Movie review - "The Long Hot Summer" (1958) **

 Disappointing. Tennessee Williams lite. CinemaScope, Fox stars, Method actors, Paul Newman looking sexy, Orson Welles mugging it up, Joanne Woodward isn't hot for Newman until the end so it's not fun to see Welles try to set them up. If she was hot for him but fighting it... that would've been fun.

Richard Anderson is dull though I guess that works. Tony Franciosca carries on. Lee Remick looks as though she's going to be more interesting than she is. Angela Lansbury provides solid support as always. 

I wanted to like this more than I did.

Movie review - "Streetcar Named Desire" (1951) *****

 Over seventy years on few cinema entrances beat Marlon Brando walking into the apartment here with his insolence and confidence. Vivien Leigh matches him of course with her brilliance - she has the added advantage of having gone mad. Kim Hunter and Karl Malden are very solid support - the less flashy roles, but so crucial.

It's so much better plotted than most Williams works - the arrival, the mystery of Blanche's past, the concern over money, the use of Mitch, the build to climax.

The domestic violence is startling as is the depiction of sexual longing and satisfaction. The censor imposed final scene is fine because we all know Stella will go back to Stanley within a week.

A masterpiece.

Movie review - "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" (1958) ***1/2

 MGM's luck wasn't great in the late 50s but it held for this Tennessee Williams adaptation - Dore Schary bought it as a vehicle for Grace Kelly who then retired but Elizabeth Taylor stepped in and for all her vocal limitations was a perfect horny housewife. Paul Newman wasn't a big star at the time - rising but not big - but he was offered the male lead (I think Ben Gazzara may have turned it down) and it worked like gangbusters.

Newman doesn't sleep with Taylor because of guilt over his friend more than being gay for his dead friend but that works on its own terms. There's still Burl Ives' bombastic Big Daddy, and Jack Carson and Madeleine Sherwood as Taylor's dreadful in laws (because it's Williams she's more of a shrew he's amiable but waeak).

It's a solid movie. Richard Brooks suits it, at that stage. Taylor, Newman and Ives all get a chance to monologue.

Movie review - "Sweet Bird of Youth" (1962) **1/2

 Tennessee Williams play had plenty of familiar characters - the male drifter failed actor (a type that was in Picnic), the ageing film star - but was very well done with solid drama, such as the drifter Chance giving his ex the clap, and her foul family castrasting Chance at the end.

MGM cleaned it up. The piece is robbed of its doom and tragedy. It retains much that is very effective - Paul Newman is terrific (as you'd hope so considering he played it on Broadway), ditto Geraldine Page. It think Richard Brooks, with his yelly style, suited Tennessee Williams. He makes sure there's a sexual charge.

This lost money though. Maybe the Williams tide was running out. Maybe it would've been a bigger hit with say Ava Gardner in the lead - but their scenes wouldn't have had the same charge.

Shirley Knight isn't bad but doesn't have the heavy aura of tragedy that role really should have. She doesn't seem like someone who's lost a child. Rip Torn and Ed Begley are electric. Knight was always pretty and fine but her performances seemed to lack an extra gear - just imagine what, say, Joanne Woodward or Gena Rowlands could have done with it.

The ending is dumb. So dumb. That awful pompous bland newspaper editor. Them beating up Chance. But then Chance/Newman and Heavenly/Knight going off together. It's really abrupt too like Brooks was embarassed.

I think the film needed a tragic ending for it to have power. He didn't need to be castrated - he comes back and heroically dies trying to protect Heavely, gets shot by Rip Torn., dies in her arms... that works. Because as it is too much of the play is kept for that ending to work. Newman begs Page for a scren test only a few minutes before the final scene. So there's no redemption. No heroism. He's taking what he can.

Movie review - "The Glass Menagerie" (1950) **1/2

 The play is fine. Simple. Autobiographical. I can imagine is cast correctly it would've played beautifully.

