10 Memorable Vincent Price Characters

In a career that spanned 7 decades, Vincent Price played every character from The Invisible Man to Sir Walter Raleigh, he worked with directors such as Otto Preminger, Alfred Hitchcock and Mario Bava, was good friends with Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing and Boris Karloff and even, courtesy of Thames Television, hosted his own cookery show. And that’s just scratching the surface.

Price is one of Hollywood’s genuine legends, a bona fide movie star with an immediately recognisable voice, and as with most legends, he was looked down upon by the Establishment before finding acceptance within the horror community. From The Invisible Man Returns (1940) to Edward Scissorhands (1990), he created a gallery of characters that deserve to be the envy of most “mainstream” performers.

At a time when voicing cartoon characters was considered at odds with “serious” acting, Price proved you could do both, voicing the villainous Professor Ratigan in The Great Mouse Detective (1986) before appearing alongside Bette Davis and Lillian Gish in The Whales Of August (1987), where his performance was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award.

In that film, Price plays Mr Maranov, an aging Russian aristocrat, but the kind of characters he’s remembered for were usually more sinister and larger than life.

Like the following, in fact. 

It’s not every actor who after a 30 year stint in horror movies accepts the opportunity to send himself up in Scooby Doo, playing a warlock who wears a red and black cape and owns a magic carpet. In fact, there’s only one thespian who could successfully rise to the challenge.

The plot of this 13 episode spin-off is loosely based on William Castle’s 13 Ghosts (1960), which was also remade in 2001 starring Matthew Lillard who, because it’s a small world, subsequently played Shaggy in the 2002 Scooby Doo movie. When Scooby and Shaggy accidentally open the Chest Of Demons, they unleash the eponymous spirits on the world and are tasked by Van Ghoul with tracking them down before they wreak havoc.

Voiced by Maurice LaMarche, the character returned in the Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated series (2010), only this time he wasn’t a warlock but a horror movie actor. Two of his best remembered movies – and Shaggy’s personal favourites – were Dr Phobos and The Killer Bee.