Alfred Hitchcock (160 page)

Hitchcock first talked about his television series in “Hitchcock, Master of Suspense, Turns to TV” by Cecil Smith in the
Los Angeles Times
(Sept. 11, 1955). As well as viewing all the television episodes Hitchcock directed, I have drawn on the research and scholarship of other authors. Key sources include “The Television Films of Alfred Hitchcock” by Steve Mamber in
Cinema
(fall 1971), “Hitchcock’s TV Films” by Jack Edmund Nolan in
Film Fan Monthly
(June 1968), “Hitchcock’s Forgotten Films: The Twenty Teleplays” by Gene D. Phillips in the
Journal of Popular Film and Television
(summer 1982), and, especially, John McCarty and Brian Kelleher’s
Alfred Hitchcock Presents
(St. Martin’s Press, 1985) and “Hitchcock’s Television Work” by J. L. Kuhns, from
The Alfred Hitchcock Story
, ed. Ken Mogg (Titan Books, 1999).

Starting with the year 1956, the chronological detail of my life story is drawn largely from logbooks of the director’s schedule and appointments in the Hitchcock Collection.

Other books: David Dodge,
The Rich Man’s Guide to the Riviera
(Little, Brown, 1962); Oleg Cassini,
In My Own Fashion
(Simon & Schuster, 1987); François Truffaut,
Correspondence: 1945–1984
(Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1989); Paul Henreid (with Julius Fast),
Ladies Man: An Autobiography
(St. Martin’s Press, 1984).

Hitchcock is quoted on
Flamingo Feather in
South Africa’s
Cape Times
(July 5, 1956).

For the section on
Vertigo
, I have cited and referred repeatedly to Dan Auiler’s indispensable chronicle, Vertigo:
The Making of a Hitchcock Classic
(St. Martin’s Press, 1998).

Vera Miles did not reply to letters requesting an interview for this book. Background about the actress was drawn in part from “Hitchcock’s New Star” by Robert W. Marks,
McCall’s
(“May 1957), “The New Grace Kellys,”
Mademoiselle
(Dec. 1959), and “I Walked Away from Fear” by Carl Clement,
Photoplay
(Sept. 1957). Henry Fonda is quoted from Lawrence Grobel’s interview in
Playboy
(Dec. 1981). Harold J. Stone is quoted from Harvey F. Chartrand’s interview with him in
FILMFAX
(Apr.-May 2002).

Sam Taylor is quoted from the Auiler, Krohn, Spoto, and Taylor books, as well as other published interviews and my own phone conversation with him.

The Balcon-Hitchcock correspondence can be found among the Balcon Papers at the BFI. The director’s May 1, 1957, letter to Anita Colby is in the Hitchcock Collection.

I consulted numerous articles and interviews with Kim Novak to depict her relationship with Hitchcock. My key sources include Peter Harry Brown,
Kim Novak, Reluctant Goddess
(St. Martin’s Press, 1986), “Dream Date: Kim Novak” by John Calendo,
Interview
(Mar. 1981), “Looking Back at
Vertigo”
by Roger Ebert in the
Chicago Sun-Times
(Oct. 17, 1996), and Beauregard Houston-Montgomery’s interview with the actress in
Interview
(Dec. 1986).

Other books: Charles Barr,
Vertigo
monograph (BFI, 2002).

My account of the evolution of
North by Northwest
, and Hitchcock’s relationship with Ernest Lehman, is drawn from Lehman’s papers in the Harry Ransom Library, and from several Lehman interviews, including those in the Spoto and Taylor books, and: “Ernest Lehman: An American Film Institute Seminar on His Work” (1977), John Brady’s interview in
The Craft of the Screenwriter
(Simon & Schuster, 1981), Joel Engel’s interview in
Screen Writers on Screen Writing
(Hyperion, 1995), and “The View from Here: A Conversation with Ernest Lehman” by Susan Bullington Katz, in the
Journal
(of Writers Guild-West) (June 1995). Gregg Garrett’s “The Men Who Knew Too Much: The Unmade Films of Hitchcock and Lehman” in the
North Dakota Quarterly
(spring 1993) added intriguing information about the “unmade” Hitchcock-Lehman projects that followed
North by Northwest.

Truffaut writes about Stewart being “too old to play the lead” in Hitchcock films after
Vertigo
in “Slow Fade: The Declining Years of Alfred Hitchcock,”
American Film
(Jan.-Feb. 1985).

James Mason is quoted from
Before I Forget
(Hamish Hamilton, 1981). Hitchcock describes Eva Marie Saint’s costuming in “Alfred Hitchcock Talking,”
Films and Filming
(July 1959). “Hitchcock gave me three directions …” is from “Five of Hitchcock’s Leading Ladies Speak Up for the Great Director” by Robert Blanco,
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
(1997 syndicated article). The Styrofoam cup anecdote comes from “Reel to Real,” David Fantle and Thomas Johnson’s interview with Eva Marie Saint in
Senior Highlights
(Nov. 1996).

