page_title: Kim Novak
section_title: Vertigo
hierarchical_section_title: Kim Novak / Acting career / Vertigo
caption_attribution_description: English: Screenshot from the original 1958 theatrical trailer for the film VertigoFrame taken from MPEG4. Note: This version of the original 1958 theatrical trailer is of significantly lower quality than the 1996 restoration theatrical trailer.
context_page_description: Marilyn Pauline "Kim" Novak is a retired American film and television actress.
  Novak began her film career in 1954 after signing with Columbia Pictures, starring in many movies, including Picnic, The Man with the Golden Arm and Pal Joey. She is widely known for her performance as Madeleine Elster/Judy Barton in Alfred Hitchcock's thriller Vertigo with James Stewart.
  Novak enjoyed box-office success and starred opposite several other prominent leading men of the era, including Fred MacMurray, William Holden, Frank Sinatra, Tyrone Power, Kirk Douglas, and Laurence Harvey.
  Although still only in her mid-30s, Novak withdrew from acting in 1966 and has only sporadically worked in films since. She appeared in The Mirror Crack'd, and had a regular role on the primetime series Falcon Crest. After a disappointing experience during the filming of Liebestraum, she permanently retired from acting, saying she had no desire to return. Her contributions to cinema have been honored with two Golden Globe Awards, an Honorary Golden Bear Award, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She works currently as a painter and visual artist.
context_section_description: Director Alfred Hitchcock was working on his next film, Vertigo (1958), when his leading actress, Vera Miles, became pregnant and had to withdraw from the complex role of Judy Barton. Hitchcock approached Harry Cohn to offer Novak the female lead without even requesting a screen test. Though Cohn hated the script, he allowed Novak to read it because he considered Hitchcock to be a great director. Novak loved it, as she could identify with the character and agreed to take part in the film without meeting Hitchcock. At the same time, she was striking for more money from Columbia, and refused to show up for work on the Vertigo set to protest her salary of $1,250 a week. Novak hired new agents to represent her and demanded an adjustment in her contract. Cohn, who was paid $250,000 for Novak to do Vertigo, suspended her, but after a few weeks of negotiations, he relented and offered her a new contract worthy of a major star. She was now receiving $3,000 a week and explained to the press, "I don't like to have anyone take advantage of me."
  
  Novak finally reported for work, and according to Hitchcock, she had "all sorts of preconceived notions" about her character, including what she would and would not wear. Before shooting began, she told the director she did not like the grey suit and black shoes she was slated to wear, thinking them too heavy and stiff for her character. Novak later recalled, "I didn’t think it would matter to him what kind of shoes I wore. I had never had a director who was particular about the costumes, the way they were designed, the specific colors.  The two things he wanted the most were those shoes and that gray suit." Indeed, Hitchcock explained to Novak that the visual aspect of the film was even more important to him than the story, and insisted on her wearing the suit and the shoes that he had been planning for several months. Novak learned to make it work for her, as she saw it a symbol of her character. Nonetheless, Hitchcock allowed Novak the freedom to develop the character herself. As she later recalled: "It excites me to work on dual personalities because I think I have many myself. And I think that I was able to use so much of me in that movie. At first I was feeling insecure because I kept saying, "Is this right? How do you want me to play this character?" Hitchcock said: "I hired you and that's who I want, what you bring to this role. But what I do expect from you is to stand where I want you to, wear what I want you to and speak in the rhythm that I want you to." And he worked a long time with me to try to get the right rhythm." The role took on a personal significance for her, as she felt she went through the same thing as her character when she arrived in Hollywood: 
  From my point of view, when I first read those lines where she says, "I want you to love me for me," and all the talking in that scene, I just identified with it so much because going to Hollywood as a young girl and suddenly finding they want to make you over totally, it's such a total change and it was like I was always fighting to show some of myself, feeling that I wanted to be there as well. It was like they'd do my hair and go and redo a bunch of things. So I really identified with the fact of someone that was being made over with the resentment, with wanting to. Needing approval and wanting to be loved and willing, eventually, to go to any lengths to get that by changing her hair and all of these different things. And then when Judy appears, it's another story and then when she has to go through that change. I really identified with the movie because it was saying, "Please, see who I am. Fall in love with me."
  Novak described Hitchcock as a gentleman, but found the experience of working with him to be strange. "I don't know if he ever liked me. I never sat down with him for dinner or tea or anything, except one cast dinner, and I was late to that. It wasn't my fault, but I think he thought I had delayed to make a star entrance, and he held that against me. During the shooting, he never really told me what he was thi
caption: Kim Novak in Vertigo
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