There’s no mystery at all why Elia Kazan — after “A Streetcar Named Desire” and “Baby Doll” — opted not to film “The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond,” a third script that Tennessee Williams wrote for him. Even if it were not filmed in the dreariest TV-movie style by the debuting Jodie Markell, this romantic melodrama set in 1920s Mississippi seems almost like a self-parody of Williams’ earlier work.
Bryce Dallas Howard gives a performance as broad as a barn door as Fisher Willow, a boozing, sexed-up flapper who seems like a cross between Blanche DuBois of “Streetcar” and Zelda Fitzgerald.
A social outcast because her daddy flooded neighboring farms, Fisher is forced to hire Jimmy Dobyne (Chris Evans) as her escort to debutante parties.
Jimmy comes from a once-prominent family, but his drunken father has been reduced to working as an employer on the Willow farm.
Fisher develops a crush on the hunky young man, but he’s more interested in an ex-flame (Jessica Collins) from the wrong side of the tracks. When he flirts with her rival, Fisher insinuates Jimmy is responsible for the disappearance of the titular earring, which Fisher has borrowed from an aunt (Ann-Margret, underused).
Evans makes a fairly wooden foil for Howard, and the talented Mamie Gummer is again wasted in a nothing role as a hostess. Ellen Burstyn fares better as a dying woman who asks Fisher for help in meeting her maker more quickly.
Unfortunately, no one was around to help put “Loss of a Teardrop Diamond” out of its misery.