Hitchcock Trivia

[RockyRoad]

.

 

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RockyRoad

[DavidEnglish]

Close, but no cigar.

[CineSage_jr]

Hitler, in THE LADY VANISHES.

[DavidEnglish]

Almost reich, but not quite there. Getting closer on the famous person.

[LuckyDan]

Benito Mussolini was a fan of Hollywood. Was it he?

 

P.S. I almost hope I'm wrong, because I know very little Hitch trivia that hasn't already been discussed.

 

P.P.S. Oh and yes, Saboteur.

 

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LuckyDan

 

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LuckyDan

[CineSage_jr]

Mussolini admired the grandiosity of Hollywood's product, and resented their eclipse of Italy's film production during World War I, a position that Hollywood, of course, has never relinquished. In his desire for Italy to regain its pre?minence in cinema, and convinced of film's indispensible power as propaganda to further the ends of his Fascist state, he ordered the construction of Rome's giant Cinecitt? studios (opened 1937).

 

Of course, Cinecitt? is, ironically, best known as the facility at which some of Hollywood's biggest epics of the 1950s and '60s, such as BEN-HUR, HELEN OF TROY, QUO VADIS and CLEOPATRA, were produced, thanks in no small part to the availability of cheap labor and building materials in post-World War II Italy.

[LuckyDan]

Wow. Good info. Seriously, Cinesage.

 

But do I win?

[DavidEnglish]

> P.S. I almost hope I'm wrong, because I know very

> little Hitch trivia that hasn't already been discussed.

 

Always happy to fulfill someone's hopes, I have to say the famous person was warmer on the last guess (never thought I would refer to Hitler as a warm person). The film is even colder. Once you find the person, the film will probably follow more easily.

[DavidEnglish]

Since no one has stepped forward with another guess, this one is probably too difficult to solve with its dual queries. There are just too many possible permutations.

 

OK, here is one of the answers. The famous person is none other than Dr. Joseph Goebbels (a case of an evil manipulator recognizing the skills of a more benign manipulator?).

 

Now the challenge is to figure out which Hitchcock film Goebbels was simultaneously praising and condemning.

[wordmaster]

"Foreign Correspondent"?

[CineSage_jr]

I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest that G?bbels was referring to a film without overt political content, such as SABOTEUR or LIFEBOAT.

 

SHADOW OF A DOUBT's depiction of small-town America as a hiding place for a depraved murderer (think Fritz Lang's M), strikes me as something that Herr Doktor G?bbels may have seen as an indictment of American morality that could be used as propaganda by the Nazis.

[DavidEnglish]

Turns out the correct answer is Foreign Correspondent (heck, I wouldn't have known it if I hadn't been searching my Hitchcock materials for a trivia question). Good catch, wordmaster. And a special tip of the hat to CineSage jr for turning up a more precise spelling for G?bbels.

 

My initial source for this odd convergence of audience manipulators is an article by Raymond Durgnat titled "The Strange Case of Alfred Hitchcock, Part Three." The article is included in the book Focus On Hitchcock. Durgnat writes, "Dr. Goebbels loved watching Foreign Correspondent, perhaps because the weak old statesman who, under torture, makes such a moving speech in favor of the indomitability of democracy, immediately afterwards gives way and does what his captors want."

 

Back to you, oh mighty master of words.

[wordmaster]

Yes, it seems that Goebbels is the more common spelling, and that the spelling with umlaut and without the "e" is the spelling on his birth certificate.

 

I am not feeling that 'mighty' these days - work pressures are mounting as summer busy season approaches - but I shall return with a question as soon as time allows.

[wordmaster]

Yes, it seems that Goebbels is the more common spelling, and that the spelling with umlaut and without the "e" is the spelling on his birth certificate.

 

I am not feeling that 'mighty' these days - work pressures are mounting as summer busy season approaches - but I shall return with a question as soon as time allows.

[wordmaster]

The more precise spelling, it seems, is the one on his birth certificate. "Goebbels" is the more commonly used spelling of his name, though.

 

Work pressures and health issues are not making me feel that mighty, so I will have to ponder a question and return later.

 

["How do I get an 'o' with an umlaut on it?", he asks teutonically...]

 

[please excuse the double post - it's going to be one of those weeks, I can just feel it...]

 

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wordmaster

[DavidEnglish]

> ["How do I get an 'o' with an umlaut on it?",

> he asks teutonically...]

 

The easy way would be to cut and paste it from someone else's writing (that's what I did).

 

To generate it from scratch in Microsoft Word, you could choose Insert from the top-screen menus. Then choose Symbol from the resulting pull-down menu. Assuming the Font window is set to the default "(normal text)," you should be able to find it about 15-percent of the way down.

 

... he answers germanely

[RockyRoad]

;

 

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RockyRoad

[wordmaster]

Not too difficult a question, I'm sure:

 

In what year did Hitch stop receiving screenwriting credits for his own filmography?

[CineSage_jr]

For anything other than Word applications, I find it easier to copy-and-paste letters with diacritical marks from a website that offers them. The one I use most often is

 

http://www.initium.demon.co.uk/charactr.htm

 

As for FOREIGN CORRESPONDENT, I should have known. I have an original script from the film (240 pages long!) which its author, the late Charles Bennett, autographed for me when I spent a lovely afternoon at his home about fifteen years ago.

[MrWriteLA]

1932 ("Number Seventeen")? (Though he made uncredited writing contributions after that.)

[wordmaster]

That's correct.

 

Away you go.

[MrWriteLA]

One of the director's epilogues to his "Alfred Hitchock Presents" TV episodes was grimly serious rather than humorous (as was customarily the case).

 

What was the episode, and why the decision for the change in tone?

[ayresorchids]

This is strictly a guess--did it have anything to do with the nation's mood after the assassination of JFK?

 

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Ayres

[MrWriteLA]

I can confidently say it did not, as the episode predated the assassination. Nice try, though.

[RobertEmmettHarron]

I don't know this, but I'll take a shot. (Yes, that's a pun.)

Is it the teleplay "Bang, You're Dead," with Lost in Space alumnus Billy Mumy as a youngster who unwittingly carries a loaded handgun rather than the toy he was used to playing with?

If so, I don't know why the ending was changed. Sponsor pressure? Or just that Hitch believed in gun safety?