Richard Linklater’s BLUE MOON to Open New York's NewFest LGBTQ+ Festival
The in-person event will take place on October 9, with a party to follow at SLATE NY.
By: Josh Sharpe Sep. 12, 2025
Blue Moon, Richard Linklater's new biographical portrait of Broadway lyricist Lorenz Hart, will be featured as the opening night title at NewFest37, the 2025 edition of the New York LGBTQ+ Film Festival. The in-person event will take place on October 9, with a party to follow at SLATE NY.
Other notable titles at the festival include Come See Me in the Good Light, the documentary about poet Andrea Gibson, A Deeper Love: The Story of Miss Peppermint, and Christy starring Sydney Sweeney. Running from October 9-21, festival passes are now on sale here.
Blue Moon profiles the final days of Lorenz Hart, part of the hit songwriting team Rodgers & Hart, and is set primarily in Sardi’s Restaurant on March 31, 1943, the opening night of Oklahoma!, Rodgers’ first collaboration with Oscar Hammerstein II as Hart’s replacement. The movie will hit theaters on October 17, 2025 in Los Angeles and New York, before expanding nationwide on October 24, 2025.
In addition to Academy Award nominee Ethan Hawke as Hart, the movie stars Margaret Qualley, Bobby Cannavale, and Andrew Scott as Richard Rodgers. The movie had its world premiere at the 75th Berlin International Film Festival, where it received rave reviews, as well as the Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance for Andrew Scott. Find out what critics thought of the film here.
Linklater produced the film alongside Mike Blizzard and John Sloss. The film is a Detour/Renovo production in association with Wild Atlantic Pictures, Under The Influence and Cinetic Media. Additional EPs include Wild Atlantic’s Macdara Kelleher, Donna Eperon and John Keville, Renovo Media Group’s David Kingland, Lisa Crnic and Aaron Wiederspahn, and Cinetic’s Steven Farneth.
Additional notable film creatives include Director of Photography Shane F. Kelly, Production Designer Susie Cullen, Oscar®-nominated Editor Sandra Adair, and three-time Academy Award® nominee, Costume Designer Consolata Boyle.
Rodgers and Hart helmed such musicals as Babes in Arms and Pal Joey, in addition to the 1934 hit ballad "Blue Moon," from which the film gets its title. Rodgers and Hammerstein went on to create several hits themselves, with South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music among them.
In addition to this project, Richard Linklater is also working on a film adaptation of Stephen Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along. The cast includes Ben Platt, Beanie Feldstein, and Paul Mescal, and is being filmed every couple of years over the course of 20 films. The 2023 Broadway revival won 4 Tony Awards.
Watch the trailer for Blue Moon below:
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