it would have been a horrible miscasting and it would have changed the whole structure of the film from a light comedy-action road movie to a more serious minded dramatic "double chase" road movie with less emphasis on the comedy and more focus probably with the drama and romance between Roger and Eve
shareI think it would work either way.
"'Extremely High Voltage.' Well, I don't need safety gloves, because I'm Homer SimpzzzZZZnnnNNNxxxXXX--" - Frank Grimes
It's easy to say now . Since grant has been thornhill for over 50 years it'll be impossible to imagine anyone else in the role .
shareStewart was evidently very interested in getting the role, but Hitchcock instinctively felt it wasn't a good fit.
Hitchcock would evidently at some point "blame" Stewart's aging appearance for the box office middling results of Vertigo(I somewhat agree, but it was the story that turned mass audiences off.) And in "Bell Book and Candle" of 1958, Stewart seemed too old for what was essentially a Cary Grant part, anyway(even if Grant was OLDER than Stewart.)
Personally, I think that James Stewart would have spoiled the crop duster scene because whereas Cary Grant in a suit looked oddly out of place on the open prairie...Western Star James Stewart would have looked just fine there.
Had Grant said "no" to North by Northwest(and he tried to get out of it), I could see Roger Thornhill more effectively played by William Holden or Rock Hudson before I would have gone to Stewart.
Funny: in the film "Dallas Buyers Club," the Matthew McConaghey character, in noting Rock Hudson's death from AIDS, has this exchange with another man:
Other man: Who's Rock Hudson?
MM: A movie star. Haven't you seen North by Northwest?
So...there's my case made for me.
Someone once said that Hitchcock used Cary Grant to play the man he wished he was, and Stewart to play the man he actually was. An oversimplification, of course, but he used Grant fore roles that contained the stuff of fantasy, and Stewart for those based in reality. More or less, of course.
Because yes, there was definitely more of Hitchcock's own self in the obsessive ex-cop in "Vertgligo", or the voyeuristic invalid in "Rear Window". Hitch reportedly did like looking into his neighbors' windows at night.
Stewart was generally irritating in everything he was in so, yes, casting Mr. Grant instead was a wise choice.
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