PERKINS--A NOVICE DIRECTOR WHO KNOWS THE ROLE

“Some people have already begun referring to me as a director,” Anthony Perkins said reflectively. “But being a first-time movie director is a bit like being a first-time bullfighter. You can find out all about the ring and the people who’ll assist you and the outfit you wear--but until you get into that ring with the bull you can’t call yourself a bullfighter. . . .”

In 10 weeks’ time, actor Perkins will be stepping into the ring for the first time--not only starring as the demented Norman Bates in “Psycho 3,” but also directing the movie.

Is he tossing and turning at night wondering why he ever said yes to the idea? He is not.

“That’s because I know I can do it,” he said the other day sitting back in his rambling Spanish-style house in the Hollywood Hills. “When Universal sent me the script of ‘Psycho 3’ (by Charles Pogue) I thought it so fascinating I just knew I could direct it.

“And when that word filtered down to Universal, they did everything they could do encourage me. It’s a question of affinity with the material. And I know this story. I should. I’ve lived with it--and sometimes tried to live it down--for more than 20 years (the first ‘Psycho’ directed by Alfred Hitchcock, was made in 1960).

“Dick Benjamin had the same feeling about ‘My Favorite Year’ (the first movie he directed). I talked to him after his first day on the set and said: ‘Well. . . .?’ And he said: ‘You know, I can’t imagine not doing this for the rest of my life.’ I can’t tell you how much that cheered me. If he’d said: ‘Well, now I see there’s a lot involved,’ I’d have been much less encouraged.

“Statistically, of course, the odds are on the side of the actor who tries his hand at directing. Most have done very well. And the great thing is, I’ve got all those highly professional film makers at Universal to help me. And I’ll take all the help I can get. I know I’ll be well into my depth. I just hope I won’t be out of it. . . .”

And so on July 8, the lights will once again be switched on in the two-story Gothic house on the Universal lot. And the walls of the Bates’ Motel will be taken out of storage and reassembled.

The movie picks up one month after “Psycho 2” ended. And there will be some new characters--among them a girl who has run away from a convent after an “unfortunate experience” (Perkins’ words) and a young drifter who is on his way to Los Angeles. Both of them check into the motel.

Producing the film will be Hilton Green, who was first assistant on Hitchcock’s “Psycho” and produced “Psycho 2.”

“He and I go back a long way,” Perkins said. “That’s going to be a big help. And what’s really encouraging is the enthusiasm these films seem to generate. Everybody wants to help.”

He has been auditioning actors for some weeks now, telling the ones he’s chosen: “You’ll just have to trust me. There won’t be time for sitting around on the set theorizing.

“Anyway, I hate all that,” he said. “One of the things I’ve learned to like about the Movies of the Week I’ve done is that you just get up there and do them.”

In an attempt to make his job as actor-director slightly easier, he intends using his double, Kurt Paul--who bears some resemblance to him--to act out the role while he arranges his shots.

“He’ll actually learn the lines and know the role thoroughly,” Perkins said. “That way I’ll be able to see how it all looks. Kurt’s going to be a big help. And there’s a bit of Norman in him too.

“What I hope is to make it fun. Hitchcock always did. On ‘Psycho,’ if things ever got tense he’d stop production for five minutes and say: ‘Please remember we’re supposed to be enjoying ourselves.’ And the tenser a scene got, the more mischievous he became.”

He intends to make full use of a storyboard (on which each scene is sketched out for the director’s reference.)

“One of the art directors told me, ‘Storyboards have gone a bit out of fashion nowadays, you know. The young directors reckon they can do without them.’ I said: ‘First of all, I’m not young (he’s 53). Second of all, I believe in them. It’ll be my Bible.

“Then I’ll probably follow the Woody Allen directing formula. You know--shoot the scene from where you feel you’d like to see it and then when you get tired of that move to another place.”

Considering his large body of work--movies ranging from “Friendly Persuasion” to “Murder on the Orient Express,” plays like “Equus” and “Romantic Comedy,” such television plays as “The Sins of Dorian Gray” and writing (he co-authored “The Last of Sheila”)--Perkins is remarkably untroubled by the fact that it is as Norman Bates that most people remember him.

“Listen,” he said, “he’s an original. It doesn’t worry me at all that people identify me with the role. It is my role. But one of the reasons I went on a worldwide tour to promote ‘Psycho 2’ was to give people the chance to see the difference between the nuts I play on the screen and the real me. I have played quite a few psychologically disturbed people and I never forget that a lot of people have grown up with me as Norman Bates. So I’m planning to tour with this one too.”

Long, long ago Perkins adopted Mike Nichols’ attitude toward his career. Nichols was once asked: “What if your next movie is a flop? What will you do?” Nichols thought about this for a moment and then replied, “But I’ll still be me, won’t I? I’ll still have myself.” Perkins, who worked for Nichols on the movie “Catch-22,” liked that and adopted it for himself.

“So I’m not losing any sleep over this,” he said. “None at all. Anyway, there’s a theory that the first movies of most directors are among their best. It’s when they’re at their most inventive, when they’re willing to listen. I think that’s a good theory.” He smiled widely. “In fact I’m clinging to it. . . .”