VICTORIA PRICE TALKS ABOUT HER FAMOUS FATHER

By Joe Holleman

From St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 11.11.1999

Her lanky physique, angular face, sharp nose and piercing eyes left no question that she was the daughter of Vincent Price, St. Louis' own horrormeister.

In town last week to promote her new book, "Vincent Price: A Daughter's Biography," Victoria Price was pleased with the warm reception she received in her father's hometown.

"He always had a very fond feeling for St. Louis," Price said in an interview. "He always said that he was glad that he was raised here. I know he appreciated the different ethnic influences that surrounded him while growing up -- Italian, German, Irish, African-American.

The actor attended Country Day School and lived in the city's central corridor until heading off to acting fame.

"I think that mix of cultures fostered his lifetime appreciation of the arts," she said.

Price said that two of the area sites that always held fascination for the late actor were the St. Louis Art Museum and Cahokia Mounds.

"When he was young, he would often visit the city Art Museum to look at great art. That had a profound influence on his life," she said, adding that Price left some paintings to the museum. She also said that the artistic side of her father is the aspect of his life that she finds the most interesting.

"My father did a lot to raise awareness for the visual arts in this country. Because everyone knew him from his movies, he had a wonderful opportunity to change people's perceptions," she said. "He tried very hard to show that visual arts were both understandable and approachable."

As to the landmark archaeological site in Illinois, Price said her father often visited the Mounds in years past. She said his fascination with the site got him interested in Native American art and led to his serving as the chairman for the Indian Arts and Crafts Commission of the U.S. Department of Interior.

At the St. Louis International Film Festival last week, it was apparent that Vincent Price's star quality and local ties still could sell tickets. Saddled with a 9:45 p.m. showing on a weeknight (Thursday), the festival's screening of Otto Preminger's film noir classic, Laura - in which Price plays Shelby, a penniless gigolo scheming to marry the mysterious title character - drew close to 100 viewers.

"The response in St. Louis has been great," Price said. She said that her father's performance in Laura is one of her favorites, along with his last role, in Edward Scissorhands.

"I think his last role perfectly showed the scariness and also the underlying sweetness of the man," she said.

Price's biography is not the skeletons-in-the-closet variety, which the daughter readily admits.

"Honestly, I adored him and I wanted to protect him." Price said. "I had great reservations about doing the book, because the modern biography - especially one done by a family member - seems to require some amount of scandal.

"But I wanted people to know what he was like as a father. People, of course, have this creepy image of him - and he certainly was good at that. But what I remember most about my father was being at the ocean on vacations. Here was this very cultured man and his hair was mussed and he didn't trim his beard and we'd walk along the beach picking up driftwood and moonstones and skipping rocks.

"And riding roller coasters," she added, laughing. "He absolutely had a thing about riding roller coasters."

The biography dodges the question about the rumors of Vincent Price's possible bisexuality but states adamantly that his marriage was not simply a union of convenience and appearance. But the author also conceded that her affection for her subject could be viewed as a bias.

"Actually, my strength in writing this biography is that I knew him, but it is a given that that also is a weakness," Price said. She said she was disturbed during her research that her father was anti-Semitic as a young man, a prejudice he dropped as years went by.

"The notion there once was that he was close to being a Nazi is simply not true," she said. "And it certainly does not justify it, but many people from my father's social class and background (the more affluent class in pre-World War II) were anti-Semitic, but we have developed this cultural amnesia about that fact."

Victoria Price notes that she does not purport her book to be the exhaustive, definitive story of her father and wonders if one could ever be written. She pointed out that the most intriguing quotes about her father was one spoken by Alec Guinness.

"He once said of my father, 'One felt that one knew him better than one did.'"