I never said Hedren was a bad actress. I said she wasn’t the greatest actress in the world which is demonstrably true. She’s very good playing the trickster socialite Melanie and out of her depth playing the psychotic Marnie. Her voice is much too high and thin for that kind of serious role and it stretched her small talent too far.
No, I don’t believe many biographies of stars or directors, which all emphasize outlandish claims of sexual misconduct. It’s what sells books. Instead, when I want to read about Hitchcock, I stick with Francois Truffaut’s book or Peter Bogdanovich’s excellent studies. Reading Donald Spoto gets one nowhere.
No Pardons: I watched Psycho last night on Turner & was again stunned by Janet Leigh’s and Anthony Perkins’ performances. The scene between them when he feeds her dinner is one of the greatest Hitchcock ever directed. I organized a dinner for her back in the 90s and she was an elegant lady who, get this, adored her “Hitch.”
Love PSYCHO and yes...when actors and actors COULD act and when directors knew how to do the job; ditto script writes, who make books shine on film! :-)
And talking about those who make scripts from novels...I'll have to tell you my Edward Anhault stories. :-)