Stage Fright **** (1950, Marlene Dietrich, Jane Wyman, Richard Todd, Michael Wilding, Alastair Sim, Sybil Thorndike, Kay Walsh, Patricia Hitchcock) – Classic Movie Review 326

Alfred Hitchcock recalls his 1950 British thriller film Stage Fright: ‘Several of the reviewers mentioned Selwyn Jepson’s novel Man Running might make a good Hitchcock picture and I, like an idiot, believed them.’

‘Love held its breath and sudden terror held the stage!’ Sounds great, doesn’t it?

Alfred Hitchcock’s return to his native Britain in 1950 after living and working in Hollywood since 1939 didn’t quite produce a classic but, instead, this amusingly stagy thriller set among show people, Stage Fright. ‘The aspect that intrigued me is that it was a story about the theatre,’ he said. It was filmed at Elstree studios, Hertfordshire, England.

Stage Fright is notable for its attractively theatrical performances and an infamous lie-telling flashback that shamefully breaks the rules of the game. It is exactly like Agatha Christie did in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. Perhaps that was Hitchcock’s inspiration.

Hitchcock asks provocatively: ‘In movies, people never object if a man is shown telling a lie, so why is it we can’t tell a lie through a flashback?’ But he reluctantly accepted: ‘I did one thing I should never have done. I put in a flashback that was a lie.’

Quintessentially Fifties, Richard Todd is properly shabby, sweaty and shifty as Jonathan Cooper, the suspect who goes on the run when the police are after him for the murder of the husband of his lover, star actress Charlotte Inwood (Marlene Dietrich, dressed in Dior).

Jane Wyman’s top-billed star turn is not at all inspired, though she still gives a fair enough account of herself as Todd’s struggling actress friend Eve Gill, who gets a job with Dietrich as part of her plan to investigate, after Todd explains that she’s the real killer. Then there is a new complication when Wyman’s Eve falls for Inspector Smith (Michael Wilding), the detective in charge of the case. This is a regular theme in Hitchcock’s movies going back to The Lodger (1927).

If it is mundane, often frankly creaky, material, Hitchcock still makes sure it is jolly entertaining by the force of his sheer professionalism, relishing the theatre atmosphere and conjuring up some of his typical magical suspense scenes. And, as ever, this is another of Hitchcock’s films that have worn well, even improving with age.

It is quite wrong to dismiss it loftily, like François Truffaut did, as ‘simply another one of those little British crime movies in the Agatha Christie tradition that added little or nothing to Hitchcock’s prestige.’

Such engaging players as Dietrich, Wilding, Alastair Sim as Wyman’s dad, Sybil Thorndike (as Mrs Gill), Kay Walsh (as Nellie Goode), Miles Malleson (as Mr Fortesque) and Joyce Grenfell (as ‘Lovely Ducks’) prove their worth and give it quite a considerable lift through the force of their personalities and performances. And this of course is in a film from a director who affected to despise actors and treat them like cattle.

The screenplay by Hitchcock’s wife Alma Reville, Whitfield Cook and James Bridie is based on Selwyn Jepson’s novel Man Running, which had just come out at the time. ‘Several of the reviewers mentioned it might make a good Hitchcock picture and I, like an idiot, believed them,’ Hitchcock said.

Hitchcock’s young daughter Patricia Hitchcock is also in the cast as Chubby Bannister (!), along with André Morell (Dr Watson in the 1959 The Hound of the Baskervilles) as Inspector Byard, Cyril Chamberlain, Helen Goss, Everley Gregg (famed as Dolly Messiter in Brief Encounter) as Charlotte’s dressmaker, Irene Handl, Arthur Howard, Lionel Jeffries, Hector MacGregor, Ballard Berkeley and Alfie Bass. Vintage old movie character actor spotters are sure to be in heaven. However, most of Irene Handl’s role as the maid Miss Mason was cut in post production.

As usual with Hitchcock, Stage Fright differs from Selwyn Jepson’s story Man Running.

