5 Things You Didn’t Know About Horror Icon Vincent Price (2025)

Few actors are as closely associated with spooky season as Vincent Price. With his towering height (6-foot-4, to be exact), richly dramatic voice and campy yet charismatic presence, the actor livened up dozens of horror movies that would go on to become Halloween classics thanks in large part to the strength of his performances.

With a career spanning over 50 years and more than 200 screen credits, the actor, who died at 82 in 1993, is beloved by multiple generations, and he was more than just a Hollywood star, as he led a fascinating offscreen life. Here are some facts you might not have known about the eternally haunting Vincent Price.

1. Vincent Price wasn’t just in horror movies

While Price is known for his roles in iconic horror movies like House of Wax (1953), The Fly (1958), House on Haunted Hill (1959), The Tingler (1959), The Pit and the Pendulum (1961), The Masque of the Red Death (1964) and The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971)—to name just a few—he also appeared in many movies outside of his signature genre.

Price started his career in the 1938 film Service de Luxe, and before finding his niche in horror in the ’50s, he was known as a character actor with supporting roles in ’40s movies like The Song of Bernadette (1943), Laura (1944), The Keys of the Kingdom (1944), Leave Her to Heaven (1945) and Dragonwyck (1946).

2. He was passionate about art history

Price studied art history at Yale, and he maintained a passion for art and a belief that it should be accessible to all. In 1957, Price donated 90 pieces from his personal art collection to East Los Angeles College, establishing the Vincent Price Art Museum, the very first art collection of its kind at a community college. That same year, he was also appointed to the Indian Arts and Crafts Board, a congressional department dedicated to promoting the arts in Native American communities.

In his mission to bring art to as wide an audience as possible, Price partnered with Sears, and from 1962 to 1971, the department store chain sold “The Vincent Price Collection of Fine Art,” a selection of prints of paintings by masters like Rembrandt, Chagall, Picasso and Whistler, as well as contemporary artists, all of which were curated by Price and sold at reasonable price points. Thanks to the actor and art historian, the collection sold over 50,000 pieces and brought art into homes that might otherwise not be able to afford it.

In 1959, Price published a “visual autobiography” detailing his lifelong love of art, I Like What I Know. In the book, he wrote, “One thing is certain: the arts keep you alive. They stimulate, encourage, challenge, and, most of all, guarantee a future free from boredom.”

3. He was a gourmet cook

Price was also known as a great cook, and he wrote a variety of cookbooks with his second wife, Mary, including A Treasury of Great Recipes (1965), Mary and Vincent Price Present a National Treasury of Cookery (1967), Mary and Vincent Price’s Come into the Kitchen Cook Book: A Collector’s Treasury of America’s Great Recipes (1969) and Cooking Price-Wise with Vincent Price (1971).

Price also hosted a cooking show, Cooking Price-Wise, on British TV in 1971, and recorded a variety of audio cooking tutorials.

4. Vincent Price had a major comeback in the ’80s and ’90s

In 1982, Price provided the spoken-word sequence for Michael Jackson’s mega-hit “Thriller,” and given the ubiquity of the spooky yet funky song on MTV, a new generation was introduced to Price’s ominous voice.

Price’s comeback continued into the ’90s, and he had his final role as the inventor in Tim Burton’s beloved 1990 goth romance Edward Scissorhands.

5. He was bisexual

While Price was married three times and had two children, his flamboyance and support of the gay community led to much speculation on his sexuality. In a 2015 interview, his daughter, Victoria Price, revealed, “I am as close to certain as I can be that my dad had physically intimate relationships with men. I know for 100 percent fact that my dad was completely loving and supportive of LGBT people.”

Victoria also spoke about how when she came out as a lesbian, her famous father was deeply empathetic. As she recalled, “The interesting thing for me is that when I came out to him and he said to me, ‘you know, I know just how you feel because I have had these deep, loving relationships with men in my life and all my wives were jealous.'”