Madhouse *** (1974, Vincent Price, Peter Cushing, Robert Quarry, Adrienne Corri, Natasha Pyne, Linda Hayden, Barry Dennen) – Classic Movie Review 6592

Director Jim Clark’s larky 1974 Amicus Pictures horror picture and murder whodunit Madhouse has three top horror stars of the era in Vincent Price as the flamboyant Paul Toombes, Peter Cushing as the cool Herbert Flay and Robert Quarry as the smooth Oliver Quayle.

Price plays a horror movie star actor, released after years in an asylum after he was believed to have chopped his wife’s head off, trying to make a comeback on TV in London in his famous role of Dr Death. All goes well until he becomes the number one suspect when there is an outbreak of murder among cast and crew.

With them dying the same way characters did in Toombes’ old movies, there is an idea that Dr Death is committing the murders but independently of the will of Paul Toombes. But can he be?

Cushing plays the co-creator of the Dr Death character; Quarry plays the slimy producer involved in the project; and Adrienne Corri plays the spider-loving burnt-out case Faye Carstairs Flay.

Adapted from Angus Hall’s novel Devilday, Madhouse is all quite entertaining, with enjoyable performances, plenty of grisly scenes, weird characters and in-jokes to relish for fans of the macabre.

The legendary television chat show host Michael Parkinson appears as the TV interviewer. Boris Karloff can be seen in a clip from The Raven (1963) and Basil Rathbone in a clip from Tales of Terror (1962), both of them Vincent Price films. The film scenes shown at the costume party are from another Vincent Price film, The Pit and the Pendulum (1961).

Also in the cast are Natasha Pyne, Linda Hayden, Barry Dennen, Peter Halliday, Catherine Willmer, Ellis Dayle, John Garrie, Jenny Lee Wright, Ian Thompson, Christopher Sandford, Michael Craze, Robert Cawdron and Julie Crosthwaite.

Madhouse runs 92 minutes, is made by Amicus Productions and American International Pictures, released by American International Pictures, written by Greg Morrison and Ken Levison, shot in Eastmancolor by Ray Parslow, produced by AIP’s Samuel Z Arkoff and Amicus’s Milton Subotsky and Max J Rosenberg, scored by Douglas Gamley, and designed by Tony Curtis. Quarry contributed uncredited to the dialogue and text.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 6592

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Vincent Price (May 27, 1911 – October 25, 1993).