40 facts about the Master of Suspense Alfred Hitchcock!

Alfred Hitchcock was one of the most active film directors and producers in the history of cinema.

Alfred Hitchcock is a really important chapter for cinema history. Check out the following facts and learn more about his life, his career, and his particular character.

1. Alfred Joseph Hitchcock was born on the 13th of August in 1899.
2. He was born in Essex.
3. Alfred Hitchcock was born in a Roman Catholic family.
4. His father gave him the following nickname: “little lamb without a spot”.
5. The first time he attended school was at the age of 7.
6. At first, he wanted to study engineering.
7. So he enrolled in night classes in London.
8. Eventually, he became an English film director and producer.
9. His breakthrough in the industry was in 1919.
10. He began his career by creating title cards featured in silent films.
11. But his debut as a director was in 1925 with the film The Pleasure Garden.
12. He is considered as one of the most influential and extensively studied filmmakers in the history of cinema.
13. He is also known as “the Master of Suspense”.
14. Even though he was “The Master of suspense” he had phobias.
15. He was afraid of the police and in general of the law reinforcement.
16. And he was also frightened of…eggs!
17. That’s why he had never tasted an omelet!
18. He directed over 50 movies
19. Most of his early movies are lost.
20. One of them -a silent melodrama- was found in New Zealand in 2011.
21. Its name was The White Shadow.
22. His movie Blackmail was the first “talkie” movie in Britain, which mean it was the first British movie with sound.
23. From 1955 until 1965 he was the host of the anthology Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
24. His movies were nominated for an Oscar award 46 times.
25. They were actually awarded 6 times.
26. His film The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog which was created in 1927 helped to shape the thriller genre.
27. Two of his 1930s thrillers are ranked among the greatest British films of the 20th century.
28. These are The 39 Steps (1935) and The Lady Vanishes (1938).
29. In 1939 he moved to Hollywood as he was already an important director in the industry.
30. He was also nominated for Lifeboat (1944) and Spellbound (1945).
31. In 1945 he created his own documentary about the Holocaust named Memory of the Camps.
32. But he never managed to win the Best Director Academy Award.
33. He didn’t want people to see 5 of his movies which after their release were among his best movies.
34. Hitchcock financed the movie himself, foregoing his normal salary in exchange for 60 percent ownership of the rights of Psycho.
35. He managed to earn 6 million dollars from this movie. That’s 50 million in today’s dollars.
36. Hitchcock personally contributed to writing a portion of the “Motion Pictures, Film Production” entry in the 14th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica.
37. In December 1926, Hitchcock married the English-American screenwriter Alma Reville.
38. Their honeymoon was in Paris, Lake Como and St. Moritz.
39. He only had one daughter-Patricia.
40. He died on the 29th of April in 1980 in California.