TennesseeWilliams Tagged Articles at Cinematical

After honing her skills in front of the camera, actress Jodie Markell ("Big Love") chose to make her directorial debut with a rather daunting project that began, long before she was born, as a rare and long-forgotten film script by A Streetcar Named Desire playwright Tennessee Williams. Years after Williams' death, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond – conceived to be directed by Elia Kazan decades ago – marks the return of Southern Gothic romance to the big screen, full of Tennessee Williams's signature melodramatic flavor. (Read Jenni Miller's review here.)

The films alights on Fisher Willow (Bryce Dallas Howard), a spoiled Southern belle who returns from abroad on the eve of the Great Depression and bristles against the social ranks of Memphis high society, even as she attempts to re-enter it. The script has the markings of a Tennessee Williams story -- a mad heroine, romantic longing galore, and plenty of cruel, fickle moments between Fisher and the object of her affection, the enigmatic Jimmy (Chris Evans).

Cinematical spoke with Jodie Markell about the road she traveled to bring The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond to the big screen.

Tennessee Williams is arguably one of the greatest American playwrights, and the film adaptations of his plays have become classics in their own right: The Glass Menagerie, Baby Doll, The Rose Tattoo, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and of course, A Streetcar Named Desire. The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond is one of the few, if only, plays Williams wrote specifically for film. Williams discussed the project in an interview with the New York Times in 1957, and Elia Kazan, the director of Baby Doll and A Streetcar Named Desire, was supposedly attached to direct. It's unclear now if Kazan was ever officially involved; the director instead went on to film Wild River and Diamond has gathered dust until now.

Bryce Dallas Howard stars as the eccentric Fisher Willow, a gorgeous young woman who chafes under the strict rules of her aunt Cornelia (Ann-Margaret) but also wants to make sure she gets her fair share of Cornelia's wealth when the time comes. The Depression is coming, and finances are getting tight, so Fisher is forced to abandon her studies in Europe to return home to Memphis. We're made sure to understand that she's a wild child in the opening scenes where she's the only white woman drinking and dancing at a blues club.

"Well, you tried it just for once, found it all right for kicks.
But now you found out that it's a habit that sticks,
and you're an orgasm addict." – The Buzzcocks

The new movie Choke, adapted from the Chuck Palahniuk novel, is about a sex addict (Sam Rockwell) who, in one element of the plot, hooks up with other sex addicts who attend the same Sex Addicts Anonymous meetings as him. Ah, the irony. The same thing happened to Sam Malone on Cheers, if I'm not mistaken, which makes the joke around 20 years old. Yet, despite that fact, sexual addiction as a term and a (non-DSM-recognized) medical problem seem fairly new to cinema.

Sure, there have been sex addicts in films for many decades, but they were more likely to be described as nymphomaniacs, lechers or typical men. Think of Dorothy Malone in Written on the Wind, a number of the female characters created by Tennessee Williams and certainly the locked up nymphos in Shock Corridor. In the past few years, however, there have been a slew of actual "sexaholics," both male and female, though some aren't exactly referred to in such a manner.

News bites for your Tuesday:

• In the wake of failed attempts at the Triple Crown and terrible horse injuries, Variety reports that Disney is getting ready to revel in Big Red, Secretariat. Mike Rich wrote the script, and Randall Wallace has signed on to direct. The film will focus on the story of owner Penny Chenery, and how she took over her father's horse farm, was slapped with a huge inheritance tax upon his death, and still managed to save the farm and horse. Secretariat then became the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years.
• On the more artsy side of things, Variety reports that Taylor Hackford is cooking up a film called Tenn, focusing on "the formative years" of Tennessee Williams. Robin Shushan wrote the screenplay, which delves into the playwright's "tumultuous upbringing -- complete with a scornful father, depression, conflicts about sexuality and watching his beloved sister institutionalized and lobotomized." In other words, a rip-roaring laugh fest. The project is said to be similar to Capote and how tragedy can breed success.
• Lastly, The Hollywood Reporter posts that Alexander Belyaev's The Amphibian is headed for the big screen, courtesy of Stone Village Pictures. The hunt is underway for a screenwriter, and the company is planning comic books/graphic novel adaptations to accompany the film. It's a strange twist of a story -- an American surgeon in the Amazon saves his son from a fatal respiratory disease by giving him shark gills. But when the underwater kid saves a girl from a shark attack, things get complicated as they fall for each other. It's like Aquaman meets Splash!
  

