Hollywood Theatre Welcomes Vincent Price’s Daughter for Double Showing

The horror icon is among the actors with the most onscreen deaths.

(courtesy of Warner Bros.)
By Chance Solem-Pfeifer

Vincent Price long ago subverted his onscreen penchant for murder and mustache-twirling. Even in the 1970s, it would've been ridiculous to wonder if the horror icon were some kind of macabre-obsessed recluse; Price toured colleges to lecture about fine art and gleefully helmed cooking demonstrations on Johnny Carson.

And even though he acted long and widely enough to intersect with '40s Otto Preminger noirs (Laura) and '90s Tim Burton fairy tales (Edward Scissorhands), camp horror will always be a logical place to start with Price. This Friday and Saturday, the Hollywood Theatre screens House on Haunted Hill (1959) and House of Wax (1953) with Price's daughter Victoria in attendance for Q&A sessions and signings. We caught up with Victoria, 56, about her dad, how he still influences her work, and the inimitable qualities of his voice.

WW: As a biographer of your father, was there ever a point when you had to reckon with just how many people shaped his legacy?

Victoria Price: I've known it ever since I was a little kid because he was just so beloved. Wherever people saw him, their faces would light up. And I got that. I was a daddy's girl; my face lit up with joy just when he would come home.

You’re now a writer of inspirational nonfiction. How do you feel your new book’s theme of casting aside unhelpful self-expectations resonates with your father’s life?
It was 2011 when I had this big epiphany about changing my life. I was a workaholic and pretty miserable. It was also the year that would have been his 100th birthday, so there were celebrations all over the world. Going out there, I wanted to give them a taste of what he was like. The nearest way I could do that was to manifest who he was, and his legacy, was this absolute love of life.
Was happiness an innate quality in him or something he had to work at?
It was absolutely innate. But everyone has to show up to joy, or it will get squelched. That said, he also held himself to very high standards. He could’ve let celebrity become more important, but he didn’t.

In both movies screening at the Hollywood, Price has this presentational streak: "Welcome to my house," "welcome to my museum." He hosted a great deal of TV, too. Why do you think the hosting role suited him?

No one’s ever asked me that. It’s something Bill Hader picked up on for those SNL sketches, which I just love. But yes, my dad was very much a host of parties, a conduit to people. He never thought he was the best actor or cook or art collector, but he loved facilitating. The great hosts of the world bring people together.

I read that some fires blazed out of control on the House of Wax set. Did your dad have war stories from all the bizarre props and effects he encountered through the decades?

He died, I think, the fourth-most of any actor in film, so things could get outrageous. Most difficult for him were the creepy animals: spiders, snakes, rats.

Price's voice was unique by modern standards. He pitched it up and down a lot in different roles, but what was closest to his normal speaking voice?

He came from a very musical family, and I think he saw his own voice as an instrument. I remember when I was in eighth grade and heard the word “mellifluous” for the first time, and I thought, “Oh yeah, that’s my dad.”

Yeah, most people can't claim a parent whose voice sounded totally different from anyone else's walking the earth today.

It's funny—I'll be walking along at a convention and hear the tone of his voice somewhere in the room, even if not the words. And I'll wonder, "What is going on?" And then I'll remember where I am.

SEE IT: House on Haunted Hill screens at the Hollywood Theatre, 4122 NE Sandy Blvd., hollywoodtheatre.org, on Friday, March 1. 7 pm. House of Wax screens Saturday, March 2. 7 pm. $12 each.

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