It's Only a Movie: Alfred Hitchcock (5 page)

“But if you felt this way, why
did
you accept?” Vidor asked.

“I didn’t feel like this on the day I accepted. I did it for Alma. I wanted her to see all of these people here because of our films. I wanted to go home with her afterwards and see the look in her eyes. That was what I most looked forward to. The best part of the evening will be when we are back at home together and all of this is behind us. We’ll sit and talk about it in the old way, sharing. Another memory for our old age.

“I want to tell everyone how important she has been, not only in my life, but to the Hitchcock films. They are hers, too. And I thought it might be the last time Alma and I could go together to an event like this, my last opportunity to pay public tribute to her.”

“You’re lucky to have had that kind of marriage,” Vidor said. “It didn’t work out that way for me.”

“I hope I won’t embarrass the Madame by not being able to stand up.”

“I wish they’d do it for me, an evening like this,” Vidor said, trying to cheer Hitchcock, and also telling the truth.

“I hope they do it for you while you’re still able to enjoy it.”

“They’d better hurry!” Vidor, though in better health, was even older than Hitchcock. “Well, at least you’ll get a good dinner.”

“I could never eat at a time like this, with everyone watching me. I had a ground steak earlier at home with Mrs. H.”

“It’s my favorite meal,” Vidor said. “Do you know where you can get the best hamburger in town?”

“My house,” Hitchcock answered.

“I’d like to invite you for lunch, Hitch, at my favorite restaurant, Hamburger Hamlet. And they have a good roll and French fries.”

“I’d like to invite you to my house for the greatest beef you ever tasted, but Alma hasn’t been well. When she feels better, we can go to Chasen’s. That’s
our
favorite restaurant.”

Alma was seated with Cary Grant at the honoree’s table as Hitchcock entered. Grant was there to assist Hitchcock, should it be necessary. Everyone in the ballroom rose except Alma, who was so small, she could scarcely be seen. Her hair and makeup artfully done, she had hoped to wear high heels, but needed the support of heavier shoes.

Weakened after a series of strokes, it was only with great force of will that she had succeeded in being there at all. Unlike her nervous husband, she had looked forward with enthusiasm to the evening. She watched intently as he entered and inched his way toward her through an audience that included some of the most famous and powerful names in Hollywood. It was as if she were taking every step with him, so great was her empathy.

John Houseman introduced Ingrid Bergman, who was the mistress of ceremonies for the evening. Speaking from the stage were Anthony Perkins, Janet Leigh, James Stewart, and François Truffaut, and from the audience, Teresa Wright, Pat Hitchcock O’Connell, Norman Lloyd, Sidney Bernstein, Victor Saville, Jane Wyman, Edith Head, Rod Taylor, Vera Miles, Ernest Lehman, Tippi Hedren, Sean Connery, Judith Anderson, and Cary Grant.

During the program, some of the tension Hitchcock had been feeling seemed to lift, and he and Alma appeared to enjoy the evening, especially as the end drew near. The strain of the intense scrutiny was nearly over.

Ingrid Bergman came onstage and spoke directly to Hitchcock. “Now, there’s just one little thing I’d like to add before we finish this evening. Do you remember that agonizing shot when you had built some kind of elevator? It was a basket or something with you and the cameraman, and you were shooting this vast party in
Notorious,
and you came zooming down with your elevator and your poor pull-focus man, all the way down, into my hand, where you saw the key in a close-up. So, that was from an extreme long shot to close-up, just the key that we saw. You know what? Cary stole that key after the scene, and then he kept it for about ten years. And one day, he put it in my hand, and he said, ‘I’ve kept this long enough. Now, it’s for you for good luck.’ I have kept it for twenty years, and in this very same hand, there is the key.

“It has given me a lot of good luck and quite a few good movies, too. And now, I’m going to give it to you with a prayer that it will open some very good doors for you, too. God bless you, dear Hitch. I’m coming to give you the key.”

Bergman left the stage and walked past the tables to where Hitchcock was seated. When she reached him, he rose, unassisted, though not without difficulty. He accepted the key, and they embraced tenderly in what was an emotional moment for both.

Ingrid Bergman was also ill, and there was only a little time remaining for them to be together.

After the show ended, I was standing near Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant as they chatted. “Was that
really
the same key we used in the film?” I heard her ask him.