Hitchcock’s cameo with Jane Wyman in Stage Fright.

Hitchcock’s usual cameo is as a passer-by man on the street turning to look back at star Wyman as Eve in her disguise as Mrs Inwood (Dietrich)’s maid 39 minutes into the film as she rehearses her scripted introduction speech to Mrs Inwood.

Hitchcock recalled amusingly: ‘In Stage Fright, I have been told that my performance is quite juicy. I have been told this with a certain air of tolerance, implying that I have now achieved the maximum limits of directorial ham in the movie sandwich. It isn’t true. There may have been a MacGuffin in my film appearance, but not a ham.”

Dietrich bitched later: ‘Miss Wyman looks like a mystery nobody has bothered to solve. Hitchcock didn’t think much of her.’

Hitchcock agreed: ‘I had great difficulties with Jane Wyman. In her disguise as a lady’s maid she should have been unglamorous. When she saw how she looked alongside Dietrich she would burst into tears. So she kept improving her appearance every day and failed to stay in character.’

Indeed, Dietrich wears costumes designed by Christian Dior. She also sultrily performs the original Cole Porter song ‘The Laziest Gal in Town’ while beginning Edith Piaf’s ‘La Vie en rose’ twice. Also, astonishingly, Hitchcock allowed Dietrich unprecedented control of her shots. Hitchcock said during filming: ‘Everything is fine. Miss Dietrich has arranged the whole thing. She has told them exactly where to place the lights and how to photograph her.’ He later recalled: ‘Marlene was a professional star. She was also a professional cameraman, art director, editor, costume designer, hairdresser, makeup woman, composer, producer and director.’

Stage Fright is directed by Alfred Hitchcock, runs 111 minutes, is made by Associated British, is released by Warner, is written by Whitfield Cook (screenplay), Alma Reville (adaptation), Ranald MacDougall (uncredited) and James Bridie (additional dialogue), based on Selwyn Jepson’s novel Man Running, is shot in black and white by Wilkie Cooper, is produced by Alfred Hitchcock, is scored by Leighton Lucas and is designed by Terence Verity.

The only cast members not British are the two top-billed stars: Wyman and Dietrich. The cast are Jane Wyman as Eve Gill, Marlene Dietrich as Charlotte Inwood, Michael Wilding as Wilfred ‘Ordinary’ Smith, Richard Todd as Jonathan Cooper, Alastair Sim as Commodore Gill, Sybil Thorndike as Mrs Gill, Kay Walsh as Nellie Goode, Miles Malleson as Mr Fortesque, Hector MacGregor as Freddie Williams, Joyce Grenfell as ‘Lovely Ducks’, André Morell as Inspector Byard, Patricia Hitchcock as Chubby Bannister, Ballard Berkeley as Sergeant Mellish, Gordon Bell as chauffeur, Cyril Chamberlain, Helen Goss, Everley Gregg as Charlotte’s dressmaker, Irene Handl, Arthur Howard, Lionel Jeffries, Hector MacGregor, and Alfie Bass.

The film cost $1.4 million and took $1,012,000 in the US and $896,000 internationally, so it was not a big hit though it was a UK success.

Patricia Hitchcock also appears in Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train (1951), her most substantial appearance, and Psycho. Patricia also appeared in ten episodes of her father’s half-hour TV show Alfred Hitchcock Presents. She was also an extra in her father’s film Sabotage (1936) in the crowd with her mother Alma Reville waiting for and then watching the Lord Mayor’s Show parade.

RIP Patricia Alma O’Connell, born Patricia Hitchcock on 7 July 1928, the only child of Alfred Hitchcock and Alma Reville. She was born in London in 1928 and died on 9 August 2021, at home in Thousand Oaks, California, aged 93. Her daughter Teresa Carruba said her mother died in her sleep from natural causes: ‘She was always really good  at protecting the legacy of my grandparents and making sure they were always remembered.’

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© Derek Winnert 2013 Classic Movie Review 326

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