10 Actors Who Shot Movie Scenes Without Permission
5. Cary Grant - North By Northwest
Alfred Hitchcock's unforgettable North by Northwest features a sequence where protagonist Roger Thornhill (Cary Grant) escapes Phillip Vandamm's (Jason Mason) henchmen and takes a taxi to the United Nations Headquarters in New York to meet a man named Lester Townsend (Philip Ober).
And though Hitchcock was certainly a household name by 1959, neither he nor the alluring Cary Grant were able to persuade the U.N. to allow them to officially shoot on or around the building.
But Hitch being Hitch, he refused to take no for an answer, and attempted to film Grant walking up to the U.N. HQ sans-permission.
After two attempts failed for various reasons, Hitch hatched one final plan, by having a cab drop Grant off by the steps leading up to the General Assembly Building and having a camera crew installed across the street to capture Grant walking up them.
It worked perfectly - you'd never guess the shot was stolen from a simple glance, even if eagle-eyed viewers might notice a man doing a double take as Grant walks past him, which honestly just adds to the charm of it all.