Grant smiled and shrugged.

H
ILTON
G
REEN
, longtime professional associate of Hitchcock, was there with his wife. Although Green had worked on
Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Psycho,
and
Marnie,
his wife had never met the great director.

“I kept my family away,” Green told me. “I thought that was the right thing to do. But the AFI function was all over, and my wife said, ‘I want to meet him.’

“I said, ‘No, this is not the appropriate time.’ Mr. H. was at a table, ringside, down there with Mr. and Mrs. Wasserman, and Cary Grant, and Alma. They were all at the same table, and I said, ‘You’re not going down there with
that
group.’

“She said, ‘I’m going to go and meet him.’ I didn’t know what to do.

“I’ll never forget. Cary Grant was in the middle of telling a story. Hitchcock was seated and I walked up behind him, and all I did was put my hand on his shoulder. He turned and looked up, and he interrupted Cary Grant, and said, ‘Hilton.’

“I said, ‘I don’t want to interrupt,’ and he said, ‘Please, please.’ I said, ‘No, I just want you to meet my wife.’

“And he said, ‘The Madame is here? Ah! you’ve kept me away from her for so long!’ And he struggled to get up, with a great effort.

“I said, ‘Don’t get up, don’t get up.’

“He said, ‘Of course I’m going to get up.’ And he did. He turned and kissed my wife’s hand and said it was a wonderful pleasure to finally meet the Madame.”

T
HE LUNCH WITH
K
ING
V
IDOR
at Hamburger Hamlet never happened.

The AFI event was the last time I saw Alfred Hitchcock.

A
LFRED
H
ITCHCOCK
turned a small boy’s fear into that incredible body of work,” Robert Boyle, colleague and friend of Alfred Hitchcock said.

That small boy, Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, was born at the very end of Queen Victoria’s reign, and he grew up during the Edwardian era. He would bring to the motion picture screen his own personal sensibilities and intelligence, shaped by a time we can only envision in faded photographs and flickering films.

The third and last child of William and Emma Jane Whelan Hitchcock, Alfred, was born on August 13, 1899, a Sunday, in Leytonstone, at the edge of London’s East End. Hitchcock told me that it was remembered in his family that the day was a Sunday, “because it was one of the only Sundays in my mother’s life that she missed church.” The family’s store is gone, but Hitchcock’s early life in Leytonstone is commemorated by a mosaic picture of him as a child and scenes from his films on the walls of the local tube station.

The Hitchcocks’ first son, William, had been born in 1892, three years after their marriage, and their daughter, Ellen Kathleen, called “Nellie,” in 1896. “I was told,” Hitchcock said, “that as a baby and small child I never cried. Even then, I didn’t engage in the negative waste of energy. I have always looked upon that kind of behavior in public as a loss of control, not to mention dignity.

“Since my brother and sister were so much older, they didn’t have much interest in me when I was growing up, so I had myself almost entirely to myself. I used my freedom to draw pictures and to watch life pass in front of my father’s store.”

Very early, young Alfred became fascinated by the traffic on the High Road, at that time, mainly horse-drawn vehicles. “There was quite a horsey smell, in fact, you might say an overwhelming stench. There was also a lot of noise from the horse’s hooves and carriage wheels. I think it was the beginning of my lifelong interest in travel.

“As a boy, I knew I wanted to travel just as soon as I could. If you are lucky enough to travel when you’re young, everything you see becomes a part of you on which you can draw all through life.”

Early in the twentieth century, the horse-drawn streetcars that passed through Leytonstone were replaced by new electric trams. “I remember their tracks and sparking trolley wire, before they put it underground, coming from somewhere and going to somewhere else, rapidly transporting people to places I could only imagine. And the street smelled better.

“When I was no more than six years of age, perhaps younger, I did something that my father considered worthy of reprimand. I don’t recall the particular transgression, but at that tender age, it could hardly have been such a serious offense.

“My father sent me to the local constabulary with a note. The police officer on duty read it and then led me down a long corridor to a jail cell where he locked me in for what seemed hours, which was probably five minutes. He said, ‘This is what we do to naughty boys.’

“I have never forgotten those words. I have, ever since, gone to any length to avoid a repetition of that kind of experience, loss of control to authority. I have never enjoyed surprises, even good ones, because they make me feel out of control.