Cary Grant and Hitchcock are quoted during location filming in New York from “Excitement at the Plaza: Hitchcock, Cary Grant” by Richard C. Wald in the
New York Herald Tribune
(Sept. 7, 1958). “Alfred Hitchcock’s ‘Expedient Exaggerations’ and the Filming of
North by Northwest
at Mount Rushmore” by Todd David Epp in
South Dakota History
(fall 1993) recounts what transpired on location at Mount Rushmore.

Again and again I drew and quoted from Stephen Rebello’s invaluable
Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of Psycho
(Dembner Books, 1990). Other key books that informed this section include Robert Bloch’s
Once Around the Bloch: An Unauthorized Autobiography
(Tor, 1993) and
Filmguide to
Psycho by James Naremore (Indiana University Press, 1973). I also consulted
“Psycho:
The Making of Alfred Hitchcock’s Masterpiece” by Rebello in
Cinefantastique
(Oct. 1986); this
Cinefantastique
special issue is somewhat different from Rebello’s later book, and includes the Saul Bass interview where Bass claims to have directed the shower sequence.

Besides the Rebello book, Joseph Stefano is quoted from his BBC transcript and “An Interview with Joseph Stefano” by Sylvia Caminer and John Andrew Gallagher in
Films in Review
(Jan.-Feb. 1996). Janet Leigh is quoted from the Rebello book, but I also consulted numerous interviews and quoted the actress from her memoir
There Really Was a Hollywood
(Doubleday, 1984) and her book
Behind the Scenes of
Psycho with Christopher Nickens (Harmony, 1995).

To report how the Production Code censors handled
Psycho
, I drew on “Hays Code: Out-Psyched by Hitch” by Jerry Drucker in the
Los Angeles Times
Calendar section (Oct. 28, 1979).

The Tel Aviv and Copenhagen incidents were recounted for
Camera Three.

Philip K. Scheuer handicapped Hitchcock’s Oscar odds in “Scheuer’s Forecast of Oscar Winners” in the
Los Angeles Times
(Apr. 16, 1961). “We’re on dangerous ground …” is from George Angell’s BBC interview. “The studios run those things …” and Hitchcock’s recollection of seeing pornographic movies and a live sex act in Japan are from
Interview
(Sept. 1974). “Oscars aren’t the end-all …” is from “The Old Wrangler Rides Again” in the book
John Ford Made Westerns: Fiming the Legend in the Sound Era.

Ron Miller’s interview with Alfred Hitchcock appeared in San Jose State College’s
Lyke
magazine (spring 1960). Miller also answered queries by E-mail.

For the section on
The Birds
, I drew extensively on Kyle B. Counts’s definitive “The Making of Alfred Hitchcock’s
The Birds”
in
Cinefantastique
(fall 1980).

Evan Hunter has been interviewed numerous times, and is quoted mainly from his book
Me and Hitch
(Faber, 1997) but also from
Cinefantastique
and his BBC transcript. I have also drawn from “Jay Presson Allen and Evan Hunter,”
On Writing
, a publication of the Writers Guild-East (Mar. 24, 1993), “Writing
The Birds:
An Interview with Evan Hunter,”
Scenario
5, no. 2, “Writing for Hitch: An Interview with Evan Hunter” by Charles L.P. Silet;
Hitchcock Annual
(1994-95); “Words of the Week” (Hunter’s talk before London’s National Film Theatre) in the
Independent
(June 14, 1997).

Tippi Hedren is quoted from various published and unpublished interviews, including the
Cinefantastique
article, Tony Lee Moral’s
Hitchcock and the Making of
Marnie (Scarecrow Press, 2002), her Southern Methodist University oral history, her BBC transcript, and her interview in 2000 with journalist Scott Eyman, a copy of which was supplied to the author. The “three golden birds with seed pearls” anecdote is from “Tippi Hedren—From
The Birds
to the Roar of the Lions” by Marianne Gray in
Photoplay
(May 1982).

“Never dared face them …” and “Almost as though she were cleansing herself…” are from “Art Is Immersion,” Fletcher Markle’s interview with Hitchcock for the CBC
Telescope
series (broadcast in 1964).

“Your letter made me cry …” is from a June 11, 1962, cable from Hitchcock to Truffaut. All the cited Hitchcock-Truffaut correspondence, the original tape recordings, and the complete transcript of the interview sessions are in the Hitchcock Collection. I have also relied upon the biography
Truffaut
by Antoine de Baecque and Serge Toubiana (Knopf, 1999).

For the section on
Marnie
, I referred repeatedly to the authoritative book
Hitchcock and the Making of
Marnie, and author Tony Lee Moral generously consulted with me on findings and interpretations.

