Teresa Wright - quotes
Quotations relating to Teresa Wright...
The other thing I love about Hitchcock's films is that no matter how serious or how tragic or desperate or scary the film is, it's always mixed up with humour. It's the humour that gives the edge to the horror. The humour makes you feel safe. After having been slightly scared, you feel very safe and you're laughing, and then, bang, there's something there that hits you.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
The interesting part, as far as the role I played, is the fact that she starts off as this innocent, and petulant young girl who's just kind of bored with life. "Gee, everybody does the same thing all the time. "Why can't we ever do anything exciting? What we need is Uncle Charlie. Someone gay and wonderful. He'll shake us all up, and mother will be so happy to see him." It was a wonderful chance for a young actress to start off one way, and to change and grow before your eyes to be dealt this terrible problem, which anybody, at any age, would find difficult to solve.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
Wright talking about the ending of the film...
When we did that scene on the train, I don't believe he... he had it choreographed in his head exactly. He just had us struggle. I had to pull back and put my feet in a certain way and hold on in a certain way. Joe would have to try to push me off in a certain way. And then, after having gotten the master shot, he would come in and do close-ups on wherever our hands and feet were. Sometimes people say, "Boy, that was a pretty good shove you gave him." It wasn't really that she pushed him, but he was trying to push her, and in resisting him, at one point in the struggle, it just happens that he falls. It was very effective. It was kind of horrifying. It's really hard to go on with the story after that. You know? You had to end it. You couldn't end with his death, and you didn't want to end with a funeral. So I think the only thing he could do was the scene outside the funeral, and try to say something about life and what his life added up to. It's an end of innocence for her, because she now cannot only imagine evil, which, she would never have imagined anything that evil before, but she knows it exists and she knew it existed in the one person her mother loved the most. She has to grow up and realise that people can be deeply loved by someone, and yet have something inside them that is so destructive, that they can poison and literally kill people.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
I'm sure, at the time we made this film, we all thought it was wonderful and thought it was a great film. I don't think any of us had an idea it would have such an impact on generations. Some films do get to have a life of their own, and this one has lived a long, long life.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
Casting
I'd come out to California to do "The Little Foxes". and I went back to New York to do a play. Then I came back to do "Mrs Miniver" because Billy Wilder had asked me, and by then, Mr Goldwyn had signed me. I did that and then "Pride of the Yankees", almost in a row. I mean, each one lasted almost four months. Then I was married and very caught up in, you know, having my first home and all of that. Then this script came, and, of course, everybody wants to do a Hitchcock film. I did not read the script. They said, "He wants to tell you the script." So I went and I sat down opposite him at a desk and he proceeded to tell the story. And he told the story like no one else has ever told a story. He used anything on his desk as a prop, whether it was a glass or a pencil or a book, to make a sound, do sound effects. He'd do steps. He'd do anything he could as a storyteller to lure you into his story. And he told that story so beautifully that I was just absolutely mesmerised. And when I finally saw the film, I said, "I've seen this film. I saw it in his office." And I really meant it.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
keywords: Alfred Hitchcock, Shadow of a Doubt (1943), casting, and pre-production
Film Production
This was the first film that I went on location on. It was not done a lot then, and it made a tremendous difference. There's no doubt that coming in real doorways and opening real windows is better than being on a set.The idea was to do the entire film up there [in Santa Rosa], and we did the entire film up there. Then, unfortunately, some things had to be re-done on a set. So then, after having done it economically, I'm sure, up there, they then had to spend the money to build a like set in Hollywood.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
It was a family picture, about a family, and we were with the Hitchcocks, who were a family. Alma was right there all the time and Hitchcock would constantly defer to her about certain scenes, the script. And it was so wonderful to have Patty, who was very bright, playing cards, gin rummy.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
I remember the crowds who came to watch the shooting and how very well behaved they were. Uh, I mean, when the assistant director shouted, "Quiet", it was quiet. I remember, one incident, we were shooting out on the street somewhere or other, and this was all absolutely new to me. A girl of about 12 or 14, something like that, came running up to me with an autograph book and said, "Sign this, please." So I signed my very first autograph as a film actor. And she looked at it and [said]... "Now hurry up and get famous!" I never forgot that.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
The interesting thing about "Shadow of a Doubt" is the twins theme, like when she says, "We really are twins. We think things the same." One piece of direction I absolutely do remember, I was just lying on a bed some way or other, having a rest. [Hitchcock] said, "No, I want you to lie there with your hands behind your head." He told me exactly how it was, but he explained why. "Because," he said, "we are going to come from a shot of Uncle Charlie lying on the bed. I want this duplicated." Those kinds of things make it harder for young Charlie and the audience to accept him as anything except this charming uncle of hers.
— Teresa Wright (2000)
keywords: Alfred Hitchcock, Shadow of a Doubt (1943), and production
I had a scene at the dining table with Teresa Wright. She said something to me. I was shocked and offended, and I stood up and stepped back from her. And, uh, Hitch said, um, "That's fine, Hume, but when you stand up don't step back." I'm not about to argue with Mr Hitchcock. We shot the scene and he said, "Cut! Hume, you stepped back again." I said, "I'm sorry, sir, but it feels so uncomfortable." He said, "Alright, then let's shoot it again. You stand up, you step back, and we'll have a comfortable actor with no head." And then he... After we'd got this shot, he said something which was worth remembering. He said, "The camera lies, you know, and when it does, you have to learn to accommodate it."
— Hume Cronyn (2000)
keywords: Shadow of a Doubt (1943), Teresa Wright, and production
