‘Psycho’ turns 60: Janet Leigh’s body double shares five secrets about iconic shower scene
Alfred Hitchcock’s horror film “Psycho” turns 60 today — and yes, we’re still on edge every time we step into a shower. In 2017, USA TODAY spoke with Janet Leigh’s body double, who shared five secrets about the iconic shower scene.
Three minutes.
That’s all it took for Alfred Hitchcock to make cinematic history with Psycho‘s infamous shower scene, in which on-the-run office worker Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) is stabbed to death in a tub by creepy motel owner Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins).
More than half a century later, filmmaker Alexandre O. Philippe is putting Hitchcock’s 1960 classic under the microscope in the feature-length documentary 78/52, named for the number of camera set-ups (78) and edits (52) used for that particular sequence.
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Earlier:Tippi Hedren says Hitchcock sexually assaulted her
Philippe’s movie (available on Amazon Prime, Google Play and YouTube) examines how the scene tapped into audience’s fears during a tumultuous era in U.S. history, stirred controversy and ultimately broke taboos about onscreen violence.
“It contains all of Hitchcock: his fears, obsessions, moral universe,” Philippe says. “This was a filmmaker who was all about providing emotion on a grand scale and the shower scene is the ultimate trick. It took everybody by surprise.”
Leigh’s scream queen stand-in, Marli Renfro, 82, a former Las Vegas showgirl and Playboy Bunny, shares what it was really like on the set of one of the most famous horror movies ever made.
1. Nudity came easy for Renfro.
Renfro, then 21, was a magazine model when photographer Mario Casilli told her Hitchcock’s latest movie was seeking a body double. When she met with the filmmaker and Leigh, she disrobed to see if their bodies were a match.
On the set the first day — topless, with just her crotch covered by a rubber patch — “I thought, ‘Oh, my God, they’re expecting a stripper,’ ” Renfro says. “But there were no jokes or anything. I was a nudist, so I was very comfortable being without clothes.”
2. Most of what you see is her.
“Janet Leigh could’ve been wearing a red-sequined ball gown for her part in the shower scene,” Renfro says. Leigh donned a cream-colored one-piece bathing suit while filming, and “the camera goes to maybe 2 inches below her breast bone and that’s it. If you don’t see her face, that’s me: the back of my head, my feet, arms, belly button.”
