The Hitchcock Project-Kill With Kindness by A.J. Russell [2.4]

by Jack Seabrook

"Kill with Kindness" was the second and last episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents to be based on a story by A.J. Russell. The first, "The Hidden Thing," was adapted by James Cavanagh "based on a story by A.J. Russell," according to the credits. It appears that Russell's story was actually a teleplay he wrote for an earlier TV anthology series called The Clock, which featured an episode titled "The Hidden Thing" that aired on July 13, 1951. Russell also wrote a number of episodes for another early TV anthology series, The Web; one was titled "Kill with Kindness" and it aired on May 14, 1952. From the brief plot synopsis available in online sources, it seems that it was the basis for the Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode of the same title. Unlike "The Hidden Thing," which was adapted by a different writer for the Hitchcock show, A.J. Russell also wrote the teleplay for the Hitchcock version of "Kill with Kindness."

Unfortunately, this episode of The Web appears to be lost, so it is unavailable to compare with the episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Still, the Hitchcock episode, which aired on CBS on Sunday, October 21, 1956, seems like it could have been done as a live TV show in 1952, since it features a small cast and few sets.

Time seems to have stood still in the parlor of the Oldham siblings, a middle-aged pair named Fitzhugh and Katherine, who pass the time pleasantly one sunny day. She sits on the sofa knitting while he tweets happily at his pet canary. Butterflies, mounted and framed, line the walls behind Fitzhugh, who is also a serious birdwatcher. He summons his sister to the window to point out a rare bird that he has spotted through his binoculars, but she is more interested in an old, ragged man who sits on a park bench every day, feeding the pigeons. He "'looks about right,'" she says.

Hume Cronyn as Fitzhugh Oldham

Fitzhugh notes the bird sighting in his journal and asks Katherine if they can keep his butterfly collection, making the viewer wonder what is going to happen that will put his treasures in jeopardy. Whatever it is, Katherine is clearly more determined to carry it out than her brother, remarking that the collection "'will have to go like everything else.'" After making her brother promise not to say the wrong things, Katherine visits the man on the park bench and offers to feed him some of the stew she has prepared. She calls her offer "'an act of human kindness'" and tells the man to pay no attention to anything her brother says. The man, who slurs his words as if he has been drinking, is surprised and glad to accompany Katherine across the street to her home.

Once he is inside the man announces that his name is Jorgy and laments that he has no home or family, admitting that he wanders from place to place, often driven out of town by the local police. He wears ill-fitting clothes and a rumpled hat and he is unshaven with thinning grey hair. Fitzhugh happily shows the man his butterfly collection, confessing that he and his sister are "'impoverished--nothing left except this house and my insurance policy.'" At this point, the viewer begins to suspect what is happening and gets an inkling of Katherine's plan.

Katherine serves the stew and Jorgy digs in, wrapping one arm around his bowl, bending over close to the stew and spooning it quickly into his mouth, clearly used to protecting his food from others. A moth flits through the parlor and Katherine wants Fitzhugh to kill it, but he catches it and releases it out the window. This demonstrates the siblings' differing views on killing, at least when it comes to small creatures. Fitzhugh remarks to Jorgy that Katherine once tried to kill him, noting that she is the beneficiary of his insurance policy and demonstrating why Katherine had told Jorgy to ignore her brother's comments. He goes on to reveal that he told his sister that they need to find a substitute for his corpse, thus revealing the Oldhams' plan and giving Jorgy a good reason to stand up and announce he's leaving.

Carmen Mathews as Katherine Oldham

Katherine is persuasive, however, and convinces the old man to stay with a promise of warm milk. Fitzhugh leans his head despondently against the fireplace mantle, upset with himself for having said too much, until Katherine distracts him by suggesting that he give Jorgy a suit and shoes to replace the rags he's wearing. Instead, Fitzhugh goes to attend to a job in the basement, leaving his sister to take Jorgy upstairs to change into her brother's clothes. Before they ascend the stairs, another moth flits around the parlor and Katherine catches it and feeds it to Fitzhugh's canary, explaining to Jorgy that she kills the insects when her brother is out of the room.