Whether she's losing roles because she's too busy, because she's done with independents or because she's unreliable, Lindsay Lohan is so known for dropping out of projects that some of us have coined the action as "pulling a La Lohan." It isn't a surprise now to learn that she's being replaced in another film, The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond. You may remember the plot of the Tennessee Williams-penned film, which we told you about in November, as centering on a Southern socialite in 1920s Memphis. Lohan had been cast as that socialite, but now the role is being offered to Bryce Dallas Howard.

As far as reliability goes, Howard may be the better choice, but as for acting talent, I'd honestly rather have Lohan. Howard has so far done awful things for the films she's starred in, and she nearly damaged my faith in one of my favorite filmmakers, Lars von Trier. I'm hoping that Sam Raimi actually gets smart and cuts most of her performance from Spider-Man 3 -- she was almost completely absent from the trailer -- although it might help him to keep her just to make Kirsten Dunst look better. I think for Williams' fans, spoiled with the memories of great actors starring in film versions of A Streetcar Named Desire, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and The Glass Menagerie, among others, as well as in his previously filmed screenplays like my personal favorite, Baby Doll, Howard will be a horrible addition to Teardrop Diamond's cast.

The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond is a forgotten screenplay* penned by Tennessee Williams. In fact, if you search Wikipedia, it doesn't even come up. It is part of a collection that was found after the playwright's death, and was subsequently published in 1984. It is now coming to the silver screen -- with a headline actress guaranteed to grab people's attention.

Continuing her attraction to almost larger-than-life casts, Lindsay Lohan will star in the feature, which also includes Chris Evans, Ellen Burstyn, David Strathairn and Ann-Margret. The script tells the story of Fisher Willow (Lohan), a 1920's debutante from Memphis with an allergy to narrow-mindedness and a habit for throwing shocks and insults. She falls for Jimmy (Evans), the poor son of an alcoholic man (Strathairn) who works for her family. Obviously, the class divide causes a strain which is further amplified when Fisher loses a diamond.

The casting seems fitting on all accounts. Lohan has made an image for herself as a shocking socialite, and she is familiar with the pressures of losing high-price jewellery, a mistake that is becoming a trend. Burstyn as the southern matriarch is a no-brainer, as is Ann-Margret as Fisher's spinster aunt. And Strathairn, well, he embodies great, gritty acting.

I see this film going one of two ways. There could be a reason no one knows about the play ... and if it's bad, it could swallow the talents of the cast. Or, it could take the Titus route. Although Titus Andronicus was a surprising choice from Shakespeare's vast collection (although one of my personal favorites), it came together in an intriguing, artsy horror fest.

[via The Hollywood Reporter]

*Thank you, Derek for pointing out that this wasn't a theatrical play, but a screenplay. MB

This could be one of the most atrocious bits of information that I have ever read: Gwen Stefani is in talks to play Baby Doll! In a remake of the 1956 Elia Kazan film, which was written by Tennessee Williams, Stefani would play a woman whose husband has been waiting through a whole year of marriage in order to finally sleep with her. The original Baby Doll was nominated for four Oscars including Best Screenplay, Best Black-and-White Cinematography and Best Actress for Carroll Baker in the title role. Although the film was controversial in its time, nowadays it just seems absurd, despite having a terrific cast, and I can't imagine how it will play as a remake. Will they attempt to update the story? Will they still have Baby Doll sleep in a crib? Because Stefani would look completely ridiculous in a crib.

Actually she'll likely look ridiculous in the part altogether. It was bad enough that Baker was too old for the part (I consider her casting almost as silly as Sue Lyons' in Lolita), but at least she was a great actress. Stefani is 36. Can she really pull off 20?

I will add that I have the perfect choice to take over Karl Malden's role: John C. Reilly. Not that if he does get the part I will have any desire to see the film.

After posting a photo of James Dean last week, I felt the young Marlon Brando also ought to be represented. First of all, Brando's birthday was this week; he would have been 82. Second of all, Brando's screen test for a film titled Rebel without a Cause (which Kim discovered was not the same as the movie later made with that title) is on the upcoming DVD of A Streetcar Named Desire. Finally, the annual Tennessee Williams literary festival in New Orleans was held last weekend, and events included a Stanley and Stella shouting contest. I felt I was practically required to post a photo from A Streetcar Named Desire. Brando's sizzling performance as Stanley Kowalski won him his first Oscar nomination (although the award went to Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen).

If you want to enjoy movies adapted from Tennessee Williams plays, you're in luck -- Warner is releasing a boxed DVD set, "The Tennessee Williams Collection," on May 2. The collection will include a two-DVD special edition of A Streetcar Named Desire as well as five other films: Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Sweet Bird of Youth, Baby Doll, Night of the Iguana, and The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone. (Sadly, it will not include "A Streetcar Named Marge," my favorite episode of The Simpsons, since Fox owns those rights.)