sat 07/12/2024

The Hitchcock Players: Herbert Marshall, Murder! | reviews, news & interviews

The Hitchcock Players: Herbert Marshall, Murder!

The Hitchcock Players: Herbert Marshall, Murder!

To espouse the gentlemanly art of solving murder, Hitchcock turned to a supremely urbane British stage veteran

A voice smooth as silk: Herbert Marshall as Sir John Menier in 'Murder!'Studio Canal

The epithet "mellifluous" might have been invented to describe Herbert Marshall’s voice. It was lucky that sound came along at the time Marshall, after a prestigious stage career, entered films when he was almost 40. We don’t hear those beautiful tones until some time into Murder!

Marshall, as the theatrical knight, Sir John Menier, is first seen as a member of a jury at a murder trial of a young actress. While 11 of the jury members discuss the case, Menier is neither seen nor heard. After they have agreed on a guilty verdict, Menier then makes his "not guilty" view known. Gradually, with the jury members chanting in chorus, he is persuaded against his inclination to vote with them.

The next morning, in a celebrated sequence, Menier, while shaving and listening to the prelude to Tristan and Isolde on the radio, expresses his doubts about the woman’s guilt in a voiceover, his face registering a range of emotions in tune with the music. 

Marshall brilliantly keeps a straight face during the film’s absurd dénouement

Later, Marshall is given an opportunity to display his elegance and wit in a scene in which Menier provides lunch in his office for a stage manager (Edward Chapman) and his flighty actress wife (Phyllis Konstam). When she mistakenly takes a teaspoon with which to eat her soup, he delicately takes a teaspoon for his soup too so as not to embarrass her. Yet Marshall brilliantly manages to keep a straight face during the film’s absurd dénouement.  

It was Murder! that launched Marshall on a long and prestigious Hollywood career although he was not particularly good-looking, and he had a wooden leg, which gave him a rather stiff gait. Nevertheless he had that voice, an urbane sensibility and a deliciously ironic twinkle in his eye, which Hitchcock was astute enough to recognise and exploit. 

Murder! is showing in the BFI's The Genius of Hitchcock season on 23 August

Murder! screens at BFI Southbank today. Watch the shaving scene below

Add comment

The future of Arts Journalism

 

You can stop theartsdesk.com closing!

We urgently need financing to survive. Our fundraising drive has thus far raised £33,000 but we need to reach £100,000 or we will be forced to close. Please contribute here: https://gofund.me/c3f6033d

And if you can forward this information to anyone who might assist, we’d be grateful.

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

newsletter

Get a weekly digest of our critical highlights in your inbox each Thursday!

Simply enter your email address in the box below

View previous newsletters