Two of Hume Cronyn’s earliest roles were in Alfred Hitchcock films, Shadow of Doubt in 1943 (in which he nearly stole every scene in which he appeared) and Lifeboat in 1944. He went on to work of the screenplay adapatations for two additional films with the Master of Suspense, Rope and Under Capricorn. His celebrated career went on for nearly sixty years, culminating in the magnificent Marvin’s Room (with my buddy Robert DeNiro), in which he again stole the show – without uttering a single word.
Because of his Hitchcock association, Mr. Cronyn was a very desirable autograph for me to obtain back in 1988 when I was in the Hitchcock autograph thrust. Unfortunately when I wrote to him on July 29 of that year, it took nearly five months to even get a response on December 10 telling me that neither he nor his wife Jessica Tandy (of Driving Miss Daisy fame) were signing autgraphs any longer.
After Ms. Tandy’s passing in 1994, Mr. Cronyn must have come out of autograph retirement. On August 9, 1997, I attempted to send him the exact same photo from Lifeboat that I had once sent in 1988; this time he signed it. He also signed a notecard and sent along a postcard-sized photo of he and Jessica as seen at the top of the posting. He personalized and signed this postcard in the margin with what was apparently a Crayola marker. One wipe of the signature would cause it to disappear, so I immediately placed it in a plastic sleeve. I guess beggers can’t be choosers.
In order to one-up the crummy signature and still have Cronyn on a photo with his wife, I purchased a nice color shot of them together from Cocoon and sent it off in August of 1998 a year later, and he inscribed this one with a nice solid signature.
Autographs of 1997 will continue…
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