“I can still hear the clanging of the cell door behind me.

“I’ve always said I didn’t remember why I was punished, but I think it was because earlier that day, late in the afternoon, I’d followed the tram tracks. I hadn’t gone very far when it started to get dark, and I lost my way. Realizing I would be late for dinner, I hurried home. My father had been forced to wait for his dinner, although I certainly would have been happier for him to have gone ahead without me. In later years, I considered perhaps he was angry because he was worried about me.

“Even before that, I was never a little boy who wanted to grow up and be a policeman. Indeed, policemen have always frightened me, the British bobby being the most frightening. That may come from my youthful trauma, or perhaps it’s simply because British policemen were the first I saw when I was young, and thus they seem more
policemen
than the rest. I think they seem more sinister because they are
so
polite, all those good manners!”

The Hitchcocks were Catholics, a minority in Leytonstone, as in England. “Just being Catholic,” Hitchcock said, “meant you were eccentric.” The ceremony of the weekly Sunday mass impressed young Alfred, though in later life he described himself as “neglectfully religious.” His mother was of Irish descent. His father was descended from a long line of English Catholics.

William Hitchcock was a wholesale and retail greengrocer and fruiterer who had a store in Leytonstone and who dealt with the market at Covent Garden. “When I was shooting exteriors for
Frenzy
in London,” Hitchcock said, “a very old man came up to me who told me he remembered my father when he bought and sold vegetables at Covent Garden.

“Some of my happiest memories were on the rare occasions when my father took me with him to the countryside. He would buy a whole field of cabbages and that sort of thing.

“My parents didn’t require me to work in the store, as my older brother and sister did. Perhaps I disappointed my father because I never showed any interest in his business and no inclination to follow him into it. I could not imagine how a wilted lettuce leaf could be of such concern to him.

“Though my father made a comfortable living as a greengrocer, dealing in perishables contributed to a certain feeling of insecurity in our family. My father had a conservative nature, but his occupation put him in the position of being a speculator. In a way, it’s not so different from my own field. Though I am in no way a gambler by nature, the endeavor I have chosen as my life’s work has put me in a position not so different from that of my father—a speculator in perishables. But no one in our family ever went hungry. That’s the advantage of being the child of a vegetable and fruit dealer.

“My mother was a homemaker, as they say. It was her full-time career, as was the accepted custom in those days. I don’t remember ever coming home and not finding her there.

“Our house was always perfectly kept. Immaculate. I took it for granted. My mother was meticulous about our home and her person. She never left the house without presenting herself at her best, her posture, her demeanor, her dress, her shoes, perfectly polished, a well-kept handbag, inside as well as outside, and gloves whenever possible. I have always admired a lady who wears gloves.

“Ingrid [Bergman] wore gloves, and I thought it very sexy, the way she took them off. I always thought it was more sexy if a woman revealed her secrets gradually, rather than indulging in overexposure.

“My mother was well groomed and properly attired, even when she was cleaning our home. She would put on a big white apron that was spotless and had a starched ruffle, covering everything but her sleeves.

“She was not a complainer. I never heard her complain. She was also not a gossip. I never heard her speak badly about anyone. Her concern was entirely for her family. She did not have women friends dropping over. At the time that did not seem unusual to me. I observed the same thing about my wife. They had full lives and did not need more.

“My mother was a good cook. My father brought home the best greens and even some imported luxury fruit he might have spotted on his visit to the Covent Garden Market. Fresh milk was delivered to our house.

“I liked to shop with my mother on the High Road and especially to visit the bakery where I was always given a free cookie or two. The bakery had the most wonderful aromas. Like perfume. Lemon Cake Number 5. Guerlain Ginger Biscuit.

“My mother liked to cook, but she didn’t care about baking, so our kitchen did not have the same delightful scents as the High Road bakery. I was able to fully enjoy the experience because it was before I ever heard the word ‘diet.’ Plumpness in very small children was considered ‘cute’ and even a sign of good health. It reflected well on the parents and their prosperity, and showed they were taking good care of their child.

“I remember my father going to work in a dark suit with a very white starched shirt and a dark tie. I never saw him when he wasn’t clean-shaven. It wasn’t for the cabbages. It was a matter of self-respect.

