Audrey Hepburn and Efrem Zimbalist Jr. in Wait Until Dark, 1967.
Audrey Hepburn Studies Blind Role Intensely
“Portraying blindness is a lot more difficult than it seems,” she commented before undergoing a series of camera tests. “Naturally, the audience knows that Audrey Hepburn is not blind. So how am I going to convince them that I am blind in the story?
Some have suggested that I stare at a fixed point off-camera, but I don’t like that idea. I think it would distract both me and the audience. Besides, one of the things I learned in my research was that the blind are taught to direct their eyes to those they are talking to.”
Miss Hepburn, whose husband Mel Ferrer is producing “Wait Until Dark”, visited a clinic for the blind in Lausanne, near their Swiss home. Then she spent two days at the Light House Institute for the Blind in New York City, undergoing blindfold training with real-life trainees.
“It was Strange and enlightening experience,” she remarked. “You realize how helpless you are without sight, and yet you learn how much can be taught to blind people so they can be virtually independent.
One of the most interesting sessions was learning how to work in a kitchen. Even the simplest of actions, like the making of a sandwich, must be thought out. You must feel everything—the sense of touch is all you have—and you even have to put your fingers on the ham, to determine if you have spread it evenly.
You must learn how to use a knife without cutting yourself, how to operate a stove without burning yourself, much of the training is aimed at preventing injury.”
By Bob Thomas, Wausau Daily Herald, Feb 9, 1967.
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