Ewan McGregor has been playing much edgier characters since he moved to America, and Halston is probably his riskiest role to date. Ryan Murphy is usually associated with campy characters, in the case of Halston it was a man who achieved phenomenal success in an already crowded field. I must say McGregor didn't portray him as a particularly sympathetic character, with his perfectionism offset by his sleazy private life and drug taking. One wonders how much of his success came from drug taking, and also contributed to his downfall. I loved the way he devoted so much attention to each of his creations, McGregor really captured this side of his character extremely well. I hadn't really thought of him as an exceptional actor before, now I can see that he is.
I loved the fashions and the beautiful settings; I especially enjoyed the scenes he shared with Krysta Rodriguez as Liza Minnelli, otherwise most of his boyfriends I found insecure and annoying. Perhaps he was a man who inspired insecurities in others; he also seemed insecure himself. His downfall was clearly mapped out, but despite all this, he was a man who made the most of his life, however he chose to live it, and I think here Murphy has created a legend for the future. I would have scored this film a little bit higher if the script had been tighter and there had been less play on Halston's mannerisms. The cigarette smoking was endless, and almost every scene opened with him lighting up.
