Anthony Shaffer - quotes
Quotations relating to Anthony Shaffer...
By putting [Hitchcock] in London with Frenzy, in touch with his roots, and by telling the story — when I say an old-fashioned way, I mean a very carefully constructed way — and I think the public responded to that very strongly. I know they did, and he got a big smash hit out of it, which cheered him up a lot and put him back on his pedestal again, where he remains to this day.
— Anthony Shaffer (2001)
source: Documentary: The Story of Frenzy
keywords: Alfred Hitchcock and Frenzy (1972)
Film Pre-Production
The difference between the novel and the movie script is that we added a lot of comedy noir, which Hitch was always very fond of. And in particular, in those scenes of exposition, where the detective, Alec McCowen, is brought to realize that, on the basis of a lot of circumstantial evidence, he has arrested the wrong man who is currently in jail. And how does he come to realize that he has made that mistake? So the way to do it, I thought, was to do it as comedy. And the comedy comes, of course, from his wife, played by Vivien Merchant, who is a gourmet cook. And she keeps giving him the most repulsive and inedible meals. And he is struggling desperately, I think, with a pig's trotter or knuckle of pork or something like that, whilst reprising the entire deductive plot. Even if you're laughing and you don't hear it, no one can complain later that there's a big hole in the picture. Because how did the detective suddenly realize that he had made a mistake? The audience have been actually told word by word. It does seem to me that we had our cake and ate it, for once, which is always nice. I think what we wanted to do was extend to the last possible moment the fact that our hero is in danger — that he's a loser... that he cannot win this one. He hits this creature in the bed, believing it to be Rusk, on the head. The arm falls out of the bed. We realize it's not a man at all. It's a woman. Just another victim of the Necktie Murderer. In the book, we have a different victim in the last scene. The secretary of Blaney's wife in the matrimonial agency is the victim, and in the film we have an anonymous lady who we never met before.
— Anthony Shaffer (2001)
source: Documentary: The Story of Frenzy
Film Production
It's a very London film, and I know he wanted to make that. I think he thought — whether he thought rightly or wrongly is another matter — that people thought that he had rather sold out and gone to live in Hollywood. I personally don't think that he would have been the world success he became had he stayed here in England. When we were filming in Covent Garden, a curious thing took place that a very old man came up to him. I remember security men running in very quickly because you know what goes on these days, or even in those days. It wasn't quite as bad, but nonetheless... And he said, "I remember your father here in the market." Hitchcock was delighted, of course. He said, "Leave him alone," sat him down, had a long talk with him about his dad, gave him a great meal and sent him on his way. It's a nice touch, but he was finding and feeling his roots as they had been.
— Anthony Shaffer (2001)
source: Documentary: The Story of Frenzy
keywords: Covent Garden, London, Frenzy (1972), and production
When we had done the first murder, it's a pretty graphic account of a rape and strangulation, and I didn't see any point in repeating ourselves. And so I introduced a phrase into the first murder. I said to Hitch, "Let's not see another murder." Why don't we just have the murderer take her up to his apartment, open the door for her and say, "You're my kind of woman" and close the door. We know exactly what is happening behind that closed door, and there's a wonderful shot that follows that. It's what Hitch called his "good-bye to Babs." The camera retreats and down a narrow, twisting staircase.
— Anthony Shaffer (2001)
source: Documentary: The Story of Frenzy
keywords: Frenzy (1972) and production