“My parents loved the theater and took me with them, whenever my father could be free, and that very much influenced my life. I could feel how much they enjoyed it. I did, too, and I never forgot those green-lit villains in the melodramas, accompanied by sinister music. The heroine always had rosy-pink light to help her to be more beautiful and pure.”

Very early, other children made fun of the way young Alfred looked, one of them telling him he was “funny-looking.” He went home and looked in the mirror. He turned to check his profile. His mother saw him doing it.

“Do you think I look funny?” he asked her.

“You’ll outgrow it,” she said. It wasn’t the answer he was hoping to hear. “I didn’t outgrow it,” Hitchcock said. “I just outgrew. No one wants to be fat. That’s a universal. With a small u.”

His pudgy, overweight appearance, his lack of interest in the games the other children played, and little athletic ability, isolated him and led to his development of more solitary interior interests. As a boy, “I led an active inner life. The other boys judged everyone on their outer lives. I may not have been athletic, but I was well coordinated.” Hitchcock said that he rather came to enjoy not having to participate in games he considered a waste of time. In those first years, his mother was his best and only companion.

“My mother was so consistently there for me, I took her presence for granted, which is a very good thing for a child. I felt I was her favorite.

“I wasn’t a popular type, so I was forced to live in my imagination, and I believe that helped me to develop my creative resources. I don’t need much stimulation from the outside world.

“There are internal people and external people. External people are more likely to spend or waste their creative resources. They are constantly faced with temptations that did not come my way. It was an advantage that the homely, less popular child has. I was forced to develop my interior self, not be dependent on the others. Then my work brought me a kind of appreciation, even love, you might say, that I never expected. Perhaps that made it all sweeter, the cream on the bun.

“My private person, the real me, is a very shy person, not at all the public impression,” he told me. “The man is not different from the boy. To understand me, you have to accept that I’m really, truly shy, you know, and I have been so all of my life. When you start out that way as a child, it’s rare that you lose it. I certainly didn’t. As a child, I found solace in my mother’s company, and in my own.”

A childhood passion he could pursue alone was collecting anything to do with travel, especially tram and omnibus maps. “I kept my collections of maps, timetables, schedules, tickets, and transfers in an orderly, careful way. I liked to see each thing in its place and in perfect condition.”

He imagined himself traveling every route, and then he set out to do just that. This interest was then extended to other cities. “I’d never been on the New York subway,” he said, “but the first time I visited New York, I felt I could have traveled anywhere in the city because I had memorized every line.”

He collected maritime schedules. “The magical moment in any journey,” he told me, “is that first moment the ship or the train departs. It’s as if you’re already a thousand miles away from where you started. I never get the same feeling with air travel.”

Hitchcock disliked the names Alfred and Joseph, and was soon known as “Hitch” to his classmates. Later in life, he was known to say to people he met, though not to women, “Call me Hitch, without a cock.”

Hitchcock’s education in Catholic schools left a lasting impression on him, particularly the Jesuit school, St. Ignatius. “What did I learn in Jesuit school? A consciousness of good and evil, that both are always with me. They taught me control, organization, discipline, and that I did not like to get a tanning, which was something I didn’t need to go to school to learn.

“The threat of corporal punishment was worse than the actual experience. I couldn’t escape the threat of it no matter how careful I was.”

Hitchcock speculated that having this fear of punishment always hanging over him may have contributed to his “ticking bomb” theory of suspense in cinema, that it wasn’t the explosion, but the threat of the explosion that created the suspense. He also learned that a sense of the forbidden and of sin makes everything more fascinating.

“My childhood was not an unhappy one, nor was it happy. At that time, I didn’t have a strongly defined sense of happiness. I was more aware of good and evil, of right and wrong.”

Reading was one of Hitchcock’s favorite activities during his childhood, and books continued to influence him throughout his life. “I was much impressed by Edgar Allan Poe, G. K. Chesterton, and by the English ‘shockers,’ such as John Buchan. I became acquainted with Conan Doyle, Wilkie Collins, and Dickens when I was very young. My favorite Dickens was
Great Expectations.
In Collins’s and Dickens’s Victorian world, to murder someone was an unspeakable crime, an attitude which stayed with me. Even in murder mysteries, it is important not to waste human life. People cannot just be thrown away.