Upstairs, Katherine helps Jorgy into one of Fitzhugh's suit jackets, flattering him that it is a perfect fit and again deeming her own acts "'human kindness'" even though they are nothing of the sort, since her plan involves deception and murder. Down in the dirty, cobweb-filled basement, Fitzhugh locates a large can marked "Kerosene."

In the next scene, Katherine is back on the sofa, happily knitting, when Jorgy enters the parlor wearing Fitzhugh's suit. She insists that he stay the night and he agrees. Katherine then goes down to the basement to check on her brother, who is happily spreading straw around the room, explaining that he must start a fire, go upstairs, and change into Jorgy's clothes, and then leave by the back door. Katherine reminds him to take the ring off of his own finger and put it on Jorgy's finger so that his corpse will be identified as Fitzhugh's after the house is destroyed by fire. The siblings lament all that will be lost; Katherine expresses sorrow that Jorgy will be killed while Fitzhugh is upset about losing his butterfly collection.

James Gleason as Jorgy

Back in the parlor, Katherine serves Jorgy a glass of drugged milk. Later, she sits on the sofa knitting while Fitzhugh shows Jorgy his butterfly collection. Jorgy begins to yawn and his eyes begin to close, so Fitzhugh takes him upstairs and leaves him in the bedroom. Fitzhugh returns to the parlor, anxious to start the fire, but Katherine insists that they go upstairs to confirm that Jorgy is asleep. She instructs her brother to put on Jorgy's clothes and leaves him in the bedroom but, after she is gone, Fitzhugh rushes downstairs and grabs the birdcage and one of his butterfly frames before joining his sister in the basement, where she lights a match and starts a huge fire.

At this point all of Katherine's careful plans begin to come apart. As smoke fills the parlor, she tells her brother to hurry up and change clothes so that he can leave, but she notices that he forgot to take the ring off of his finger and put it on Jorgy's. She realizes that, without her brother's ring on Jorgy's finger, his corpse will not be identified as that of Fitzhugh and her scheme to defraud the insurance company will fail. They go upstairs and see that Jorgy already has his own ring, which is stuck on his finger and won't come off. As smoke continues to fill the house, the Oldhams panic and Katherine wakes Jorgy and has Fitzhugh help him downstairs.

Later, Jorgy and Katherine sit side by side on the park bench where they had met the day before and a woman brings coffee to Fitzhugh, who holds his precious birdcage. The woman calls him a "'real hero'" and he agrees. A fireman also praises Fitzhugh and, as Katherine looks crestfallen, her brother remarks to the fireman that "'You know how women are in an emergency. Poor Katherine. She always loses her head.'" Fitzhugh smiles smugly and watches his house burn down as the screen fades to black.

"Kill with Kindness" is a classic episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents that includes great acting by the three leads and mixes humor and dark themes in a way that recalls Arsenic and Old Lace. The difference here is that no one is killed.

Margie Liszt

Hume Cronyn is superb as the eccentric Fitzhugh Oldham, who seems so focused on his butterfly collection and his bird watching that he fails to understand that he and his sister are no longer able to support themselves. Childlike, scatterbrained, and forgetful, he is a gentle soul whose personality contains contradictions: he wants to save moths and set them free yet he kills butterflies and mounts them in frames on the wall; he has no compunction about killing another human being and he has an unhealthy interest in setting and watching fires.

Cronyn does a wonderful bit of business each time he goes up or down the staircase. Instead of stepping on alternate stairs with alternate feet, he looks down intently and makes sure that each foot lands on each stair, shuffling along quickly like a child afraid of falling. The effect is humorous and subtly demonstrates the character's arrested development.

As Katherine, Carmen Mathews is cold and calculating, having once tried to murder her own brother to collect on his insurance policy and now trying to carry out a plan to murder a stranger and make it look like her brother has died. She is cheerful at all times and repeatedly refers to her own acts as being done out of "'human kindness,'" yet underneath she is trying to manipulate the men around her to suit her own purposes. She treats Fitzhugh more like a son than a brother, often referring to him as "'dear'" and gently chastising him.