This film is... is what it is. Gets off to wrong start with Arthur Kennedy in the merchant marine. Kennedy doesn't feel like Tom. Too strong. Kirk Douglas is also too strong. I mean, why is he calling on her. He's doing his best. Everyone is. The film is made with care. The cast just annoyed me.

Jane Wyman didn't I should say. She was playing it like the text. Gertrude Lawrence wasn't bad. She was just whatever. The flashback scenes seemed dumb.

Some of the scenes play well - Douglas and Wyman in the dark with the lights. But even then Douglas feels too cocky.

Who would've worked? Well, a faded beauty film star for the role of Amanda. Bette Davis, or someone. And a sensitive new age boy for Tom - Monty Clift, or Farley Granger. 

The happy ending is insulting.

Movie review - "The Rose Tattoo" (1955) ***

 A big deal in its day - Anna Magnani had buzz, Tennessee Williams and Burt Lancaster were stars, Daniel Mann was consideredn an exciting director.

It's not bad. Magnani is a woman whose husband dies in an accident. She whines about it. Her daughter Maria Pavan is horny for Ben Cooper. Like all these Williams' adaptations I've been watching it feels a half an hour too long. It drags. Lancaster doesn't appear until like 45 minutes in.

At first I was resistant to it and I'm not convinced it's a great movie or anything - too 1950s-adaptation-of-Broadway - but I got used to it.Lancaster is clearly trying - he's slightly amateurish but he's giving it a go, suits the part physically, and is a handsome charismastic star. Magnani Acts all over the place but she commits too. It helps a lot that the two seem into each other and like each other. This was missing in Fugitive Kind - Brando and Magnani didn't seem to care in that one.

Lots of dialogue and acting and two handers. Cooper is fine, I guess. Pavan is sweet. It's a more upbeat Williams. Happy ending and so on.

Movie review - "This Property is Condemned" (1966) **1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 A tour de force for Natalie Wood who is gorgeous and very good as a wildcat living in a small town panted over by a lot of men, including Charles Bronson (a rail worker) and some old dude John Harding. Then Robert Redford comes into town and he pants over her too.

Redford is handsome and gives what David Shipman once described as his "usual hesitant, nice performance". Director Sydney Pollack once said they never cracked the love story - I think the issue is more Redford struggles to portray lust for Wood. He's always been better as a lust object  - Wood's keen for him but you don't get the sense that she's keen for her. Also the reason he dumps her is so stupid - because his mother says she's a liar. He just believes the mother, walks out on Natalie Wood, who is naked in the shower. I'm sorry he doesn't care about her - why should we care about them?

The film feels vey studio bound although there was some New Orleans filming. Some weird decisions - Wood runs off after Redford discovers she's married and stole money off Bronson (so?).. she dies off screen... we don't know what happened to Redford.

Why not have Bronson appear and kill Redford? Or why not make Redford a complete cad? Why cheat Wood of a death scene? It's so stupid. Wood's excellent performance deserved better. Bronson is good too. The mother is fine. Redford isn't up to it.

Mary Badham is Wood's younger sister. Mary Reid is a stock monstrous Williams mother, and Robert Blake is in it too.

Movie review - "Night of the Iguana" (1964) ****

 Tennessee Williams' last hit on Broadway was also his last hit in the cinemas. He's helped by gorgeous casting: Richard Burton as a defrocked priest (apparently the original choice was James Garner who wouldn't have been anywhere near as perfect), Ava Gardner as a lusty woman running a hotel in Mexco, Deborah Kerr as the seemingly prim woman with fire underneath.

I love its naughtiness - Sue Lyons is so keen to bonk Burton who's fighting her off, and Burton is this boozy loser who is still charismatic, and Gardner has these beach boys with maracas. A big role goes to Grayson Hall who is the antagonist, crucial to the story. John Huston clearly adores his characters and he's obviously loving working in Mexico.

This is a funny, fun joyous film. The constrant references to Burton sleeping with young girls is maybe a little dubious if you think about it too much. And like a lot of these William adaptations it's half an hour too long. But one of the best adaptations of the work - if you get the cating right there's a lot of fun to be had.

