Helen Mirren as Mrs Hitchcock?

Sacha Gervasi, director of the sublime Anvil! The Story of Anvil!, is a famously well- connected chap.

Father of Geri Halliwell's child, former secretary to Ted Hughes, writer of Steven Spielberg's The Terminal, he doesn't have much trouble getting talent on the phone. So we should not be surprised to hear that he has persuaded Helen Mirren to play Alma Reville, wife to Alfred Hitchcock, in a film based on the making of Psycho.

Who could carry off Hitchcock? Timothy Spall, maybe. Richard Griffiths? It looks as if Gervasi might plump for Sir Anthony Hopkins. That could be fun.