The birds is coming
Correcting Hitchcock
Released in March 1963, The Birds was Alfred Hitchcock’s first film since Psycho, and Universal went all out to promote it. Billboards, posters, and bus ads appeared across the U.S., many bearing the striking—but mildly perplexing—tagline “The birds is coming.” Plenty of people must have scratched their heads, not least because birds was left in lowercase, making it look less like a film title and more like a grammatical blunder. But few took their concerns directly to the master of suspense himself—unlike one class of third graders in Manhattan who felt compelled to set him straight.
Transcript follows.
New York 26, N.Y.
March 5, 1963Mr. Alfred Hitchcock
Hollywood, CaliforniaDear Mr. Hitchcock,
We saw an advertisement on the bus for your new movie. It said “The Birds is coming.”
We are in the third grade and we have learned when to use is and when to use are. We learned that is is for one thing and are is for more than one thing. We think you made a mistake in your advertisement. We think you should change your sign to “The Birds are coming” if you mean many birds are coming, or “The Bird is coming” if you mean one bird is coming.
We hope you will change your advertisement because people or children will learn incorrect English. Please don’t think English is strictly for the birds.
Sincerely,
Class 3-4
Letterheady
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that Letterheady—my online celebration of interesting letterheads—had been revived and found a new home. Since then, many of you have visited, sent kind words, and even shared your own favourite finds. Thank you. It means a lot.
If you haven’t yet taken a look, you’d be very welcome. So far we’ve had letterheads belonging to Stevie Nicks, Andy Warhol, Gertrude Stein, Ray Bradbury, and others, and there are thousands more to come.
Hopefully see you there.
If you’re willing and able to support this one-man timesuck, here’s how:
Thank you!
How wonderful! I especially like the little joke that the children ended their letter with. Do you know if there was any reply to the class’ letter?
Love it.