Hitchcock's Leading Men Trivia Quiz

Answer: Sean Connery

"Marnie" was the first film Sean Connery completed outside of his work on the "James Bond" series since he was cast as the titular spy. At the time, having completed three "Bond" films, Connery had begun to worry that his contract with Eon Productions would limit potential future roles, and had turned down every role outside the "Bond" series that Eon had offered him, instead telling them that his ambition was to work with Alfred Hitchcock.

Although Connery and Hitchcock got on well during the production, he insisted on seeing the script prior to taking the role of Mark Rutland, as he wanted to ensure that he was not doing either a spy film (so worried was he about typecasting), or a rehash of earlier Hitchcock productions.

When told by Hitchcock's agent that even Cary Grant had never asked to see a script before signing, Connery is alleged to have replied "I'm not Cary Grant".

Answer: Robert Donat

The decision to cast Robert Donat in the lead role of Richard Hannay was a calculated one by producer Michael Balcon. Donat was under contract to London Film Productions, and had some success in the US market with their films, leading to his playing a role in the 1934 United Artists production of "The Count of Monte Cristo".

As a consequence, Donat had a significant profile in the United States that Balcon was keen to exploit for his production company, Gaumont-British. The success of "The 39 Steps" saw Hitchcock try to use Donat again, in both "Secret Agent" and "Sabotage"; however, on both of these occasions Alexander Korda, the head of London Film Productions, refused to make Donat available.

Answer: Jon Finch

Following the lack of success of his previous two films, Hitchcock returned to the UK in 1971 to put together a largely British cast and crew for his next feature, "Frenzy". The director eventually chose Jon Finch to play the film's protagonist, Richard Blaney. Finch had appeared in two Hammer films, and played the lead role in the BBC series "Counterstrike", and the title role in Roman Polanski's "Macbeth", when he was cast as Blaney.

However, he angered Hitchcock by openly criticising the script to journalists, to the point where Hitchcock almost fired the actor and recast the role.

Answer: Cary Grant

Hitchcock originally planned his adaptation of "To Catch a Thief" in 1952, for which Cary Grant was approached to play the lead, in what would have been his third collaboration with the director. However, Warner Brothers, to whom Hitchcock was under contract, was not interested in the project, and so he was forced to wait until his agent negotiated a new deal for him with Paramount.

Despite the long wait, Grant retained his interest in doing the film, in spite of tentative intentions to retire from film acting.

The success of "To Catch a Thief" saw a renaissance in Grant's career, and eventually led to his fourth and final screen collaboration with Hitchcock, in 1959's "North By North-West".

Answer: Paul Newman

When Hitchcock was in the process of casting "Torn Curtain", he was forced into a compromise over his leads. He had intended to bring in his long-time collaborator Cary Grant in the lead role of Professor Michael Armstrong, until he found out that, by 1965 when the film was in pre-production, Grant planned to retire after the completion of his next project.

The eventual choice of Paul Newman in the role came not from Hitchcock, but Universal executive Lew Wasserman, who insisted on "name" stars for the film. With Newman from a different generation to Hitchcock's previous male leads, such as Grant and James Stewart, the director and his star found it difficult to work together, with Newman often questioning the script and characterisation during filming - on one occasion, Newman, who was a method actor, asked Hitchcock about his character's motivations, to which Hitchcock replied "your motivation is your salary".

Answer: Laurence Olivier

In 1940, following considerable success in Britain, Hitchcock began work on his first American production, an adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's "Rebecca". In searching for the male lead of the brooding widower Maxim de Winter, Hitchcock and producer David O. Selznick had looked at a number of actors, including Ronald Colman, William Powell and David Niven, before deciding on Laurence Olivier, who had just had significant success in the film version of "Wuthering Heights", playing the equally brooding Heathcliff.

The production process was fraught, with a number of disagreements between director and producer, including over Olivier's performance, with Selznick asking Hitchcock to slow down the actor's line readings and speed up his reactions. Olivier himself had sought to have Vivien Leigh cast in the female lead role of Mrs de Winter, but her screen test was poorly received by Selznick and Hitchcock.

Answer: Gregory Peck

"Spellbound" was the second collaboration between Hitchcock and producer David O. Selznick, following 1940's "Rebecca", and again the producer had opinions over who should be cast, favouring Joseph Cotten for the lead role of Dr Anthony Edwardes; the director instead saw Cotten in a different role in the film. Eventually, Gregory Peck was cast to play Edwardes. Peck, who had only made his film debut in 1944's "Days of Glory", was appearing in just his fourth feature, but already had an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor to his name.

However, despite Peck's talents, Hitchcock expressed disappointment at his limited range of facial expression, which Peck put down to the training he had received in the Stanislavski method.

Answer: Anthony Perkins

When screenwriter Joseph Stefano approached writing the screenplay of "Psycho", he found that, as originally conceived in the original novel, the character of Norman Bates was unsympathetic, and he could not perceive how he would be able to transfer the empathy of the audience to Norman upon the death of Marion Crane. So, the character that Stefano wrote for Hitchcock was described as "young, vulnerable and kind of sad".

When asked by the director what he thought of Anthony Perkins, Stefano replied that he was practically how he described the character. Perkins had not only had a successful acting career up to that point (having already gained two Tony nominations), but had also released three albums, securing a sizeable teenage fan-base. As a consequence, "Psycho" was something of a gamble that could potentially damage his career.

Despite this, he decided to do the film, and found Hitchcock receptive to his ideas about the look and portrayal of the character.

Answer: Michael Redgrave

Michael Redgrave made his professional debut in 1934 at the Old Vic in London, and made a number of stage appearances after that. However, when cast in the male lead in "The Lady Vanishes" in 1938, he had never appeared in film before, and was reluctant to appear, as it would have meant a move away from the stage.

He was eventually convinced to do so by John Gielgud, and the success of the film made Redgrave an international star. Despite this, the actor's relationship with Hitchcock was poor, as Redgrave sought more time for rehearsal, while the director was more in favour of spontaneity on the screen.

The two never collaborated again.

Answer: James Stewart

"Rope", the first film Hitchcock made in colour, was also the first of four collaborations between the director and actor James Stewart. Despite their later successful working relationship, which even went as far as the pair forming a production corporation for one of their later films, Stewart found the process of making "Rope" stressful, as the film is structured as a series of long takes intended to portray the action in 'real time'. Stewart later said of the film that it was an experiment that was worth trying, but didn't quite work, while subsequent reviews have suggested that Stewart himself was miscast in the role of a philosophy professor. "Rope" eventually proved to be the least successful of the four films Stewart and Hitchcock made together.