Themes and plot devices in Hitchcock films other iconic stairwell shot comes from the movie "Suspicion" as Cary Grant slowly walks up the stairs to deliver what would have been the poisonous warmed milk to his wife. Hitchcock, the studios and Grant decided his character could not end up as a murderer and that scene becomes a red herring with a new ending added. In "The Birds", the camera follows Tippi Hedren up the stairs to the attic where (suspensefully) the birds wait silently to attack her. Staircases also appear prominently in the 'ball-gown scene' in "Rebecca" and in the 'guard-dog scene' in "Strangers on a Train".
A. S. Hitchcock A. S. Hitchcock Albert Spear Hitchcock (September 4, 1865 – December 16, 1935) was an American botanist and agrostologist. Hitchcock graduated from the Iowa Agricultural College with bachelor's degree in 1884 and M.S. in 1886. From 1892 to 1901 he was a professor of botany at the Kansas Agricultural College. Hitchcock joined the USDA in 1901 as Assistant Agrostologist under Frank Lamson-Scribner. In 1905 he was put in charge of the grass herbarium and became Systematic Agrostologist. After 1928, he held the title of Principal Biologist in charge of Systematic Agrostology of the Department of Agriculture and kept that title