Movie review - "Summer and Smoke" (1962) **1/2

 Geraldine Page is a very fine actress just not a movie star. Laurence Harvey isn't bad as the hedonistic doctor but the two of them don't have chemistry. I didn't really get the sense he was that into her or she wanted to be pummelled by him. Others may disagree.

(You know who would've been interesting and who was contracted to Hal Wallis? Elvis Presley. He was Southern and hunky and charismatic and played well with older actors.)

But my core issue of this is it didn't get the transformation of Page's character. She's meant to go from airy fairy to hedonism and that's not really well done. It's a sexless version. I can see why it wasn't that popular.

Pamela Tiffin is pretty as the young horny girl who Harvey winds up marrying. She's a little amateurish but it suits the part.

Movie review - "Period of Adjustment" (1962) **1/2

 Little remembered though it was a hit at the time - well, profitable for MGM at a time when everything from that studio was constantly flopping. Also it was from Tennessee Williams, an early role from Jane Fonda and the first feature from George Roy Hill.

It's a more comic take from Williams - no one's life is destroyed or goes mad, although as in many plays it has men reluctant to have sex with women. Jim Hutton and Jane Fonda get married  but squabble and she winds up at the house of Anthony Franciosa, Hutton's old army buddy who's just had a fight with his wife, Lois Nettleton.

Williams' film adaptations had a good chance it it was about a hot, beautiful female star who was horny - here they were lucky enough to get Jane Fonda. Hutton was a dab hand at comedy, which helps. She and Jim Hutton are sweet. Their plot is Huddon is scared to have sex - he didn't even do it with the gals during the Korean War.

I don't really like Franciosa, he gives off too much of a wife beating vibe (I'm not saying he did it, just that's the sense he gives) even if he's a good actor. I didn't care that much for Lois Nettleton or that plot - she's "homey", he married her for dad's money. It feels 50s TV. Maybe if Nettleton had been more heartbreaking or Franciosa more empathetic. Or more Southern. (John McGiver as her dad isn't very southern). I'm being mean, maybe I just didn't really care about either compared to the others. It's also long.

But it's fine.

Movie review - "Last of the Mobile Hot Shots" (1970) **

 Having missed with an earlier Tennessee Williams film, Lumet strikes out again. An even more imperfect source - The Seven Descents of Myrtle - an even more distinguished screenwriter (Gore Vidal), an impressive cast (James Coburn, Lynn Redgrave, Robert Hooks), James Wong How as cinematographer, Quincy Jones did the score.

I know it's Tennessee Williams but this is a lot of hammy yapping in rooms mostly. Coburn marries Redgrave on a game show then they go to an old house and meet Coburn's brother, Hooks. None of the casting feels right. Coburn starts off bad, I got used to him, he grew into the role more, but he feels wrong. I liked Redgrave at first but then she got on my nerves more and more and was eventually too hard. I wanted to like Hooks, it was great to see a black man in a Williams production but he doesn't feel right. Too lightweight or something.

I didn't get it. I'm not sure Lumet did. On a basic level, the themes of sexual attraction and the menace of the incoming flood are not felt at all.

This film and Boom! killed Williams' appeal as someone whose work Hollywood wanted to adapt (though he came back on TV in the 1980s).

I've got to say though - it's oddness has an appeal.

Movie review - "The Fugitive Kind" (1960) **

 Must have seemed like a sure fire thing - Brando, Magnani, Lumet, Williams, Woodward.

But it doesn't work. It's so long - two hours and feels it. Lots of chat. A small town in New York stood in for the South - that doesn't really work.

I mean, it's interesting to watch these actors. But it's not sexy. Magnani feels off. Brando seems a little too old - he's meant to be thirty, ageing... but he's not trying. The opening scene where he talks is interesting.

On a basic level the film doesn't work - it's not sexy, we don't feel a sense of impending doom about the town.  The material isn't the strongest- there's a reason the play flopped - but it has inherent sex and violence so could work on a base level but doesn't here. Maybe Lumet was the wrong director.

