Writing with HITCHCOCK. Media Kit

Transcription

1 Writing with HITCHCOCK Media Kit

2 The Scribe Who Knew Too Much An in-depth look at the films made by legendary director Alfred Hitchcock and screenwriter John Michael Hayes In spring 1953, the great director Alfred Hitchcock made the pivotal decision to take a chance and work with a young writer, John Michael Hayes. The four films Hitchcock made with Hayes over the next several years Rear Window, To Catch a Thief, The Trouble with Harry, and The Man Who Knew Too Much represented an extraordinarily successful change of style. Each was distinguished by a combination of glamorous stars, sophisticated dialogue, and inventive plots, and resulted in some of Hitchcock s most distinctive and intimate work, based in large part on Hayes s exceptional scripts. Screenwriter and film historian Steven DeRosa follows Hitchcock and Hayes through each film from initial discussions to completed picture and also reveals the personal story filled with inspiration and humor, jealousy and frustration of the initial synergy between the two men before their relationship fell apart. Writing with Hitchcock not only provides new insight into four films from a master but also shed light on the mysterious process through which classic motion pictures are created. This updated edition includes previously unpublished archival material such as Alfred Hitchcock s dubbing notes for Rear Window, deleted script sequences, Hitchcock s own notes on John Michael Hayes s screenplay for The Man Who Knew Too Much, and forty-four illustrations.

3 Book Facts John Michael Hayes was Hitchcock s most frequent writing collaborator in Hollywood. The first chapter gets its name from the fact that Paramount Pictures thought so highly of John Michael Hayes s treatment for Rear Window that it used to be presented to writers as an example of A Perfect Treatment. Hayes is the only writer in Hollywood to complete more than two consecutive movies with Hitchcock. Following his collaboration with Hayes, Hitchcock never again completed consecutive movies with the same writer. On eight of those ten films, Hitchcock used multiple writers. Although John Michael Hayes was already working as a screenwriter, it was his radio work on comedy and detective shows that drew Hitchcock to call on him specifically to write the screenplay for Rear Window. John Michael Hayes based the Grace Kelly character in Rear Window on his wife, Mel, who was fashion model. On each of the four films he wrote for Hitchcock, Hayes worked on revising and honing the script well into production, dispelling the myth that Hitchcock did not begin shooting until the script was completed and everything was planned out to the smallest detail. Hayes received $15,000 to write the treatment, two screenplay drafts, and all revisions on Rear Window. Although Hitchcock promised a bonus if the film was successful, Hayes never received one. When Hitchcock learned that Hayes had never been to the French Riviera, he sent him there for two weeks to do research in order to write To Catch a Thief. In their spare time and over lunches, Hitchcock and Hayes discussed ideas for a movie that eventually became North by Northwest, although the final movie ended up being written by Ernest Lehman. Hitchcock would not let Hayes see the original version of The Man Who Knew Too Much so that he could have a fresh take when writing the screenplay for their remake. Hitchcock wanted Hayes to be involved as a story editor on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, but they had a falling out before the show went into production. On more than one occasion in the 1960s, Hitchcock s closest advisors urged the director to go back and work with John Michael Hayes. Writing with Hitchcock is published by CineScribe MEDIA $20.00 US (Paperback) / $25.00 CAN / UK ISBN: Published: No of pages: 400, 44 illustrations

