Vincent Price Unmasked by James Robert Parish

Thanks to a witty and literate script, the producers succeeded in attracting some of the best actors in England for supporting roles. Theatre of Blood originated as a project with Sam Jaffe, Price's former agent and friend, who offered Vincent the role of Edward Lionheart. You killed my wife and now I'm going to kill you.' Revenge is one of these great ballsy things. You mug someone on the street for $1.98 and then shoot him for the fun of it. Our motives of mayhem today are so senseless. In Vincent Price Unmasked by James Robert Parish and Steven Whitney (Drake Publishing), the actor said, 'Revenge is really the only evil human emotion that is not dated, and it is in everyone. Phibes films were campy art deco horror fantasies, Theatre of Blood pokes fun at the theatre world while paying homage to the Grand Guignol tradition. Phibes Rises Again! (1972), in its revenge scenario. Often cited by Vincent Price as one of his favorite films, Theatre of Blood is an ingenious black comedy which bears some comparisons to the horror actor's two earlier films, The Abominable Dr. Peregrine Devlin (Ian Hendry), a key member of the London Theatre Critics Circle, suspects the true culprit behind the bizarre murders and tries to convince the police of his theory before he himself becomes a victim. Assisting the deranged actor in his sinister schemes are his devoted daughter Edwina (Diana Rigg) and a ragtag army of homeless derelicts who fished Lionheart from the Thames River where he was thought to have committed suicide. Who hasn't had the urge at least once to forever silence a snobbish critic who panned a favorite book, play or movie? For most people, the mere fantasy of exacting revenge is enough, but in Theatre of Blood (1973), a classically trained actor named Edward Lionheart (Vincent Price) goes a step further, literally stalking and dispatching his most severe critics in a variety of innovative ways, copied from famous death scenes in Shakespeare plays.