“When an actor comes to me and wants to discuss his character, I say, ‘It’s in the script.’ If he says, ‘But what’s my motivation?, ‘ I say, ‘Your salary.’”

One must never set up a murder. They must happen unexpectedly, as in life.

The picture’s over. Now I have to go and put it on film.

To make a great film you need three things – the script, the script and the script.

Really, the novelist has the best casting since he doesn’t have to cope with the actors and all the rest.

In the old days villains had moustaches and kicked the dog. Audiences are smarter today. They don’t want their villain to be thrown at them with green limelight on his face. They want an ordinary human being with failings.

I enjoy playing the audience like a piano.

I never said all actors are cattle; what I said was all actors should be treated like cattle.

Claude Jade is a brave nice young lady. But I don’t give any guarantee what she will do on a taxi’s back seat.

I am to provide the public with beneficial shocks.

I’m full of fears and I do my best to avoid difficulties and any kind of complications. I like everything around me to be clear as crystal and completely calm.

Mystery is an intellectual process. But suspense is essentially an emotional process.

Television has done much for psychiatry by spreading information about it, as well as contributing to the need for it.

It seems to me that television is exactly like a gun. Your enjoyment of it is determined by which end of it you’re on.

Actually, I have no regard for money. Aside from its purchasing power, it’s completely useless as far as I’m concerned.

To me Psycho was a big comedy. Had to be.

Blondes make the best victims. They’re like virgin snow that shows up the bloody footprints.

It is in the character of very few men to honor without envy a friend who has prospered.

You can be a pretty face, but if you’re not a nice person, it just doesn’t work.

If you’re beautiful inside it shows on the outside.

You did not come this far to be a supporting character in someone else’s film.

You may fall in love with the beauty of someone. But remember you have to live with the character, not the beauty.

What comes out of you when you are squeezed is what is inside of you.

You truly are the average of the 5 people you surround yourself with.

Be loyal to the royalty within you.