Tippi Hedren has erased the word 'fear' from her vocabulary

Originally published on Nov. 1, 2016

Tippi Hedren doesn't fear much nowadays.

In fact, one of the only fears she has left is something rather small in comparison to the things she's faced throughout her career. "Spiders, I really don't like them," she reveals. Host Tom Power chuckles at that reveal, considering what their conversations have already touched on, leading up to this.

Hedren is best known for her roles in Alfred Hitchcock's Marnie and The Birds and while part of the actress' legacy will forever be tied to the famous director, she looks back at those years with both an admiration and disgust at him. As she reveals in her new memoir, Hitchcock tried to sexually assault her.

"He tried to," she clarifies, stating that he didn't succeed. "It was a very uncomfortable time; that's when I said I wanted to get out of my contract." 

Hedren says she felt imprisoned during her time under Hitchcock's contract and even though he threatened to end her career if she walked away, fear didn't stop her from marching on.

She faced another scary experience — well, scary to those hearing the story, not so much to Hedren herself as she recalls the incident — when filming the 1981 film, Roar.

During a scene, a "rather bitchy" lioness bit her on the back of her head and while she admits to it being a disturbing event, that never stopped her from completing the film. She concludes: "I knew it was one accident and I was going to prevent the next one." 

Tippi Hedren's new book, Tippi: A Memoir, is out now.