Hitch Goes to Hollywood (excerpts)

Among other things each of the three excerpts below contains at least one example of how chance events in the interpersonal, institutional, or societal worlds around Hitch gave him access to essential developmental opportunities just exactly when he needed them - chance opportunities which were critical in accelerating his development along the road to becoming an "international institution".

"...No doubt Alfred Hitchcock was born “anxious”, or at least “inhibited”. Still that doesn’t exactly book you straight into Norman Bates’ motel. What Hitch needed was a little something extra, something right at the outset to give him a definite jump on the competition, to pump his little “needs and insecurities” up into a fullblown fear -- an awful, endless, abiding fear of a chaotic, unpredictable and overwhelming world, the kind of world that’d smother little Fred with love, and then forget to feed him, that’d keep him so scrubbed up and tidy he probably figured his dipes were starched - the kind of world that only a mother could provide.

And not just any mother. What Hitch needed was a special kind of mother; in his case an Irish Catholic mother from a “stern” cockney, working class background; a “meticulous”, “neat” mother who “wouldn’t venture out of her room” unless she was “perfectly dressed”; a mother unexpectedly blessed with one last little baby boy, a baby who obviously “needed” her.

And Hitch got that little something extra, that early jump on the competition. He got himself “surrounded” with momma’s “doting affection”, with a “devotion” that was somehow “too intimate”, too “overwhelming”, too “intrusive”; a devotion that “imprisons rather than frees”, a devotion that must have driven Emma’s little bundle of joy ever further into retreat; into sitting “quietly in a corner”, ever vigilant -a “loner and a watcher” - “saying nothing”, just “looking and observing a great deal”; a devotion that no doubt drove him even further yet - into that secret world of dreams and fantasies - of escape, and safety, and, yes, revenge; into that inner world where little Freddy finally got his hands on the joy stick, where he could keep the milk trains running right on time, and watch the mud pies come flip-flopping, flying, splashing down, and SPLAT -- all drippy, black and brown, and gooey down the wicked witch’s back.

OK, not exactly Psycho, but still, not a bad start for five. You could say Hitch got his first big break just when he needed it, and her name was momma. ..."

several pages of Arrival omitted here

"...By the time school days rolled around, Hitch definitely had the all the basics - a conscience you could barely lift, a fear that never quit, and the sort of “active inner life” Edgar Allan Poe would have been proud to be bricked up in. What he needed now was the right kind of school, a school that would harness all this potential, a “healthy, English” school with a “relentless moral rigor” - not to mention “whysking rod” - a school that would definitely keep him on that straight and narrow road to Hollywood.

But first he needed a bit more work on the home front, a few more years to cement those ties that bind, to buffer him from all the nasty influences out there on the street - classmates, school chums, friends -the sort of temptations that could easily distract young Fred from the task at hand.

Happily this wasn’t much of a challenge for the folks. At seven, when it “was time to think of school”, that’s about all they did. While the other neighborhood kids were taking that first big step down the road to the Leytonstone local, little Fred just stayed “at home”, safely buried in “his timetables”. From 8 to 11, when the other guys were milling around the playground swapping lunches and hunches, and punches, Hitch was mostly just swapping schools - moving around the East End, following dad’s shop from Leytonstone to Poplar to Stepney. That probably put pay to any danger of him becoming one of the lads. Still just to be on the safe side, Hitch’s folks took whatever extra measures seemed necessary - little touches like hiring on the local ‘paper boy’ as their son’s “protector”, touches that no doubt brought young Fred straight home after school - home to his wall charts and travel books; his steaming potatoes and “fried cod” and “long-back bacon”; home to his “evening confessions”, right there at the foot of momma’s bed... continues in Arrival... Little touches that kept Hitch “safe, quiet, withdrawn, and friendless”; that had him well prepared for St. Ignatius College by the fall of 1910, for St. Ignatius and its three years of “relentless moral rigor”.

St. I. wasn’t around during the Inquisition, but you could have fooled Hitch. The place was perfect. The “rubber strap” hanging in the prefect’s office, like votive candles in that damp, dark church - ever flickering in your mind, a constant reminder of Father Vaughn, of Father Newdigate, their names etched hard and narrow over the confessionals, their knuckles tight. The sermons and lectures and essays, the injunctions and warnings, on sin and sin, and sin and sin, and “sex and crime, and sin and death”; on “fornication, lust and lying, and vice, and murder”; and “theft” and “table manners”; on “frivolity”, and “ice rinks”, and “picture palaces” - the picture palaces that were springing up all over London, that would soon replace the darkened ice rinks where Hitch was already sitting - sitting and watching the screen and worrying, about sex and crime, and sin and vice and death; about the “mortal terror” of “being summoned” down the hall “to the gallows” - to the prefect and his “rubber strap”, the strap that left you “numb” after “three strokes”. The strap, and the Jesuits, and sin and vice and death - no wonder Hitch was more than “terrified of physical punishment”. Thanks to those three years of “relentless moral rigor”, Hitch had worked himself up into a fullblown “moral fear” - a “fear of being involved in anything evil”. Or more to the point, of being seen to be involved in anything evil.

