FILM 1716: THE WRONG MAN

TRIVIA: The scene where Henry ("Manny") Fonda is taken to prison was filmed in a real prison. As he is led to his cell , you can hear one of the inmates yell out "What'd they get ya for, Henry??", and a bunch of other prisoners laughing.

Alfred Hitchcock filmed one of his usual cameos, standing in a restaurant as Manny sits, but decided on using a narrated prologue instead.

Although based on a true story, Alfred Hitchcock deliberately left out some of the information that pointed to Manny's innocence to heighten the tension.

This marked the only time Henry Fonda worked with director Alfred Hitchcock. Fonda's close friend James Stewart worked with Hitchcock 4 times.

In the opening scene, it shows Manny (Henry Fonda) playing his bass viol. Seated at the piano, next to him is the pianist/conductor who tags the final note played. This is in reality Betnard Herrmann, the composer and conductor for many Hitchcock movies and many other Hollywood films of that era.

Included among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Schneider.

FILM 1612: STAGE FRIGHT

According to Alfred Hitchcock, he ran into great difficulties with leading actress Jane Wyman. Wyman was required to appear frumpy and inelegant when she goes incognito as a maid, but the actress was reluctant to appear so plain when Marlene Dietrich appeared so glamorous. The director recounted that Wyman would cry when she would see Dietrich looking glamorous on set when she herself was in her maid disguise. Hitchcock said that she could not accept the idea of her character being frumpy or dowdy. Much to the director's chagrin, Wyman would secretly put on makeup or otherwise try to improve her appearance, thus failing to maintain her character.

In "Hollywood Babble On" Marlene Dietrich is quoted as saying, "I did one film for Alfred Hitchcock. Jane Wyman was in it. I heard she'd only wanted to do it if she were billed above me, and she got her wish. Hitchcock didn't think much of her. She looks too much like a victim to play a heroine, and God knows she couldn't play a woman of mystery - that was *my* part. Miss Wyman looks like a mystery nobody has bothered to solve."

During filming, food was still strictly rationed in London. Alfred Hitchcock circumvented this problem by having steaks and roasts flown in from the United States to be prepared and cooked at some of the city's finest restaurants. He treated himself and his leading ladies Marlene Dietrich and Jane Wyman to frequent, extravagant dinners. The director told the actresses that "Ladies must be well fed."

In an extraordinary move for the normally controlling director, Alfred Hitchcock provided Marlene Dietrich an exceptional amount of creative control for the film, particularly in how she chose to light her scenes. Hitchcock knew that Dietrich had learned a great deal of the art of cinematography from Josef von Sternberg and Günther Rittau, and allowed her to work with this film's cinematographer, Wilkie Cooper, to light and set her scenes the way that she wished.

After completing this film, Alfred Hitchcock would not work in his native Britain again for over 20 years.

Famed composer Cole Porter composed "The Laziest Gal in Town" specifically for Marlene Dietrich in this film.

Marlene Dietrich's costumes were designed by (an uncredited) Christian Dior.

DIRECTOR CAMEO: Alfred Hitchcock: turning to look at Eve in her disguise as Charlotte's maid.

FILM 1603: THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY

TRIVIA: One of Alfred Hitchcock's favorites of all his films.

Originally designed by Alfred Hitchcock as an experiment in seeing how audiences would react to a non-star-driven film. He was of the opinion that oftentimes having a big star attached actually hindered the narrative flow and style of the story. He also developed the film with a view to test how American audiences would react to a more subtle brand of humor than that which they were used to.

Location filming in Vermont was hampered by heavy rainfall. Many exterior scenes were actually filmed on sets constructed in a local high school gymnasium. Much of the dialogue recorded there was inaudible due to the rainfall on the tin roof, so much post-recording was necessary.

The film was unavailable for decades because its rights (together with four other pictures of the same period) were bought back by Alfred Hitchcock and left as part of his legacy to his daughter. They've been known for years as the infamous "5 lost Hitchcocks" among film buffs, and were re-released in theaters around 1984 after a 30-year absence. The others are The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Rear Window (1954), Rope (1948) and Vertigo (1958).

"What seems to be the trouble, Captain?" was Alfred Hitchcock's favorite line from all his movies.

Due to the indifferent weather conditions in Vermont, boxes and boxes of autumnal leaves were shipped back to California where they were painstakingly pinned onto trees on a studio soundstage.

Alfred Hitchcock insisted on using a real actor for the body of Harry. He chose Philip Truex.

Unlike some of Hitchock's other leading ladies, Shirley MacLaine became his "eating buddy", and he took her for breakfast every day before shooting. He never propositioned her, but thought of her as "a girl who needed to be fed". After living the poverty-stricken life of a Broadway chorus girl that she had just been plucked from, it was a pleasant change for MacLaine, and as a result she gained 15 pounds during shooting. Ultimately ending in a phone call from the studio telling her to stop eating so much as she was going to "ruin her career before it had even begun".

FILM 1599: HITCHCOCK/TRUFFAUT 

TRIVIA: Kent Jones said that Brian De Palma declined to participate because of De Palma (2015): "...Noah Baumbach and Jake Paltrow just did a movie about him. They worked on that film for about 4 years. I asked [De Palma] and he said he wanted to save what he thought about Hitchcock for their movie." [2015]

Interpreter Helen Scott (1915-1987) is uncredited in this documentary although her voice is heard throughout. Born in New York, she was brought up in Paris where her father worked for the Associated Press. Decorated for her work on the Free France resistance radio in Brazzaville, Congo, during World War 2, she later worked for the French Film Office in New York and helped Truffaut when he needed help with communicating in English.

Kathryn Bigelow was asked to speak in this film but she declined saying she was "too shy".

Famous writer and screenwriter William Goldman feels that the book this film is about ruined Hitchcock as a filmmaker. He pointed out that it made Hitchcock self conscious and concerned with being an artist in a way that destroyed his ability to engage audiences and be the great director he had been up to that point.

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