This movie has its fans. I just wasn't in to it.

Brando only did it for the money - oh the days when he'd sell out making a million dollars to appea in a Tennessee Williams adaptation directed by Sidney Lumet!

Book review - "Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimmage of the Flesh" by John Lahr (2014)

 Excellent look at Williams' life and times - occasionally reads like a series of in depth New Yorker profiles cobbled together but since those profiles are in depth that's okay. Very well researched, beautifully written, it analyses Williams' life and how it informed his work and vice versa. A had just read Williams' memoirs and this counter balanced it beautifully.

Full of exotic characters - the star, plus Elia Kazan, Audrey Wood, Maria St Just, Diana Barrymore (they were mates), Frank Merlo and so on. Worthy look at one of our greatest writers, even if he was a shit a lot of the times.

Book review - "Memoirs" by Tennessee Williams

 The 1970s weren't an easy decade for Williams but this is a first rate memoir - the writing is tight, clever, wry, warm. He was always good on himself. Honest. Maybe too accepting of flaws... a little restraint wouldn't have hurt.

John Waters wrote an entertaining introduction posing the question what would have happened had he lived. I wonder. Amazing work ethic.

Full of colourful characters: his sister Rose, mother, father, Gore Vidal and Truman Capote, Frank Merlo, Tallulah Bankhead, Maria St Just, David Merrick, Elia Kazan, Brando. There's lots of gay sex - like a lot. And pill popping and meltdowns and cracking up.

Williams writes with lucidity and power. His skills had not deserted him.

Movie review - "Boom!" (1968) **

 Cripes. Odd. Weird. The play is weird but this is weirder because Liz Taylor is too young and Richard Burton too old. Interesting locations. Noel Coward looks half dead as the witch of Capri. Joanna Shimkus is lovely as the secretary but she feel miscast too.

Too random and weird to be a bad movie. Striking locations and set design. Occasionally the camera moves. This is really a two hander. The little person feels extraneous.

Play review - "In the Bar of a Tokyo Hotel" by Tennessee Williams

 One of Williams' flops but I liked it. Simple one act play in two scenes about a painter cracking up and his girlfriend tries to take advantage. Both are Tennessee Williams and this was written when he really flipped out.

Script review - "Baby Doll" by Tennessee Williams

 Really it should be credited to Williams and Kazan. It's a Williams work don't get me wrong - the South, the sex, the odd characters. But it has more of a Kazan drive and passion. The plots about burning down the gin, and getting revenge feel like they've been infused with Kazan. Odd ending.

I don't rate this as highly as others do but it is its own thing.

Play review - "Summer and Smoke" by Tennessee Williams (1948)

 Basically a two hander, quite touching, about a relationship between two neighbours who knew each other as children, Alma and John. Alma is a spinster and then John is a talented doctor. Originally he's a party boy, who drink drives and goes to casinos and she's all prim... then he gets respectable and she goes off the rails. Written with empathy. It feels like a work in progress but not bad.

Play review - "Seven Descents of Myrtle" by Tennessee Williams

Curious to read this because it was slammed in William Goldman's The Season. A good play is in here trying to get out. It doesn't get out. 

It's a three hander with a decent central story - a married couple arrive at a house trying to get possession of it off the man's half brother. The half brother is part black which is interesting as is the fact his brother is a tranvestite. The wife is a former show girl.

But the characters don't really leap off the stage, there's no heat between the wife and the half brother, the ticking clock of the incoming flood is underutilised.. The death of the transvestite has some power but there's too much chat and it feels undercooked.

Play review - "Orpheus Descending" by Tennessee Williams (1957)

 Filmed as The Fugitive Kind. A hot stud (with a guitar). Some horny women getting on in years. Good ole boys who turn violent. A violent climax. Carol, one horny lady, is introduced and forgotten as another one, Lady, takes over. It has a solid structure, is interesting, feels as though it needed another draft.