Editorial Content for Hitchcock's Blondes: The Unforgettable Women Behind the Legendary Director's Dark Obsession
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Reviewer (text)
In HITCHCOCK’S BLONDES, acclaimed biographer Laurence Leamer has set his sights on one of the world’s greatest film directors, revealing both his genius and his underlying, eerie passions and partialities.
Born in England, Alfred Hitchcock was able to rise steadily upward in the nascent film industry there, participating in silent movies and producing its first talkie. Urged by producer David Selznick to migrate to the US, he further proved his genius when the first film he directed in the States, Rebecca, won the Academy Award for Best Picture. But Hitchcock soon realized that he needed to have complete control to make the movies he envisioned. Those would involve a usually petrifying plot in which charming but evil men would dominate, terrorize and, in some cases, brutalize or savagely kill beautiful, blonde ladies. A few women would retaliate, taking the criminal path.
"By mining each movie for his central theme, Leamer has created a readable and fascinating examination of Hitchcock’s secret life, while resisting the temptation to delve too deeply into specific nomenclature regarding his psychological makeup."
As Leamer’s title indicates, Hitchcock saw blondeness as the epitome of womanliness. His wife, Alma, was a blonde who assisted him behind the scenes. A full participant in his obsession, she helped him choose the palest, prettiest and most audience-attractive females in filmdom. The blondes who are Leamer’s focus are thus well known, indeed legendary, luminaries --- Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint and Janet Leigh --- all of whom Hitchcock dressed to the finest detail. If he found the smallest inclination in his women toward feminism, he quickly staunched it.
Hitchcock was as much a mystery as his famed and well-named films were: Dial M for Murder, To Catch a Thief, Notorious. Possibly fading into his own fantasy world of female abasement, his behaviors often involved unwanted touching and stray but clearly planned remarks, once approaching actress Tippi Hedren with a proposition that she took as so salacious that she never repeated what he said.
By mining each movie for his central theme, Leamer has created a readable and fascinating examination of Hitchcock’s secret life, while resisting the temptation to delve too deeply into specific nomenclature regarding his psychological makeup. Hitchcock simply adored fair-haired women and treated them like servants, which, for the duration of filming, they were. They would reap the benefits of his strange aspect, which combined a passion for light-haired ladies and the dark side of life, depicted in a multitude of ways in his films. And though he secured for his works the attraction of handsome male stars like Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant and Gregory Peck, perhaps envying them for their fine physiques, he also could prove bossy and personally denigrating in his relationships with them.
Throughout this film-by-film biographical perspective, Leamer subtly shows Hitchcock’s genius and his shadowy psyche, his ability to push “emotions away, using irony as his shield.”
Teaser
In HITCHCOCK’S BLONDES, Laurence Leamer offers an intimate journey into the lives of eight legendary actresses whose stories helped chart the course of Alfred Hitchcock’s career --- from his early days in the British film industry, to his triumphant American debut, to his Hollywood heyday and beyond. Through the stories of June Howard-Tripp, Madeleine Carroll, Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Janet Leigh, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint and Tippi Hedren --- who starred in 14 of Hitchcock’s most notable films and who bore the brunt of his fondness and sometimes fixation --- we can finally start to see the enigmatic man himself. After all, “his” blondes (as he thought of them) knew the truths of his art, his obsessions and desires, as well as anyone.
Promo
In HITCHCOCK’S BLONDES, Laurence Leamer offers an intimate journey into the lives of eight legendary actresses whose stories helped chart the course of Alfred Hitchcock’s career --- from his early days in the British film industry, to his triumphant American debut, to his Hollywood heyday and beyond. Through the stories of June Howard-Tripp, Madeleine Carroll, Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Janet Leigh, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint and Tippi Hedren --- who starred in 14 of Hitchcock’s most notable films and who bore the brunt of his fondness and sometimes fixation --- we can finally start to see the enigmatic man himself. After all, “his” blondes (as he thought of them) knew the truths of his art, his obsessions and desires, as well as anyone.
About the Book
Bestselling author of CAPOTE'S WOMEN Laurence Leamer shares an engrossing account of the enigmatic director Alfred Hitchcock that finally puts the dazzling actresses he cast in his legendary movies at the center of the story.
Alfred Hitchcock was fixated --- not just on the dark, twisty stories that became his hallmark, but also by the blond actresses who starred in many of his iconic movies. The director of North by Northwest, Rear Window and other classic films didn’t much care if they wore wigs, got their hair coloring out of a bottle, or were the rarest human specimen --- a natural blonde --- as long as they shone with a golden veneer on camera. The lengths he went to in order to showcase (and often manipulate) these women would become the stuff of movie legend. But the women themselves have rarely been at the center of the story, until now.
In HITCHCOCK'S BLONDES, bestselling biographer Laurence Leamer offers an intimate journey into the lives of eight legendary actresses whose stories helped chart the course of the troubled, talented director’s career --- from his early days in the British film industry, to his triumphant American debut, to his Hollywood heyday and beyond. Through the stories of June Howard-Tripp, Madeleine Carroll, Ingrid Bergman, Grace Kelly, Janet Leigh, Kim Novak, Eva Marie Saint and Tippi Hedren --- who starred in 14 of Hitchcock’s most notable films and who bore the brunt of his fondness and sometimes fixation --- we can finally start to see the enigmatic man himself. After all, “his” blondes (as he thought of them) knew the truths of his art, his obsessions and desires, as well as anyone.
From the acclaimed author of CAPOTE'S WOMEN comes an intimate, revealing and thoroughly modern look at both the enduring art created by a man obsessed…and the private toll that fixation took on the women in his orbit.
Audiobook available, read by Sharmila Devar
