George Tomasini

It had never been done before, so could it be done? Bass believed it could, so to show it, he created a proof of concept.

He borrowed a little wind-up IMO camera, kept Janet Leigh standing behind on set after a day's shooting, shot about 50 feet of film, and cut it together with the film's editor, George Tomasini.

Mercifully, Hitchcock liked the test.

He approved Bass' proof of concept and also added two images of his own to the shot list.

The script supervisor Marshall Schlaum said the bathroom was a tiny room built around a six foot bath with four removable walls so the camera could sit in places no real bathroom would allow.

And Hitchcock did something very unusual for the time.

He brought a moviola, the machine editors used to cut film, right onto the set with him.

Normally, you'd only find out whether your shots fit together long after filming had wrapped.

Altogether, the sequence took seven days to film, with some 78 separate camera setups.

Editor George Tomasini then assembled the footage into a murder, lasting about 45 seconds, with more than 50 cuts.

It was slow, exhausting work.

Thanks to the editing, though, audiences would be convinced they'd witnessed one of the most brutal murders ever put on screen, without the knife ever actually entering Marion's body.

Rod Taylor, an Australian actor best known for The Time Machine, was cast as Mitch Brenner, a San Francisco lawyer whose path Melanie crosses in a pet shop and whom she impulsively follows to Bodega Bay.

Jessica Tandy would play his mother, Lydia, and Suzanne Plachette, the local schoolteacher, Annie.

Hitchcock surrounded himself with his usual crew, cinematographer Robert Burks, editor George Tomasini, Edith Head.

There would be one new title in the credits, though.

Janet Leigh Cinematography, John L. Russell.

Edited by George Tomasini.

Music by Bernard Herman.

Production company, Chamblee Productions.

Like, anything outside of that? I don't know.

Outside of that stylistic stuff.

And then George Tomasini was the editor.

Let's see.

Hitchcock also reunited with costume designer Edith Head, who'd worked with him on Notorious, while assistant director Herbert Coleman helped manage the production and became an important link between Hitchcock and his new studio.

Finally, in the editing room was George Tomasini, a Paramount editor whose recent work included Billy Wilder's Stalag 17, helping build the film's suspense by cutting between what Jeff saw through his window and his reactions to it.

In short, Hitchcock had assembled a remarkable group of collaborators.

And while none of them knew it then, or maybe they did, together they would help make some of the most defining and celebrated films of his career.