The studio closed in 1919, but Alma Reville was given a job at Paramount's Famous Players-Lasky, an American motion picture company in Islington, where she met her Future husband, Alfred Hitchcock. The same company gave him a job as a graphic designer before he became an art Editor. She worked on British films with such Directors as Berthold Viertel and Maurice Elvey. The first film Reville worked on with Hitchcock was in 1923 when Hitchcock received the role of assistant Director for the film Woman to Woman. Reville had just lost her job from the studios, so Hitchcock hired her as an Editor.
Reville converted to Roman Catholicism from Protestantism before their marriage. Reville was just one day younger than Hitchcock. The couple married on 2 December 1926 at Brompton Oratory in London. Their only child, a daughter, Patricia, was born on 7 July 1928. Reville became Hitchcock's collaborator, and sounding board, with a keen ear for dialogue, and an editor's sharp eye for scrutinising a film's final version for continuity flaws so minor they had escaped the notice of Hitchcock and/or his crew. It was Reville who noticed Janet Leigh inadvertently breathing after her character's fatal encounter in Psycho (1960), necessitating an alteration to the negative.
The Ring, 1927. Juno and the Paycock, 1929. Murder, 1930. The Skin Game, 1931. Rich and Strange, 1931. Number Seventeen, 1932. Waltzes from Vienna, 1934. The 39 Steps, 1935. The Secret Agent, 1936. Sabotage, 1936. Young and Innocent, 1937. The Lady Vanishes, 1938. Jamaica Inn, 1939. Suspicion, 1941. Shadow of a Doubt, 1943. The Paradine Case, 1947. Stage Fright, 1950. I Confess, 1953
The Constant Nymph, 1928. The First Born, 1928. After the Verdict, 1929. A Romance of Seville, 1929. The Outsider, 1931. Sally in Our Alley, 1931. The Water Gipsies, 1932. Nine till Six, 1932. Forbidden Territory, 1934. The Passing of the Third Floor Back, 1935. It's in the Bag, 1945.
There were many scripts on which Reville worked with her husband in Hollywood. She collaborated with Joan Harrison to create the script for Suspicion, which was completed on 28 November 1940. They worked on the script in the Hitchcocks' home in Bel Air as Hitchcock preferred writing within a comfortable and intimate environment rather than an office.
She was portrayed by actresses Imelda Staunton in The Girl (2012), and Helen Mirren in Hitchcock (2012). Staunton was nominated for a BAFTA and a Primetime Emmy for her performance, while Mirren was nominated for BAFTA, Golden Globe and SAG awards for her performance.