Already Hitch was “affecting an innocent look”, letting “nothing appear on the surface” with the result that it “was difficult to know what might be going on underneath” And just as well, because what was “going on underneath” was much more of a tidal wave than a ripple. In fact it was more like three years of tidal waves - three years of Scott and Shakespeare, of Dickens, and Dante, and Defoe; of treading the boards with the likes of Hamlet and Macbeth, and Exton and bloody Richard; of Paris and London, and Miss Havisham’s mouldy wedding cake; of Jarndyce and Jarndyce, .. continues in Arrival... and Lady Dedlock, “cold and dead” in the melting snow. It was three years of reciting and memorizing and paying “particular attention” to those endless “moral dramas”; three years of studying and performing, and, yes, three years of living them - and not for class, or exams, or “Prize Day”; not to escape that long walk “to the gallows”. Hitch was living them - living in them, and through them - like his .. continues in Arrival... . Hitch was living by proxy, by fantasy, by ... continues in Arrival... trips he was constantly “planning”, by trips he was constantly taking - with Dickens and Defoe, with Shakespeare and momma and Newdigate.

So while his classmates were still busy sorting out what the bits and pieces of Bleak House or Richard II might have to do with the likes of “truth and justice”, “power”, “love” and “corruption”, Hitch was downing the big picture like a plate of yams. He didn’t have to work his way through the concretes to find the abstractions. He had already been through enough concrete to be an abstraction - the justice of the slammer, of the strap; the love of a mother, of a family; the power of a prefect, of a cold, dark, empty house. . .continues in Arrival... Shakespeare and Dante and Dickens weren’t giving Hitch his first trip to Hell, they were just showing him a few more rooms. After a 1000 pages of Bleak House, Hitch wasn’t working out the “similarities between Tulkinghorn, Kenge and Vholes”; or recognizing the “emblematic qualities” of Mrs. Jellyby, or Jo or Jarndyce or Krook, or anyone else. He didn’t have to - Hitch had already met the whole crew. Dickens was just introducing him to some more people he already knew - from his own bleak house. So while the other kids were working their way up to the big picture, Hitch was practically previewing some old clips of his own - clips we’d all be seeing over and over in the years to come - the “grim distrust of public institutions”, of “statesmen and judges and lawyers and policemen” - each more “venal, and small-minded” than the other - “driven by the most intense lust and greed” - none of them “much better than the villains” themselves..."

several pages of Arrival omited here

"... Of course in the fall of 1913 Hitch’s obsessions weren’t exactly the problem. For that matter, neither was Hollywood. In fact it wasn’t even a fantasy. Out of school, out of work, and still out in East Epping, it was gonna take a bit more than mom and dad, or the Jesuits, to get Hitch to Hollywood. It was gonna take The Allies and the Central Powers, and the British War Effort. It was gonna take World War I.

Hitch for his part was probably too busy to notice. Too busy with his books and maps and momma’s home cooking, too busy with the local movie theatres and his evening courses - his courses in “navigation, and mechanics, and electricity”; courses that seemed a logical extension of his maps and charts and timetables; courses that might get him a “respectable position” in the expanding war industries, that might add a few coins to the shrinking family coffers; courses that were suddenly available for a pittance at the local University of London campus, courtesy of the British War Effort; courses that were part of the buildup to 1914, part of the massive Allied campaign, part of the campaign to get Hitch into Hollywood...

continues in Arrival

Information and quotes re Alfred Hitchcock in above come primarily from Spoto (1984), Taylor (1980), Truffaut (1978), Pocock (1981), Rebello (1992), and Miller (1985).

re theoretical discussion of the critical role of chance events in accelerating Hitch's development in each of the above excerpts, see Chaotic Matching/ Spwins.

Arrival contains discussions of academic research relevant to the analyses presented in the excerpts above.

The focus of this discussion re the 1st excerpt ("...No doubt Alfred Hitchcock.. to .. her name was momma") includes, eg Kagan & Snidman, 1991, Plomin et al, 1988, Thomas & chess, 1977, etc re inherited tempermental biases; Egeland et al, 1993; Belsky et al, 1984; Gerrnspan & Lieberman, 1989; re maternal insrusiveness and effects on young child; Erikson 1963; Allen, 1994, etc re issues of trust and autonomy, etc

re the second excerpt above ("..By the time school days rolled around.. to.. the villains” themselves..." ) the focus is on:

* the influence of family moves and overprotective parental behavior on undermining children’s independence and the development of friendships, and on the development of fear. Research cited includes, eg, Brett (1982), Stewart et al (1982), Stokols et al (1983), Goldberg (1980), Minuchin (1974), Wise (1986), etc.

* the influence of St I's in continuing Hitch's development of a fullblown 'moral fear' is discussed wth ref to eg, Wise, 1986; Minuchin & Shapiro, 1983, etc.

* the development of visual dramatic skills is also considered with reference to, eg, Gardner (1973, 1982), and Wood (1993).

all of these references and many others are available in the Arrival. see Sources