Themes and plot devices in Hitchcock films Clift at a dinner party around the filming of "I Confess" (1953) to swallow a carafe of brandy, which caused the actor to pass out almost immediately. In "Torn Curtain" and "Topaz", brandy is defined more closely as cognac. Melanie Daniels (Tippi Hedren) is offered a brandy by Annie Hayworth (Suzanne Pleshette), and after being attacked by the birds, drinks the brandy offered by Mitch (Rod Taylor). In "Rear Window", Lisa Fremont (Grace Kelly) is "just warming some brandy". In "Frenzy", Richard Blaney is sacked for supposedly stealing brandy, and can be seen in several sequences to be drinking brandy.
The Birds (film) he hired Evan Hunter to adapt Daphne du Maurier's novella, "The Birds", first published in her 1952 collection "The Apple Tree". Hunter had previously written "Vicious Circle" for "Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine", which he adapted for the television anthology series "Alfred Hitchcock Presents". He also adapted Robert Turner's story "Appointment at Eleven" for the same television series. Hunter later suspected that he was hired because he had demonstrated he could write suspense (with the 87th Precinct novels, as Ed McBain) and because his novel "The Blackboard Jungle" had received critical acclaim. The relationship between Hunter and Hitchcock during the creation