Free Alfred Hitchcock by Patrick McGilligan

do is to force the door,” he said.
    “Oh, is there no other way?”
    “I’m afraid that’s the only solution. I find that one of the wards of the key has been broken off. You must have dropped it.”
    “I did—this afternoon, after I had closed the door. Well, as force is the only remedy, do you mind trying?”
    A few heaves with his shoulder proved sufficient to send the door flying open.
    “Thank you so much,” she said. “In return for your kindness may I ask you to come in and sit down until the rain ceases?”
    Bob hesitated for a moment; then he remembered Jim’s advice, and assented, with thanks. Once inside, he lost no time in getting acquainted, and the end of thirty minutes saw the pair intensely interested in each other. Brainy man, Jim (thought Bob), to put me on a stunt like this. I shall never be able to thank him enough! He’ll be glad to hear of my progress.
    At the end of an hour he was all but engaged. Then came the sound of footsteps up the path.
    “My husband,” she gasped. “What shall I do? You must get out of the window—hide—or do something—quick!”
    “Oh—hell!” groaned poor Romeo. “Here’s a go!” To her he said quickly: “Switch out the light, and I’ll slip out of the door when he enters!”
    She sprang to the switch and the room was plunged into darkness.
    But almost simultaneously her husband opened the door and turned on the light, finding Bob at his feet, ready to escape.
    “Bob!”
    “Jim!”
    “You d—n fool!” he shouted. “I said Fulham—not Peckham!”
    Here was Hitchcock’s first suspenseful “love triangle.” But it’s also a triumph of comedic inference: “he lost no time in getting acquainted, and the end of thirty minutes saw the pair intensely interested in each other”—from a director who often got away with sly sexual innuendo while distracted censors fretted over the footage of violence.
    Several of Hitchcock’s
Telegraph
stories make obvious references to the world of theater. The extent to which the stage influenced his filmmaking has never been adequately assessed. Theatrical style and effects—bravura style and special effects—suffused his work.
    Was Hitchcock involved with some sort of amateur theater group during this formative period? Henley’s arranged for employees to subscribe to West End plays. The company also established a drama club, just starting up in 1920, which met to mount shows at the Cripplegate Institute. Hitchcock never claimed any such involvement, but one has the sense, in these early writings, of someone watching people perform, while dreaming up alternative realities.
    One might speculate that in “What’s Who?” his fifth bylined piece, Hitchcock was writing from his own vantage among just such a group. Published in December 1920, this story predicted one of the issues that troubled his own career: it poked fun at producers, who, to him and many other directors, could be a nuisance.
WHAT’S WHO?
    “Now,” said Jim, “the proposal I have to put forward is a novel one!”
    We yawned.
    Jim was the producer of our local amateur theatricals, you see, and beyond that description it is not in my power to make further comment. Jim is twice my size.
    “In the next show each of you three,” he continued, “will impersonate each other!”
    I gasped.
    “Now you, Bill,” he said to me, “will be him”—pointing to Sid; “and Sid will be Tom, and Tom you. Then when—”
    “Wait a minute,” interposed Tom, “let’s get this clear. Now I’m Sid—”
    “No, you’re not, you’re me!”
    “Well, who’s you?”
    “You are,
you fool!
”
    “You’re all getting into a muddle. Let me explain further,” said Jim.
    “Doesn’t need any explanation,” I replied, “it’s all as clear as Tom—”
    “What do you mean?” interrupted he. “If you’re going to get personal about it, I’ll chuck up being you before we start.”
    “All right then, you be Sid, and I’ll be you.”
    “But!”