Ethan Hawke just admitted to filming Blue Moon was “rewarding” but also difficult.
The 54-year-old actor has teamed up with director Richard Linklater for the ninth time on the film, where he plays iconic songwriter Lorenz Hart, and the filmmaker kept pushing the star to “disappear” into his character.
Ethan told Black: “What Rick really wanted me to do was disappear. After a while, my way of criticizing, Rick said, ‘I saw you.’ And every time he saw ‘me’ he kicked away what I was doing. It was frustrating and difficult. And rewarding. Almost like asking me, ‘Can you build this cabinet with the five tools?’
The Childhood star drew inspiration from his early days on the New York theater scene for the role, seeing similarities between his character and his mentors from back then.
He said: “I got my training in the theater from older gay men. They were intelligent men like Larry (Hart). He’s a writer and he loves life and he has demons and he’s in society at a time when being gay was more of a problem.
“I knew people like Larry Hart, with the extreme depth of feeling and perception and insight. They knew everything about theater, in much the same way monks treat the Bible,” Ethan added.
“And if you have a mentor who’s gay, at least you realize they’ve spent a lot of life in the closet. I recognized them in Larry, and it’s heartbreaking,” he said.
“But I also have this person inside of me. And Rick knew that. And I knew I was excited about this time at bat. This is a role that’s out of my comfort zone, but I know this guy. I’ve played a lot of different characters, but in some ways, Larry is the one closest to my heart,” Ethan Hawke concluded.
