The Hitchcock Hallway

My workplace has an events staff that arranges all sorts of so fun things throughout the year to engage the different populations and units together into a larger community. Each year, they sponsor Halloween parties at each campus with a costume contest and department door decorating contest. You may see where I am going with this. I love Halloween and design and can tend to get a little competitive. I still think we were robbed last year as the judges were swept up in World Series fever and gave prizes to the Giants doors.

At the end of last year we said that this year we would turn the hallway into a diorama of Gypsies, Tramps & Thieves. When we brought it up at a staff meeting in September, the idea was nixed as the term "gypsy" is now considered pejorative. Which I do recognize as true, but so also are "tramp" and "thief." But I take the point and I wasn't all that keen on the idea anyway. Especially after the office decided I should dress up as Cher. And once I got the Turn Back Time video stuck in my head, I was on "No."

After a nice internal stream of consciousness brainstorming walk around the building, I came up with this: The Hitchcock Hallway, representing a dozen iconic images or references to the most popular films from the Master of Suspense. This is what I sketched out:


My co-conspirator did some excellent sourcing of off materials such as wall banners, and I found some black bird wall decals and fake feathered birds. Once presented at the department meeting, everyone was enthusiastic and we were able to build on the ideas and make construction a team effort. This is, after all, about team building, right? (No, it is about winning. And being awesome. And well yes of course some team building. But mostly about making something really cool happen. And maybe a little winning.) And my boss is so totally awesome that she supports these things whole-heartedly and gets enthusiastic too.

From sketch to reality, it really came together quite well:




And in detail we have:

Rear Window

Psycho

North by Northwest



Rope


The Birds



Vertigo

The falling man is actually mounted about two inches in front of the poster so there is some parallax as you move your head, and the poster itself and the black backing are both off kilter just enough that your brain tries to correct them visually and it actually makes you dizzy when you look at it. I love this.

Dial "M" for Murder (My favorite.)


(My Co-worker) Rebecca




Ken Jennings as The Man Who Knew Too Much



Portrait entitled "The Day We First Met," when we were Strangers on a Train


The 39 Steps


And finally, Lifeboat


I also learned that Alfred Hitchcock's first movie as a director was a 1927 silent film, The Lodger: A Story of the London Fog, which was a sort of Jack-the-Ripper tale. This film is in the public domain now and available from The Internet Archive. We're projecting it through one of the entry windows onto the opposite wall with film facts and synopsis. I don't have the accompaniment, but we are playing the score from Vertigo at the other doorway.


This has been a frightful amount of fun, and I'm so happy that so many people are enjoying it, and taking the time follow the clue the clues. Happy Hitchcock Halloween!