Quotes from Vincent Price

In art, religion, and politics the respect must be mutual, no matter how violent the disagreement.

I'm extremely profane, unconsciously so, when I see something great for the first time; I don't know why, but beauty and profanity are related to me in the same way. It may be that I want to think of art in the vernacular, but I have no control over what comes out of my mouth when my eyes take in great beauty...it might just be the reason I avoid going to museums with elderly ladies.

There comes a time in life when you know what you like and have to make up your mind to like what you know, or at least have begun to know. In other words, you must determine in what direction your knowledge is leading, thus far.

I was never educated to be an actor. I went to a regular college. It was a great thing for me because I feel that the main thing to get out of college is a thirst for knowledge. College should teach you how to be curious. Most people think that college is the end of education, but it isn't. The ceremony of giving you the diploma is called commencement. And that means you are fit to commence learning because you have learned how to learn.

Do you ever rub your eyes and suddenly find you're awake and not asleep, as you'd grown to suspect you were?

Sometimes you read a passage by a great writer, and you know what he says and how he says it will always be, for you, the only possible way it could be. Less often a painter will describe an event in a way that fits into your interpretation of that event so perfectly that it becomes the event itself.

We may all be a peculiar lot...often broke, often dissatisfied because we're not doing more and better work...but we know how to have a ball that makes the rest of the world seem square.

In order to get out of the dumps, there are many steps to walk up, and most of the ones I know of, not only for myself but others, are made of money.

I trust people who are violent about art, as long as they aren't closed-minded. But, unfortunately, most art blowhards are also art bigots.

I know what I like—I like art—and I like what I know.

If I could prescribe a single rule for looking at a work of art it would be to enjoy it. If we're honest with ourselves, we have to admit we enjoy our tears just as much as we enjoy our laughter. The only moments of life that are a bore are when we don't care one way or another.

Well, what do you owe yourself? Do you dare take time out to listen to the grass grow, or can you even afford the expense of getting far enough away from life's daily cacophony to hear it grow if you took the time?

I do, however, get along fine with apes and I have worked sack of potatoes in front of the camera. Trainers tell me they like my voice and that because I treat them as people they like me. Well, it's easy to do, since some of them are people and easier to work with than some—people, I mean actors.

Art is love-times-love; the creator loves it and his audience adores it. To miss the sensation of loving art is to miss a kind of parenthood—false pregnancy perhaps—but as Van Gogh said, "If, defrauded of the power to create physically, a man tries to create thoughts in place of children, he is still part of humanity"...a big part.

What do you do when you find yourself out in a lie—even a white one? Well, one thing for sure, you don't put on black, you don't mourn and beat out a staccato mea culpa on your breast. You go! Get the hell out! Take a chance! Forget you're an American, living in the suburbs of success, hoping to move into the big city...You go!

Art is excitement which if we can't create ourselves, we can at least, through love of it, make available to others.

The follower of fashion can be as honest as the leader of the rebellion against it.

San Diego has the finest zoo in America, but the Los Angeles Zoo is not much more than a home for retired Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer lions.

It is quite obvious that you do not understand me, and in all probability, you never will.

The jet is a great invention. Besides being a world shrinker, par excellence, it has much of the quality and charm of a roller coaster. And it's big. Once, years ago, on a ten-stop, cross-country air trip, I turned to the man next to me and said, quite genuinely: "What keeps these big goddam things up in the air?

Many Hollywoodians may have good taste and an interest in culture but they certainly hide it. They're afraid they'll be branded as sissies if someone finds out they write poetry or own a painting. They're so timid about culture.

Nevertheless, Los Angeles is my "Home, Sweet Home." I chose it, and, as goes the cliché, I've made my bed—but I'll be damned if I'll lie in it or, worse, culturally die in it!