The Yorkshire Evening Post carried details of the death of Charlie Brown in December 1936. However, this wasn’t the Peanuts cartoon character created by Charles M. Schulz — this was the head carver at the famous Simpson’s in the Strand: Charlie Brown is dead. After working at Simpson’s in the Strand for 59 years he was pensioned off two moths ago (writes the London correspondent of “The Yorkshire Post”). Deprived of his barons of beef… (read more)
Here’s another article from the archives, this time from the Dundee Courier (27/Jan/1953)…
In 1928, British International Pictures ran a series of newspaper adverts, hoping to find new female stars…
Following on from yesterday’s post, here’s another archive clipping about Blackmail (1929) from the Hull Daily Mail (11/Sep/1929)… SOUND v. SILENT FILM VOTE. BERLIN, Tuesday. The first showing in Berlin of the British International Pictures production, “Blackmail,” was used to test the feeling of the public here on the vocal film. The whole work was passed twice across the screen, once with and once without the voices, and the audience, consisting mainly of people connected… (read more)
Another newspaper clipping from the archives! The Dundee Evening Telegraph (09/Aug/1929) proclaimed Blackmail to be a “triumphant success” and Hitchcock’s direction filled with “touches of sheer genius”…
The list of Hitchcock projects that failed to move into production (or even pre-production) is long and relatively well documented. However, I believe this is one which has been missed by Hitchcock scholars — a project to film John Buchan’s Huntingtower. It’s well known that Hitchcock was a fan of Buchan’s novels and he would eventually adapt The Thirty-Nine Steps in 1935. It is also well-known that he considered adapting two other Richard Hanney novels… (read more)
Here’s little throwaway piece that appeared in the Aberdeen Evening Express on October 29th, 1952: What’s a Hitchcocktail? Ask Alfred Hitchcock, famous director of a score of thrillers. It’s a beverage made of vodka, brandy and orange juice. “Hitch” calls it “a suspense-drink,” explaining that you can’t tell what’s going to happen until you drink it…
If I had to give one bit of advice to a Hitchcock newbie, it’d be don’t believe anything you read about Hitchcock… especially anything he said in an interview! ;-) Hitchcock was a man who closely guarded his privacy and was uncomfortable in situations that he couldn’t control, especially with interviewers. For Hitch, this was often a catch-22… he needed publicity for his work, but dreaded intrusive or awkward questions. By the 1950s, he tended… (read more)
In 1928, Hitchcock’s star was rising and he’d signed a new contract with British International Pictures which reportedly made him the highest paid director in England. According to some sources, Hitchcock discovered the picturesque village of Shamley Green during location filming for The Farmer’s Wife (1928). Whether that’s true or not, he decided to buy Winter’s Grace, a period property on Stroud Lane. In 2008, The Telegraph newspaper published a fascinating article which included several… (read more)
I’ve put the Hitchcock Family Tree blog posts on hold until I finish the research, but I’ll carry on with some of the trivia that I’ve unearthed… Firstly, I’ve often wondered why Hitchcock and writer Anthony Shaffer decided to change the lead character’s name in Frenzy (1972) from “Richard Blamey” (as used in the source novel) to “Richard Blaney”. Although Hitchcock books usually note the change in character name, I’m not aware that any have… (read more)
