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BLUE MOON · written by Robert Kaplow · 2025
Scene 6 of 26 · ≈ 7 min on screen · Act one
On the opening night of Oklahoma!, lyricist Lorenz Hart drinks through Sardi's while chasing one last renewal with Richard Rodgers and the young woman he adores, but both are already moving beyond him.
Hart collapses alone in a rainy alley as his obituary lists the songs that will outlive him.
Hart watches Oklahoma! triumph without him and flees the theater for Sardi's.
Hart crosses 44th Street from the St. James Theatre toward Sardi's.
At Sardi's, Hart trades Casablanca riffs with Eddie, asks for whiskey despite his pledge, and describes his adoration of Elizabeth and his wish to stop being afraid.
A flower delivery lets Hart recruit 'Sven' to his imaginary party, test whether his songs remain famous, and turn his sexuality and failing renown into jokes.
This scene
Hart reaches for a shot of Old Grand Dad. But he stops; wags his own warning finger; then raises his glass of club soda.
HART
(toasts the others)
To the great and glorious past.
When it all mattered so much.
(to Rifkin)
Keep playing. You're good.
MORTY RIFKIN
Oh, thank you. I'm an aspiring composer.
HART
Aspiring? That means you're breathing, right? I better take your name down in case I need a new partner.
Hart's reached into his jacket pocket for a piece of paper: he's found a folded Playbill, a wartime issue with a flag printed on the cover.
EDDIE
Hey, did you go to the opening tonight?
HART
(re: Playbill)
Oklahoma! With an exclamation point, no less. FACT: Any title that feels the need for an exclamation point, you want to steer clear of.
(to pianist)
What did you say your name was again?
MORTY RIFKIN
Morty. Rifkin. But I go by the name of Morty Rafferty.
HART
No one could possibly guess you're Jewish.
MORTY RIFKIN
Wha'dja think of Oklahoma?
MOVING IN CLOSER
HART
What did I think of Oklahoma? Well, Knuckles--Knuckles O'Rifkin--that's what I'm gonna call you. I saw the show a couple of times in previews in New Haven, back when they were still calling it Away We Go! Exclamation point. And I felt sure Dick was gonna call me: "Larry, we're in big trouble. I need you to funny up the show. We need some big comedy numbers." And I was all ready to say: "Dick, instead of all this corn-pone Americana, let's do a send-up of corn-pone Americana!" I was already writing lyrics in my head--I couldn't stop.
MORTY RIFKIN
And did he call you?
HART
Are you kidding? He was too busy writing more hits...I sat in my box seat tonight, and watched Oklahomo-exclamation-point down there glittering in all it's pink lights, and all those cowboy hats and twirling lassos, and I knew two things with absolute certainty: It was a 14-carat hit, and it was a 14-carat piece of shit.
EDDIE
Friend of mine saw it in previews? Said it was one of the best shows he'd ever seen.
HART
The show is fraudulent on every possible level. And this is not jealousy speaking. OK? I watched that show tonight and I felt this just great...sinking in my heart. And all around me people are roaring. They are roaring at third-rate jokes. I wanted to grab the audience by the shoulders and say: "What are you laughing at? Come on. Demand more." And Rodgers is a genius. I say that without one second's hesitation. You're a piano player; you know that I'm right.
MORTY RIFKIN
Yeah, he's pretty good.
HART
Pretty good! There is no one with his range. His inventiveness. Great, soaring, masculine melodies building like pile-drivers. I mean, Rodgers is a cold-hearted son-of-a-bitch, but he can get a melody to levitate. And that is the hallmark of great art: Levitation.
(talk-sings)
"I've got a beautiful feel-ing..." That's the moment. You hear that? When your spine glows and the whole apparatus of songwriting suddenly breaks free from gravity. There's maybe five people on the planet that can pull that off. And that son-of-a-bitch is one of 'em.
And then, oy, "words by Oscar Hammerstein the second".... What can I say about Oscar? He's gonna come striding in here any second: all seven and a half feet of him.
HART (CONT'D)
And you know Dick deliberately went with somebody tall this time. You know that? But what can I say about Oscar? He's so... earthbound. And, let's face it, most of us are earthbound. But there are moments, I swear to God, there are moments in my work when I have made something bigger than myself.
