Soundtracks and spin-offs
- The Master’s long-running series spawned many equally popular works in other media
- Dial Eminem for Murder: first of two novelty tie-in LPs inspired the rapper’s recent opus
- Numerous tie-ins and spin-offs also include radio remakes and countless creepy books
Note: this is part of an ongoing series of 150-odd Hitchcock articles; any dead links are to those not yet published. Subscribe to the email list to be notified when new ones appear.
AHP Collectors’ Guide, Part 1: Production and home video releases
Peter Lorre, Steve McQueen and Neile Adams in the “Man from the South” episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1960). It was based on Roald Dahl’s 1948 short story “Collector’s Item” and later remade for the new AHP pilot (1985), and Tales of the Unexpected (1979).
Contents
Soundtrack releases
Hitch’s choice of French composer Charles Gounod’s whimsical 1872 piece “Funeral March of a Marionette” (“Marche funèbre d’une marionnette”) for his programme’s theme tune made an already well known work world famous. The director was, of course, again demonstrating his lifelong love of counterpoint – in his case, lighthearted moods, music and humour juxtaposing suspense, thrills and horror. According to renowned critic-historian and all-round good egg Professor Sir Christopher Frayling, Hitch was inspired by its effective use in F. W. Murnau’s Sunrise (1927). He even made it one of his picks when he appeared as a guest on BBC Radio’s Desert Island Discs in 1959. For the TV series, it was arranged five times between 1955 and 1964, the last of which was by Bernard Herrmann. However, the version above is an arrangement by Jeff Alexander which introduces the show launch tie-in novelty album AHP Music to be Murdered By (1958). It also includes a jaunty, big band swing version by Stanley Wilson and His Orchestra which was previously released on a US promo-only 7″. From the album’s Allardice-penned rear sleeve:
Gentle Listener:
The record in this envelope is called “Music To Be Murdered By” and is part of a campaign of mine to return to murder the dignity and charm it once had. Today there are few good, honest murderers left. Most of them are hoodlums or neurotic wrecks with no sense of style or form and certainly no interest in good music. I realize there may be a few who whistle as they work but that is hardly the same thing. This modern notion that all murders should be performed a capella simply has no historical basis. You don’t think Nero was fiddling for his own amusement, do you? Certainly not.
These days a murder is amusing for the onlookers and the murderer but no one thinks of making things pleasant for the victim. He may be a tiresome bore but he is still rather essential and is entitled to some consideration. Music, I feel, will heighten his appreciation and make his own murder the truly ennobling experience it should be.
One warning: My disembodied voice will be heard occasionally, but I promise not to sing. After all, this record was designed to accompany murder, not to commit it.
I sincerely hope you enjoy “Music To Be Murdered By” and I trust that before your demise you have time to stagger out and buy some more albums for a few of your close enemies.
With deepest sympathy,
Alfred Hitchcock
- LP/CD/MP3 AHP Music to be Murdered By (1958), also in 2-CD w/AHP: Ghost Stories for Young People, (1962)
Featuring similar Allardice-Hitch introductions to Alexander’s easy listening instrumentals throughout, in 2020 it provided the concept, cover art and title for rapper Eminem’s eleventh album. The following year, he released an expanded edition, Music to Be Murdered By – Side B, featuring a further Hitch homage, ahem, killer track; the single and video “Alfred’s Theme”.
Whereas Presents entirely used pre-existing stock music, original scoring was commissioned for its expanded Hour incarnation then constantly recycled until the end of its run. British-born composer-conductor-arranger Lyn Murray, fresh off scoring To Catch a Thief, was enlisted to supply the bulk of Hour’s music, with most of the rest courtesy of Hitch’s most well known collaborator. During perhaps the most renowned director-composer pairing in all of cinema, Bernard Herrmann worked on eight consecutive Hitchcocks from The Trouble with Harry to Marnie, until the pair fell out over the musical direction of Hitch’s next film, Torn Curtain. On fire at the time, Herrmann wrote scores for seven episodes of The Twilight Zone (1959–1964), including the pilot, and the credits music for the first season. He also scored many episodes of Hour up until his schism with Hitch and all its surviving music was exclusively anthologised by soundtrack specialists Varèse Sarabande in three limited edition CD sets. 15 master reels of the series’ original recordings are thought to survive but one could not be located, so the sets aren’t quite ‘complete’.
