MOVIE NEWS – Hollywood actress Veronica Cartwright has one of those instantly recognizable faces in horror: she was Lambert in Alien, Nancy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and Felicia in The Witches of Eastwick. All of these roles showcased Cartwright’s range in horror and cemented her as an underrated icon of the genre. However, perhaps her most significant early horror role is one that many may not immediately remember: as a child, Cartwright starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s “nature strikes back” horror classic, The Birds.

Cartwright is currently promoting her latest movie, a return to the genre called The Ruse. According to IndieWire, she plays a dementia-afflicted musician whose home is filled with mysteries for the young nurse who comes to care for her. At 76, Cartwright still proves she hasn’t lost her touch—unsurprising given her decades-long career, working with directors like Ridley Scott, Philip Kaufman, George Miller, and of course, Alfred Hitchcock. In an interview with IndieWire, she shared her memories of working with the legendary director of Psycho, Rear Window, and Vertigo:

“I never felt intimidated by him. It was so interesting. I got The Birds because of The Children’s Hour. Hitchcock requested to meet me, so I went to his bungalow where he told me about the best wines, how his favorite cellar was in Bristol (where I was born), and how to cook a steak because some day I’d get married… all these bizarre things, and I was thinking, ‘OK, what am I supposed to do with this? I’m 12!’”

In The Birds, Cartwright played Cathy Brenner, the young girl who witnesses the terrifying bird attacks in Bodega Bay. Hitchcock wasn’t known for working with children, but it seems he had some surprisingly insightful advice that stuck with Cartwright throughout her life:

“He said, ‘If your eye sees movement, you assume everything is alive,’ and it’s true. To this day, I can look at a jungle gym, think it’s a fake bird, and then it moves.”

“How many times does someone get to experience that? This man was a legend, and I would have tea with him every afternoon.”

After a long break from acting in the mid-60s, Cartwright returned to Hollywood with a controversial comedy called Inserts. Three years later, in 1978, she starred in Kaufman’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers, fully embracing her horror talents. But in 1979, Cartwright joined the Nostromo crew in Ridley Scott’s Alien, one of her finest performances.

Lambert’s character often fades into the background compared to Ripley, but Cartwright’s authentic reactions—her genuine screams of terror—are as essential to the scene’s impact as the special effects that made Kane’s stomach burst so shocking. Cartwright spoke with admiration about how Ridley Scott pushed her to give everything:

“His whole background was as a graphic artist, so he was very interested in how everything looked. There’s a scene where I slap Sigourney [Weaver] across the face, and every time I tried, she ducked. Ridley turns to me and says, ‘Just f*cking get her this time.’ So she ducked, and I pulled my hand back and backhanded her. She wasn’t happy, but it worked for the scene.”

Source: IndieWire