ROCKPORT — The daughter of classic horror icon Vincent Price will be part of a special weekend at Cape Ann Community Cinema to celebrate the actor, who was an art collector and amateur chef.
Victoria Price, the actor’s daughter, will host the screening of six films starting with “The House Of The Seven Gables” on Friday, July 12, at 7 p.m. at the community cinema, 37 Whistlestop Mall in Rockport. The opening event also features the screening of Rockport animator Ben Wickey’s short film of the same story. Five more Vincent Price films will be screened over the weekend, and presented by Price, too.
Robert Newton, Cape Ann Community Cinema’s creative director, said this weekend features the inauguration of the cinema’s Vincent Price Screening Room in the 20-seat armchair cinema known as “The Purple People Seater.”
“He was such a charismatic and commanding presence in all those great Roger Corman films that so many of us grew up watching on Channel 56, but he was so much more than that, and that’s what we have set out to illuminate with this new project,” Newton said.
In addition to his acting legacy, Newton noted that Price was a lover of art and fine food.
Victoria Price noted that her parents were avid collectors of great art from around the world.
“In the 1950s, they donated 90 pieces from their collection to East Los Angeles College, and this ‘teaching art collection’ has grown to over 9,000 pieces in the last half century,” she said in a prepared statement. Of that collection, 2,000 artworks were donated by the Prices.
During his lifetime, Vincent wrote a nationally-syndicated art column, multiple books on art, and served on numerous museum boards.
“Another thing that a lot of people don’t know is that my father was an amazing amateur chef,” Price said. “He wrote three cookbooks — the most iconic of which ‘Treasury of Great Recipes’ sold 360,000 when it debuted in 1965 and was named one of the 100 most important culinary events of the 20th century by Saveur Magazine.”
Also on opening night this Friday, the cinema will open the 250 square-foot Vincent Price Gallery, across the hall from the screening room, with an installation of works by Cape Ann’s Haig Demarjian. The inaugural exhibition, “Classic Horrors,” will feature “famous faces from your nightmares” and the unveiling of Demarjian’s latest work, a tribute to Vincent Price (1911-1993). The gallery will be open when the cinema is open.
“To me, Vincent Price has always been larger-than-life; a one-of-a-kind horror icon, and I am thrilled that my work is being shown in tribute to him,” said Demarjian, a Salem State University professor in “Art + Design” for more than 20 years.
From his downtown Gloucester studio, Demarjian co-created the award-winning 2005 classic cult film “Die You Zombie Bastards!” as well as its comic book spin-off “Super Inga.” Since 2021, his studio has been the home of Blacksmith Press, his fine art imprint for a selection of “innovative and idiosyncratic collaborative projects.”
The other Vincent Price films to be shown over the weekend are: “House Of Wax” (1953); “House Of The Long Shadows” (1983); “The House On Haunted Hill” ( a 1980s music video that features Price’s voice will precede the film); “The Last Man On Earth” (1964); and another Price classic celebrating its 60th anniversary, 1964’s “The Masque Of The Red Death,” which will be preceded by Xavier Garcia’s new short film “Good: The Examination Of An Accused Witch,” filmed in part at Halibut Point State Park in Rockport.
Throughout the weekend, The Book Shop of Beverly Farms will be at the cinema with copies of Victoria Price’s book “Vincent Price: A Daughter’s Biography.”
For show times and tickets, visit www.CapeAnnCinema.com.
Gail McCarthy may be contacted at 978-675-2706, or gmccarthy@northofboston.com.