Finally, James Gleason is utterly convincing as Jorgy, the homeless man who is brought into the Oldhams' home in order to be killed. At once charming and pathetic, he eats like he rarely gets a hot meal and he is easily manipulated with promises of warm milk, clean clothes, and a comfortable bed. It seems like Jorgy has so little to lose that he is willing to overlook clear signs of danger from Fitzhugh and Katherine Oldham; perhaps his brain has been so addled by alcohol that he no longer has much interest in self-protection.

Taken together, the clever story and the fine acting make this an enjoyable episode of the series. It's not clear where the story takes place, though. Behind Jorgy on the park bench, the background resembles New York's Central Park, with tall buildings seen in the distance. However, in a subsequent scene, Fitzhugh refers to "'our little town'" and Katherine later reminds him that he is to go to the Trenton Hotel in Spring City, clearly a fictional place.

The buildings in the background look
like Central Park West in New York City.

A.J. Russell (1915-1999) was a successful writer for television beginning in 1950. He wrote 11 episodes of Lights Out and adapted Fredric Brown's story, "Crisis, 1999" for the series, Tales of Tomorrow. He began writing for The Jackie Gleason Show in 1952 and was one of the writing staff responsible for the classic 39-episode season of The Honeymooners in 1955-56. He went on to write for The Phil Silvers Show in 1957-58 and shared an Emmy with the rest of the show's writing staff in 1958. He continued writing for television into the 1980s. Russell's skill with humor is evident in his teleplay for "Kill with Kindness."

"Kill with Kindness" is directed by Herschel Daugherty (1910-1993), a prolific TV director from 1952 to 1975 who also directed a couple of movies. He directed 27 episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents in all, including "The Blessington Method," and he directed 16 episodes of Thriller.

Hume Cronyn (1911-2003) began his acting career on Broadway in 1934 and he was on screen from 1943 until 2004. He had important roles in Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt (1943) and Lifeboat (1949) and was also one of the writers credited on Hitchcock's Rope (1948) and Under Capricorn (1949). Cronyn appeared twice on Alfred Hitchcock Presents (the other episode was "The Impromptu Murder") and among his other memorable film roles were The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946) and Cocoon (1985), a late-career hit. His wife, Jessica Tandy (1942-1994), was also a great actor who appeared on the Hitchcock TV show.

Mike Ragan

Carmen Mathews (1911-1995) appeared on screen from 1950 to 1992. She was born in Philadelphia and started her acting career on stage in England before returning to America, where she was seen mostly on TV and occasionally on film. She was also frequently on Broadway, from the late 1930s until the early 1980s. She appeared once on The Twilight Zone and was seen six times on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, including "The Older Sister," another story of domestic murder between siblings.

James Gleason (1882-1959) was a veteran character actor who started out on stage and who served in the Army in WWI. He appeared on film from 1922 to 1958 and on TV from 1952 to 1958; he was very busy in films in the 1930s and 1940s. This was one of two appearances he made on Alfred Hitchcock Presents; the other was "The End of Indian Summer."

The woman who calls Fitzhugh a hero at the end is played by Margie Liszt (1909-1992), who appeared on radio, film, and TV from 1947 to 1964. Hers was the voice summoning Fats Brown in the classic episode of The Twilight Zone, "A Game of Pool."

Rounding out the cast as the fireman is Mike Ragan, who was born Hollis Bane and who appeared in countless movies and TV shows starting in 1924. He was seen on the Hitchcock TV show eight times, including "Breakdown."

Watch "Kill with Kindness" here or order the DVD here.

Sources:

CTVA US Anthology - “The Web” (CBS) Season 2 (1951-52), ctva.biz/US/Anthology/Web_02_(1951-52).htm#google_vignette.

Grams, Martin, and Patrik Wikstrom. The Alfred Hitchcock Presents Companion. OTR Pub., 2001.

IMDb, www.imdb.com.

"Kill with Kindness" Alfred Hitchcock Presents, season 2, episode 4, CBS, 21 October 1956.

Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.org.

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