“Good evening.” With those two words, Alfred Hitchcock welcomed viewers into a weekly world of murder, mystery, suspense and wonderfully dark humor.
Alfred Hitchcock Presents premiered on CBS in 1955 and ran for seven seasons as a half-hour anthology. In 1962, it expanded into The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, continuing for three more seasons until 1965. Each episode told a separate story, usually ending with an unexpected twist or a criminal discovering that the perfect crime was not quite perfect.
The opening became almost as famous as the stories. Hitchcock stepped into a simple outline of his unmistakable profile while Charles Gounod’s “Funeral March of a Marionette” played. Hitchcock had drawn the nine-stroke caricature himself.
Although he introduced every program, Hitchcock directed only 17 episodes of the original half-hour series. Producers Joan Harrison and Norman Lloyd helped select stories, writers, directors and actors who could deliver a complete suspense film in less than 30 minutes.
The television series also influenced Hitchcock’s movies. He later used members of the show’s experienced television crew to make Psycho, helping him film quickly and economically while creating one of the most famous thrillers ever made.
Did the theme music make you uneasy before Hitchcock even said, “Good evening”?