4 Author Q&A Q: What attracted you to write about Alfred Hitchcock s relationship with his screenwriters? Alfred Hitchcock himself said his favorite part of making movies was the time spent in his office with the writer when they plotted, invented, and devised new ways to thrill an audience. Yet this has remained an overlooked aspect of Hitchcock s career because more attention is paid to stars and directors than to writers. The politics of the Hollywood studio system and the widening acceptance of the auteur theory downplayed the significance of the screenwriter s contribution to the art of filmmaking. The director who has been most often canonized as an auteur is Hitchcock. And Hitchcock never went out of his way to correct the myth that he was the sole creator of his movies. Q: How did you come to select John Michael Hayes as your subject? Hitchcock frequently made disparaging remarks about his writers in interviews. No Hitchcock writer felt this injury more than John Michael Hayes. In François Truffaut s book, Hitchcock dismissed Hayes as a radio writer who wrote the dialogue. This comment was made after Truffaut praised Rear Window as Hitchcock s very best screenplay in all respects. I wanted to give Hayes his due credit by highlighting his contributions to the films he made with Hitchcock. Q: How did Hitchcock come to call on Hayes? In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Hitchcock had suffered a string of box-office flops and the failure of his own prodcution company, and he needed a hit. He used to listen to the radio often and kept on hearing John Michael Hayes s name, so when he was preparing to move from Warner Brothers to Paramount to make Rear Window, he asked his agents to get hold of this writer. As it turned out, they were represented by the same agency. Q: What did Hayes bring to Hitchcock? John Michael Hayes s greatest contribution to the films he wrote for Hitchcock were richly drawn, sympathetic characters. But more than that, Hayes brought a wit, sophistication and lightness to Hitchcock s work that had been lacking, particularly in his films at Warner Brothers. In Writing with Hitchcock, I describe how the whole conflict between Lisa and Jeff came from John Michael Hayes s own relationship with his wife, Mel, who like Lisa Fremont was a fashion model, and at one time, for career reasons, he had been putting off marrying her. In Rear Window, the protagonist s story is clearly discernable and it is clearly emotional. In movies and in drama, characters have to overcome obstacles. Sometimes those obstacles are physical, but most often, to achieve a powerful lasting impact, the obstacles must be emotional ones. John Michael Hayes understood this, and that s one of the reasons his films with Hitchcock endure. Q: What is your favorite Hitchcock film? Why? It s always difficult to answer that question, because I have so many favorites for different reasons. But if I had to choose one film to watch over and over, it would be Rear Window. It s the film in which nearly all of Hitchcock s major themes and greatest techniques meshed with their primary purpose entertainment. Voyeurism, fear of intimacy, point of view editing, it could be told completely visually in other words you could turn off the volume and still understand exactly what is happening in the story. It is arguably his best written film. Easily one of his warmest. It has Grace Kelly, at her most lovely, and the quintessential everyman hero in James Stewart. For more information visit writingwithhitchcock.com Media Contact: Veronica Louis veronica@cinescribemedia.com Steven DeRosa is a screenwriter and has also worked as an editor of movie theater previews. He has lectured on screenwriting and film at NYU s Hitchcock Centennial Conference, The American Museum of the Moving Image, Film Forum, and New School University, and has been a contributing writer to the Writers Guild of America Awards. Steven can be seen on-screen in the documentary, The Master s Touch: Hitchcock s Signature Style, available on Warner Home Video s 50th Anniversary Blu-ray of North by Northwest, as well as in featurettes on Paramount s DVD release of To Catch a Thief. The author can be contacted at steven@writingwithhitchcock.com or through the Writing with Hitchcock Facebook community at facebook.com/writingwithhitch

5 Praise for Writing with Hitchcock For many, Hitchcock is and has been the very definition of cinematic auteur. Steven DeRosa s book gives us fascinating insight into the collaboration between Alfred Hitchcock and screenwriter John Michael Hayes, a collaboration that resulted in four of the master s finest films. The auteur did not work alone. Curtis Hanson, Director, L.A. Confidential With diamond clarity, Steven DeRosa defines the art, the joy, the rewards and the hazards of screenwriting for a cinematic genius like Alfred Hitchcock. Joseph Stefano, screenwriter of Psycho The four films that John Michael Hayes wrote for Hitchcock, were made during the richest and most complex period in the director s career. DeRosa describes the relationship in meticulous detail, providing fascinating evidence of the extreme care with which Hitchcock chose and worked with his writers. The New York Times Book Review Steven DeRosa s book eloquently reminds us, someone actually had to sit down and write the scripts. Writing with Hitchcock offers not only entertaining biographical sketches of both men, chockful of anecdotes, but a thorough illumination of the Hitchcock/Hayes collaboration: how it worked, who contributed what, and how it ended. Variety John Michael Hayes wrote the screenplays for a quartet of Alfred Hitchcock s perennially popular film classics. Steven DeRosa skillfully shows just how the works took shape and why Hayes must be ranked as one of Hollywood s great writers. Donald Spoto, The Dark Side of Genius: The Life of Alfred Hitchcock Collaboration is the key word in the subtitle to Steven DeRosa s intriguing book key because it was never a word for which the master of suspense had any time. John Michael Hayes, the hitherto unsung hero of DeRosa s book, wrote four scripts for Hitchcock To Catch a Thief, The Trouble With Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Rear Window, this last, the film that sealed Hitch s highbrow reputation. Sunday Times (London) DeRosa s research is impeccable, and he charts the genesis and progress of each of the projects with style and wit. This is a subperbly insightful portrait of a short-lived but productive creative marriage. Scotland on Sunday It s a finely detailed story DeRosa tells. And like all the best Hollywood tales (egos, money, pressure, hard feelings, and a whole lot of work), it ends sadly. Ed Sikov, On Sunset Boulevard: The Life and Times of Billy Wilder DeRosa has soundly researched his subject and gives us not only an in-depth portrait of this working relationship but a comprehensive look at the industry in the late 1950s. The author engagingly describes the cultural politics of the time and brings convincing drama to Hayes and Hitchcock s breakup. An important study for film and Hitchcock scholars. Publishers Weekly