MORTY RIFKIN
I agree. Definitely.
HART
Thank you. The words were bigger than the music; bigger than the characters who sang them--and they approached--for maybe one half-second--something immortal. Excuse my limitless self-regard, but they did, and if nobody else is gonna say it, then I'm going to. I have written a handful of words that are going to cheat death.
EDDIE
Spoken with the modesty of a true lunatic.
HART
Hey, when Shakespeare wrote Not marble nor gilded monuments/Of princes shall outlive this powerful rhyme, did people say, "My God what an ego?" No. They said "He is a genius, and he knows his work is going to last."
EDDIE
So now you're Shakespeare?
HART
Look, Oklahoma! is gonna win the Goddamn Pulitzer. I know that. High schools are gonna put it on from now til doomsday because it is so inoffensive. But, really, who wants inoffensive art? Knuckles! Are you listening to me! I'm trying to answer your question!
Morty plays "Look For the Silver Lining."
HART (CONT'D)
Is this why God put us on the planet? To not offend people? The problem with Oklahoma! is this--and the problem was right there in the original play, "Green Grow the Fucking Lilacs." And Dick first showed that play to me! All right?
HART (CONT'D)
He asked me to adapt it first. And I said no. And I don't mind that it's nostalgic, but Oklahoma!-exclamation-point is nostalgic for a world that never existed. And do you really want to write a show where the main character's name is Curly? Oh, here's an idea for a song: "Hey, Moe! Hey, Larry! I Just Stepped in Cow Shit!"
(does Curly knuckle business)
I mean, am I bitter? We write together for a quarter a century and the first show he writes with someone else is gonna be the biggest hit he ever had? Am I bitter?
EDDIE
Larry...
HART
Fuck yes. But I need to tell you about Elizabeth. I need to cleanse my heart.
EDDIE
Here we go, the twenty-year-old--
HART
She's gonna come in here any second.
MORTY RIFKIN
Rodgers is gonna be here tonight, right?
HART
Don't worry, I'll introduce you.
MORTY RIFKIN
That'd be great. I'm trying to get somebody to listen to my songs.
HART
Listen and learn. I'm telling you about Elizabeth. There's something appealingly...ethereal about her face.
EDDIE
What the fuck does that mean?
HART
Look, I got her all these presents.
He rummages through the rumpled shopping bag he's placed on the bar.
EDDIE
You bought her something from Klein's?
HART
She's gonna love this.
From the bag he removes a sprig of purple flowers, a small, battered-looking framed painting and an old novel (Of Human Bondage) still in its yellowing dust jacket.
EDDIE
Yeah, but that's used shit? What are you doing?
HART
This is an authentic first-edition. You don't understand the magic and the mystery of this girl.
Eddie sighs in agony.
HART (CONT'D)
I have been waiting for this my whole life. It's what Somerset Maugham says in that thing, you remember?
EDDIE
Me?
HART
Yeah. "There's always one who loves and one who lets himself be loved." ...That's the truth, isn't it? Of course, you know you're in trouble when you're looking for the meaning of life in a book with the word "bondage" in the title.
EDDIE
Larry, she's a girl. Right? OK. See, I always thought your interests went more towards--
HART
My interests? So now you're going to analyze me? Thank you, Doctor Bacardi. Look, I met her at rehearsals for By Jupiter. And she's not an actress. She's a college student. Sophomore. Yale. Not the general school; that's for guys. This is the School of Fine Arts! Bohemian goddesses in gray smocks mixing paint in morning light. She's all of twenty years old.
EDDIE
And you're--what?
HART
A youthful 47! You know what I call her in my letters? My irreplaceable Elizabeth! Can you believe it? If I could write what's in my heart this second I would have the entire audience levitating. Oklahoma! would close in shame if it could hear eight bars of what's in my heart. And I've been in eight bars tonight so I know what I'm talking about.
(Morty plays a little vaudeville sting; Eddie steals a glance at his wristwatch)
Last summer I found myself awake at 4:30 in the morning. And all I'd done the previous five hours. What the hell are you lookin' at your watch for?
EDDIE
Larry, I'm working here.
HART
What the hell do you think I'm doing? And I'm not even getting paid. All right.