Hitchcock discussed Grace Kelly’s casting in
Marnie
in “Grace Kelly … Ice That Burns Your Hands” with Peter Evans in the
Daily Express
(Mar. 24, 1962). Mariette Hartley is quoted from
Breaking the Silence
with Anne Commire (Putnam’s, 1988), and from “20 Questions” in
Playboy
(Aug. 1982). Sean Connery is quoted from Andrew Yule’s
Sean Connery: From 007 to Hollywood Icon
(Donald I. Fine, 1992). Joan Fontaine is quoted about Tippi Hedren from
Hollywood Royalty.
“He almost had a heart attack …” is from Scott Eyman’s interview.

Other articles and books: Alfred Hitchcock, “It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s …
The Birds!”
in
Take One
1, no. 10 (1968); Camille Paglia,
The Birds
(BFI Film Classics, 1998).

Joseph McBride graciously supplied clippings from his own Hitchcock file, as well as many insights from his personal study of Hitchcock films. His definitive “Alfred Hitchcock’s
Mary Rose:
An Old Master’s Unheard Cri de Coeur” appeared in
Cineaste
26, no. 2 (2001).

The transcript of a “taped conversation between Mr. Hitchcock and Mr. Robert Bloch on Friday, November 20, 1964” and the Hitchcock-Nabokov correspondence are in the Hitchcock Collection.

“You’ll never know what I went through …” is from Hitchcock’s October 20, 1966, letter to the Reverend Thomas J. Sullivan, S.J., in the Hitchcock Collection. “It was fun then …” is from “Hitch His Own Star” by Margaret Hinxman in the
Daily Telegraph
(Oct. 5, 1969).

“I just never believed Julie Andrews …” is from “Hitchcock Still Fighting Hard to Avoid the Conventional” by Joyce Haber,
Los Angeles Times
(Feb. 7, 1973). “Gray everywhere …” is from “Hitch: I Wish I Didn’t Have to Shoot the Picture,”
Take One
1, no. 1 (1966). Keith Waterhouse is quoted from his correspondence with me and from
Streets Ahead
(Hodder & Stoughton, 1995).

The Herb Gardner anecdote is from the William Friedkin interview in
Dialogue on Film
(American Film Institute, Feb.-Mar. 1974). Hitchcock disparages Antonioni in the
Daily Telegraph
(Oct. 5, 1969): “It’s easy to make a pretentious film. Pop in quite unnecessary images to baffle people. Like that Italian chap, Antonioni.” Penelope Houston’s “Hitch on
Topaz”
appeared in
Sight and Sound
(winter 1969). Bill Krohn’s article about
Topaz
, “A Venomous Flower,” appeared in
Video Watchdog
(Aug. 2001).

Other articles and books: Anatoly Dobrynin,
In Confidence: Moscow’s Ambassador to America’s Six Cold War Presidents, 1962-1986
(Times Books, 1995); Frances FitzGerald,
Way Out There in the Blue: Reagan, Star Wars and the End of the Cold War
(Simon & Schuster, 2000); Herb A. Lightman, “Hitchcock Talks About Lights, Camera, Action,”
American Cinematographer
(May 1967); Charles Loring, “Filming
Torn Curtain
by Reflected Light,”
American Cinematographer
(Oct. 1966);
Vladimir Nabokov: Selected Letters, 1940-1977
, eds. Dimitri Nabokov and Matthew J. Bruccoli (Harcourt, 1989); Bob Rains,
Beneath the Tinsel: The Human Side of Hollywood Stars
(Three Lions, 1999); Robert Windeler,
Julie Andrews: A Life on Stage and Screen
(Birch Lane Press, 1997); Norman Zierold,
The Moguls
(Coward-McCann, 1969).

Anthony Shaffer is quoted from the Spoto book, “The Wicker Man and Others” in
Sight and Sound
(Aug. 1995), and his posthumously published
So What Did You Expect?
(Picador, 2001). “I’m a bit disturbed at their psychedelic nature …” is from “Chilling Chevalier” in the
Evening Standard
(Jan. 12, 1971). “We cleaned up the story …” is from “Hitchcock Turns 73, Basks in Praise for Latest Thriller” by Orin Borsten in the
Birmingham News
(Aug. 25, 1973). Henry Mancini is quoted from the American Film Institute publication
Dialogue on Film
(Jan. 1974).

Key articles which informed my account of the making of
Frenzy:
“Hitch … But That’s No Head in His Pocket” by Shaun Usher in the
Daily Sketch
(Jan. 13, 1971); “A Dream—Is It the Vital Clue to Hitchcock?” by Geoffrey Matthews in the
Evening News
(Sept. 30, 1971); “Why Hitchcock Treats His Women Rough” by Clive Hirschhorn in the
Sunday Express
(March 7, 1971); and “Hitchcock’s Finest Hour” by Paul Sargent Clark in
Today’s Filmmaker
(Nov. 1972). “One is preoccupied …” and “No, my father was not …” are from “Thrillers by an Innocent” by Peter Lennon in the
Sunday Times
(Aug. 1, 1971). Jonathan Jones’s perceptive “He Travelled Every Tram Route” appeared in the
Guardian
(Aug. 14, 1991).