The first two sets consist of Herrmann’s scores, all of which luckily survive, and his opening and closing themes, takes on Charles Gounod’s “Funeral March of a Marionette”, bookend all three collections. Disc one of the third set comprises the scores for four of the 44 original episode scores by Lyn Murray, who was also composer for To Catch a Thief, while disc two has both episodes by Leonard Rosenman, and each of Lalo Schifrin and Benny Carter’s sole episodes. Additional composers, for whose scores no separate music stems survive, were Pete Rugolo, Robert Drasnin, Leonard Rosenman and Richard Shores.
- 2-CD AH Hour Original Television Soundtrack, Volume One (2011, 3,000 copies)
- 3-CD Volume Two (2011, 2,000 copies)
- 2-CD Volume Three (2012, 1,000 copies)
Books
The Alfred Hitchcock Hour 1962 trade magazine ad by Robert M. Thompson, via VintageTVArt.com
There are two fine reference books dedicated to the series and though they have a fair amount of overlap, between them they cover most of everything you could wish to know but not all – there’s always room for another! On a related note, hundreds of Hitch-fronted tie-in books and magazines began to be published commencing with his American years, rolling out internationally when his popularity was at an all-time high by the time of Presents. By now, his personal marketing machine had achieved juggernaut force and some publications even continue to this day.
- AHP: An Illustrated Guide (1985) – John McCarty and Brian Kelleher
- AHP Companion (2001) – Martin Grams Jr. | excerpt
- Brividi sul divano. I telefilm di AH (2019) – Beatrice Balsamo and Giorgio Simonelli
They chiefly consist of short story compilations by renowned living and dead writers aimed at adults, often being adapted for the TV series, and medium length mystery novels intended for children. Much of the credit for their worldwide success must go to Brit artist Fred Banbery, best known for drawing Paddington Bear, whose evocative illustrations often brought them so thrillingly to life… and death! It would require a whole book itself to do the subject of Hitch horror anthologies justice but various folk have supplied admirable overviews nonetheless; here, here, here and here are good places to start.
- Reclaiming AHP – Andrew A. Erish
- The Television Work of AH – Neill Potts
- The AHP Project – Jack Seabrook | Blogger | interview, #2
- The Televisual Hitchcockian Object and Domestic Space in AHP – Curt Hersey
But one book in particular is among the most noteworthy: Stories They Wouldn’t Let Me Do on TV was first published in 1957 and its title is pretty self-explanatory, though it aged quickly. Four of the stories, “The Waxwork”, “Being a Murderer Myself” (retitled “Arthur”), “Water’s Edge” and “The Jokester”, were adapted later in the series’ run; who said Americans don’t do irony? It’s a great compendium of 25 punchy, classic gems that naturally err towards the grisly side of life death. Immensely successful, it was translated at least twice and, in the US and UK, was quickly republished in two volumes as 12 and 13 More Stories... In 2010, five of the tales were adapted by BBC Radio 4 as 15-minute episodes for The Late Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Bizarrely though, they opted to redo already-filmed “The Waxwork” and “Being a Murderer Myself”.
Perhaps the other most notable related piece of merchandise is AHP: Ghost Stories for Young People, a 1962 LP similar to Music to Be Murdered By, which also features Hitch introductions. This time they’re to six short stories mostly written and evocatively recorded in ghoulish style by US voice actor John Allen, who also appears responsible for Hitch’s dialogue and the witty rear sleeve notes.
- LP/CD/MP3 AHP: Ghost Stories for Young People, (1962), also in 2-CD w/AHP Music to be Murdered By (1958) and 2-CD w/Famous Monsters Speak ( 1963)
Related films
The aforementioned series were all from Hitch’s company Shamley Productions, named after the village of Shamley Green, Surrey, the location of his former home, Winter’s Grace manor house. The rest of Shamley’s output is comprised of Psycho and Dark Intruder, a 1965 feature originally planned as the pilot for an ultimately unrealised TV series. On DVD, it was initially paired with The Night Walker, a 1965 black-and-white chiller scripted and novelised by Psycho author Robert Bloch, and directed by budget horror maestro William Castle.
- The Night Walker (1964) – Robert Bloch | De
- US: Universal 2on1 DVD The Night Walker/Dark Intruder (2015)
- Shout Factory BD The Night Walker (2018)
- Kino BD Dark Intruder (2021)
- UK: Final Cut DVD The Night Walker (2018)
AHP Collectors’ Guide, Part 1: Production and home video releases
Related articles
This is part of a unique, in-depth series of 150-odd Hitchcock articles.
