I am new to this forum. Since joining it I have noticed with more than passing interst the previous comments pertaining to the movie "North by Northwest." It has been a favorite of mine since first seeing it in 1959. As with any Alfred Hitchcock picture, the story as well as the acting were superb. Also the role that the New York Central played in it was of particular interst too.
As noted before, the actor who played the porter on the Twentieth
Century Limtied was said to be the same person who played the same role in another MGM movie from 1953 "The Bandwagon" starring Fred Astaire. It was rumored that he wasn't really a professional actor but an NYC employee recruited for the part in each instance.
Another coincedence to both movies mentioned is the GCT platform scenes. In each of those pictures those scenes were said have been shot at the studio. The interior scenes of GCT in NBNW were authentic location shootings.
There were quite a few other location shootings in and around New York City too such as the scenes at the PLaza Hotel, the UN building and the mansion at the Old Westbury Gardens on Long Island. The LaSalle Street Station, Ambassador Hotel and Midway Airport terminal scenes were the real thing too
On the Twentieth Century Limited the interior of the club lounge was not one that was recognizable as anything that the NYC owned or oprerated. The dining car, on the other hand, was certainly that belonging to the Century.
During the scene in the dining car, over the dialogue between Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) and Eve Kendall (Eva Marie Saint) and the background music, the sound of the dual note E8 air horns is frequently heard. The scenery from the dining car windows suggests that the train is still on the Electric Division and the diesel power would not have been added until the train reached at Harmon. Secondly, in those days the light weight passenger cars were made with an abundance of soundproofing material so that most ambient noise from the outside was not heard in the interior of those cars.
In this forum someone asked about the locomotive units pictured in this production and their history. At LaSalle Street Station we saw a brief shot of E8A 4044. Three years earlier, in 1955, that same unit was leading train # 1, the "Pacemaker," when it was involved in a terrible accident at Schodack Landing on the Hudson Division. Moments before reaching the point of impact, a rock slide had occurred without warning. The train was traveling at the ruling speed at that time. The second locomotive unit was 4067. The lead unit landed on its side in the river killing the engineman. There were no ther fatalities but quite a few people were injured as other cars of that train left the rails. Within the year the diesel units were back in service and went on to finish out their lives with PC then Amtrak.
This was not the first time that Alfred Hitchcock used the NYC in one of his movies. The 1946 release "Spellbound" had a segment where the characters portrayed by Ingrid Bergman and Gregory Peck board #39 the "North Shore Limited" and travel from GCT to Rochester. All that is visible, when the train is under way, is the darkness of the Park Avenue tunnel until it emerges on to the viaduct above the avenue where Gregory Peck becomes entranced by the parallel pattern of the adjoing tracks. Leo G. Carroll was in that picture too.