Vincent Price

Price earned his lasting connection to gothic horror and unhinged villainy through headline performances in a string of 1960s pictures drawn from Edgar Allan Poe’s poems and tales, among them The Raven, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum, and The Masque of the Red Death. Widespread familiarity with those and similar productions quickly linked his voice to the genre, prompting numerous recording projects and an album released under his own name. Even his eerie laughter alone could summon grim images, while his refined enunciation intensified the impression. Concrete examples of his work range from a featured role on Alice Cooper’s Welcome to My Nightmare, issued by Atlantic in 1975, to a spoken passage on Michael Jackson’s Thriller for Epic in 1982, plus a track on the 1998 children’s collection Scooby-Doo’s Snack Traks: The Ultimate Collection. His own effort, Witchcraft and Magic, appeared on Capitol Records.

Additional fields welcomed his singular delivery. For Disney’s Great Mouse Detective he supplied the voice of a key character, prompting songwriters to create two original numbers tailored to him. On television he served as host of the PBS anthology Mystery throughout the 1980s. He also parodied his own image, voicing Vincent Van Ghoul in the 1984 animated series The 13 Ghosts of Scooby-Doo. One rare setback occurred when Disneyland Paris premiered Phantom Manor with Price’s English narration; visitor objections prompted management to substitute a French speaker. The episode remained an isolated exception in a career that began after he earned degrees from Yale University and the University of London’s theater-arts program, followed by stage work in Britain, on Broadway, and alongside Orson Welles at the Mercury Theater. Beyond acting, Price performed on radio, wrote several books, mastered gourmet cooking, and assembled a notable art collection whose ninety-piece gift helped launch both the permanent holdings and educational initiatives at East Los Angeles College, later honored by the naming of its Vincent Price Gallery. His collecting began at age twelve with the purchase of a Rembrandt etching.

Price married three times: first to Edith Barrett in 1938, a union that ended in divorce a decade later; then to Mary Grant in 1949, which concluded in divorce in 1973; and finally to Coral Browne in 1974, a marriage that lasted until her death in 1991. He and his wives had two children, Vincent and Victoria. His father, Vincent Leonard Price, directed a candy company, while his mother, Marguerite Wilcox, helped found the St. Louis Community School. Three older siblings—James Mortimer, Lauralouise, and Harriet—preceded him. The actor died of lung cancer in 1993.