Girls, I am telling you, I have been feeling like a real bitch all week, and there has been plenty to bitch about, but what does one do about such a matter? Well, my answer is always a good slasher film, where you can root for the killer because the victims are so abysmal they almost deserve what they get. But how many times can you watch "Prom Night" or "Terror Train?" Occasionally you need to take a break. I was pondering this, darlings, when a film that remains in the back of my consciousness (ie; not quite forgotten) surfaced--1973's "Theatre Of Blood," starring Vincent Price!!!!!!!!!
Loves, this is FABULOUS!!!!!!! If you are a high school or college student studying Shakespeare in English class, I can fully attest this is more fun and informative than any Cliff Notes. An as far as slashers go, this is the classiest and stylish within the genre.
Vincent Price, really hamming it up, plays a hammy English stage actor named Edward Lionheart. Near the end of a lifelong theatrical career, he performs a full London season of Shakespeare---all the classics!!!!!! For this he is nominated for an acting award and feels he will and should win. BUT the critics on the committee dismiss his achievements as being...well...hammy...and bestow the prize on a young up and comer. Before you can Maleficent in "Sleeping Beauty", Lionheart attacks the committee of critics, and in humiliated retaliation, kills himself in front of them by leaping out the terraced window into the river below, to the trauma of his grown daughter, Edwina (the brilliant Diana Rigg), who has followed her father, to try and stop him from further humiliation.
Several years go by, and we see the lovely Edwina, dressed in white like Ophelia in the mad scene, putting flowers on her father's grave. Quicker than you can say the words Globe Theatre, it becomes apparent that someone is dispatching the critics one by one, like something out of Agatha Christie. The gimmick is each murder corresponds to one in the Shakespeare canon, and it is fun to guess which one along the way. And for the uninitiated, it is an entertaining lesson.
The opening is actually the best. A critic and his wife are having breakfast, when he receives a call that the condemned property he owns and is trying to sell, has been taken over by vagrant squatters. He is called to get them out. He arrives, and two British looking policemen escort him inside, where the derelicts have set up camp. He goes to dismiss them, when suddenly, they, like actors on cue, take on an alertness of manner they hitherto have not displayed, close in on the autocratic critic, and murder him en masse. As he is dying, the taller of the policeman stands over him, removes his moustache and make-up!!!!!
Yes, it is Lionheart!!!!!!! "But you're dead!" the critic gasps!!!!!! Chortlinjg over his vengeance, the deranged actor-killer ends his verbal diatribe with the words "It is you who are dead!"
What an opening!!!!!!! So, of course, what follows is the remainder of the critics dispatched in Shakespearean mode, the most celebrated and favorite of them all, being Robert Morely's "Titus Andronicus" death, and the rather campy manner in which it is executed!!!!!!! After enough critics die, the remaining catch on to what is going on and why, and the film proceeds to a predictable, but enjoyable conclusion.
Even the opening credits are classy, with silent film Shakespearean scenes being performed, which seem to be footage of stage performances--I recognized Paul Robeson as Othello in one clip. Girls, if you are feeling like one Vicious Queen, or maybe because you are on the brink of menopause, then this is the film to watch. Its vitriolic mirth will drain all the bitchiness right out of you.
I will never forget seeing this film for the first time. It was the spring of 1973, just before I graduated from high school. My friend Marc and I drove from South Plainfield, NJ, home, to a movie theater off of Route 22, near Scotch Plains.The title alone was appealing. But my expectations were not high; I basically thought I was going to see and entertaining piece of crap!!!!! Well, this crap turned out to be classier than I imagined, and several years back, it got its artistic due, when, during one Halloween period, the Film Forum in NYC ran it for a week as part of its programming. Seeing it onscreen again reminded me how classy, and bitchy it truly is.
Vincent Price was brilliant, knowing just how far to go and not with the role. Same with Diana Rigg, who had the more difficult role; you feel for her losing her father the way she did, and the trauma she was put through, her sadness at him not being accorded his honorable due, but then you have to wonder--did she and her father plan this scheme out years in advance, even down to the enactment of his "suicide?" After all, what guarantee was there that he would survive such an attempt? Which begs the question, is she as psychologically unbalanced as he????
I still am not sure. But raising these questions as it does indicates the film has a degree of depth unusual for its genre. And, girls, I have to tell you, you have got to see Diana as Butch, the hairdresser. And wait till you see the "permanent wave" Coral Browne's character gets!!!!!!!! It is enough to make one become a home stylist!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But home or not, girls, "Theatre Of Blood" is such fun!!!!!! There was even a stage version of it done in London several years back, in which Diana Riggg's real daughter, played onstage her mother's film role. How I hoped it would come here, or that the script would be published, so I could play in it!!!!!!!!! Alas, no such luck!!!!!!!!!! But if you see this film, even on a repeat viewing, you will luck out, loves, as it drains the bitchiness right out of you!!!!!!!!!!!!
At least until it is time for the next drink!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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