Hitchcock Chronology: The Short Night

Entries in the Hitchcock Chronology relating to The Short Night...

1966

October

• 22nd - British spy and double agent George Blake escapes from Wormwood Scrubs prison and flees to Russia. The story is later fictionalised by author Ronald Kirkbride and Hitchcock purchases the story rights with the intention of filming it as The Short Night.

1968

August

• 2nd - Hitchcock arrives in Helsinki to scout for locations for his next project The Short Night. Over the next couple of days he visits Hämeenlinna, Aulanko and Vainikkala railway station, as well as giving interviews to the Finnish press.

September

• 4th - Variety announces that The Short Night will be Hitchcock's next film after Topaz.

1977

February

• The press announce that The Short Night will become Hitchcock's 54th film.

May

• Hitchcock begins working with writer James Costigan on the pre-prodcution of The Short Night, the director's 54th film. Finding it difficult to work with Costigan, Hitchcock soon ends the partnership.

October

• Ernest Lehman begins helping Hitchcock on the pre-prodcution of The Short Night.

1978

July

• Norman Lloyd begins helping Hitchcock on the pre-prodcution of The Short Night.

September

• Feeling that they're still not ready to develop a full script, Norman Lloyd ends his work on The Short Night.

December

• Writer David Freeman begins working with Hitchcock on the script of The Short Night.

1979

May

• 8th - Hitchcock's old friend Victor Saville, who had recently attended the director's AFI Lifetime Achievement Award, dies. Several sources regard Saville's death as a contributing factor to Hitchcock deciding to abandon any attempt to make The Short Night and to shut down his bungalow office at Universal.

2005

July

• 2nd - Screenwriter Ernest Lehman, who wrote the screenplays for North by Northwest and Family Plot, and worked for a while on the unfilmed The Short Night, dies aged 89.