closest i got to success was actually taking a little bit of history an unknown nugget of history that then suddenly became very well known as another a competing movie got out before I managed to finish it mine and I think that is another thing about the a true life story that no one knows about uh is definitely about uh value about the the value of of what people know or what's out there i don't know how successful this would have been if it had been fictional, i mean it is fiction but you know what i mean if it had not been about right real life real people who lived who lived and like we. Know rogers and hammerstein's names almost. Everyone knows. Even if you don't surely you've seen i was going to ask you this have you seen you've seen casablanca but have you seen have you seen casablanca. Yes okay i just checked have you seen oklahoma uh i have performed in oklahoma who were you i was a dancer oh okay, I can't sing, so I didn't get to any of the no-name roles for me. I was shocked by this. Yeah, okay. Well, I tell a lie. I was not in Oklahoma. I was in a high school Western musical medley, which started with Oklahoma and had Annie Get Your Gun and Seven Brides for Seven. Oh, God, they really picked the bad ones. And then I can't even remember what the fourth one was. If you were dancing, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers is mostly about dance and color. It's not about anything else. So, you know, being a dancer is probably good. Okay, so I have seen Casablanca, and I'm aware of the story of Oklahoma. Right. And some of the songs, not all of them. Because I'm wondering what someone would come into this completely cold, knowing nothing about any of those, having not seen, like, there's other pop culture references, but seeing the main two things they revolve around. And I do think that there's an edge to, we know who Rodgers and Hammerstein is, and therefore we know what he, quote unquote, missed out on in terms of like, oh, globally famous, you know, still have things that are performed to this day, et cetera. Obviously, there's the music that he headlines, but I think there's an immediate, touchstone for most people of going, oh, okay, I understand the main stakes of this, even if I don't know who he is. Well, I think the script does a very good job. You mentioned about like how much heavy lifting it does early on, Even though it is about the characters, like, you know, first of all, you get the radio announcer telling us who Hart was as he dies, right? And then

you've got Hart coming in saying that is, I'm going to quote the actual line. It's got carats of gold in there. I know two things with absolute certainty. It was a 14-carat hit and it was a 14-carat piece of shit. Rhyming. Rhyme schemes. And they're telling us so much in that. In in that opening even though without it ever feeling like exposition because it is true to Hart's experience although as you've accurately pointed out they do have or audience surrogate characters in there so yeah i mean i i i don't want to demean my wife's cinema knowledge i believe she's seen Casablanca i'm not sure how aware she is of oscar and of sorry of Hammerstein and Rodgers but i she did not enjoy the film very much and i suspect that was to do with the Elizabeth interaction as well interesting but i i don't know i. Can see that it is a very very, man of a certain age rights interaction of man of a certain age with a young woman gen genuine like sexuality aside it is it there are parts that are very much that that i don't think that that is the weakest part for me. I mean she never felt unsafe no no no no no no no that's. That's yeah but it yeah the the desperation does drip a bit. Yeah well thank you Mel for making this happen and for choosing the homework this. Is one where i had seen all of the movies for adapted or for original screenplay which was a lot of fun then because then i essentially got I mean, I really only got to choose from three because I couldn't find the other ones in English. Thanks, as always, also to our amazing patrons who bring you more Draft Zero more often, and particularly our top-tier patrons. Krob, Thees, Sandra, Jesse, Randy, Paolo, Thomas, Jen, Millay, Lily, and Alexandra, who... Is Oscar nominated for his short film. This is going to date very quickly, so hopefully we'll get it out in time. If you are an Academy Award winner, please vote for Alexandra's film. Maybe we should record two versions, Academy Award nominee versus Academy Award winner. I'm also obliged to mention Alexandra's partner, Natalie Musatiatas, as I believe, is a listener, and their film is Two People Exchanging Saliva. Oscar nominated. And recording here for posterity, there's no way I'm going to go back and edit this, but let's presume that I am motivated enough to go back and edit this. Academy Award winning listener, Alexandra and Natalie. I hope you all feel like arguing with either Stu or myself about anything on this episode or anything in general. And you can find many ways of getting in touch with us at our website at draft-zero.com. At the website, you'll also find the show notes for this and all our other episodes. As well as links to support us and spread the word for free via a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Very important for spreading the word. Or if you think that what we do here is worth a dollar or preferably more than a dollar, then you can also find links to our Patreon page to support us getting these episodes to you quicker. Thanks. And thanks for listening. And now for Backmatter.