My interview with John Landis on that very subject:



<< Pop star Michael Jackson's Thriller (1982) was--and is--the world's best-selling album. And Michael Jackson's Thriller (1983), a 14-minute music video of the album's title track, is no slouch in the popularity department either; it's recognized by Guinness World Records as the most popular music video of all time. Surely anyone connected with either project made a quick, permanent relo to Easy Street. Imagine being connected with both!



Vincent Price performed the ghoulish voiceover "Rap" for album and music video, but he never got a share of the mega-millions that accrued. Others reaped rich rewards, but Price heard the door slam, and wound up with total payments that were more like the funk of 40,000 cents. Michael Jackson's Thriller director John Landis reminisces about Price, in particular the actor's reaction to going from Rap-Off to ripped-off...



JOHN LANDIS: The song "Thriller" was originally recorded for the Thriller album, which had been out for about a year before we made Michael Jackson's Thriller. When Michael asked me to do it, he wanted a regular rock video, a three-minute thing, which I wouldn’t do. I thought I could exploit his celebrity and "bring back" the theatrical short; in fact, my deal with him was that it had to be released theatrically. (And it did play theatrically, with Fantasia [1940] in Los Angeles, before it was on television.) When I told Michael that I wanted it to be a "two-reeler," to bring back the shorts, he was very excited about that idea. Now, I certainly don’t want to impugn Michael Jackson in any way, because he was brilliant and a great performer, and I actually quite liked him. But so much has been written about how he collaborated on it, wrote it--



Q: It says in the credits that he co-wrote and co-produced.

His contribution was, he said he wanted to turn into a monster [laughs]. He had seen An American Werewolf in London [1981] and he was fascinated with the metamorphosis, and that's what he wanted to do. And that was his contribution. Yes, on-screen it says "co-written," "co-produced" [laughs]--Michael didn’t do anything except he was the star. Oh, and of course he worked with Michael Peters, who was a brilliant choreographer. A lot of the actual Thriller dance itself was choreographed by Peters, but a lot of the just-dancing-around was Michael; I had him improvising stuff.

Vincent Price had done his "Rap" on the original Thriller album. In doing my film, I remixed the song, so I needed the original tracks. But the Vincent Price narration track was tied into some kind of rhythm track, so I couldn’t use it the way I wanted to. I called Mr. Price and asked if he would come in and re-record it, and he was very kind and he said "Sure!" and he did. He came to Universal and we went to one of the ADR stages. He was wearing a very beautiful sweater, a Missoni sweater that must have cost a fortune. He did the Rap very quickly, he just read it cold. Then I asked, "Would you give me some creepy laughter?" and he said, "Sure! Ah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah!" If you listen to the song itself on the record and then listen to it on the video, it's quite different: I cut out a lot of the parts of the song I didn’t like, and I rearranged stuff. I used the original tracks of the original vocals except for Vincent. But Vincent sounds almost identical [in both]. Not exactly, but almost.



Q: Whose idea was it for VINCENT PRICE--THRILLER to be on the theater marquee in the video?

Oh, mine. And the film posters you see outside the theater [House of Wax, The Mad Magican, The Masque of the Red Death] were my posters. I started collecting posters in the '60s, when I was a kid; I used to send away to Canton, Oklahoma, to some place called Movie Poster Service, a National Screen warehouse, and the deal was: Any movie before 1960, the one-sheets were 50 cents, and anything after 1960, they were a dollar. I had quite a remarkable poster collection.



Q: According to a couple sources, the last zombie we see in the video, the one who looks into the camera, is Price in heavy makeup.

[Laughs] Oh, no! No, that's a makeup artist, Greg Cannom. Price was never on the set or anything.



Q: So where the music video is concerned, re-reading the Rap was it, Price-wise.

Yes. He read it, it was really fast and easy, and then we went to lunch at Musso & Frank. Fade-out, fade-in: Quite a bit later, after the success of the video, I got a call from Mr. Price, who said, "John, I'm very embarrassed, but...would you please speak to Michael about something for me?" I asked, "Well...why don’t you call Michael?" Vincent said, "He won't take my calls"--which was very much like Michael. I asked, "Why?" He said, "Well, I did a vocal on the biggest selling record of all time--and I've received no money. And I don’t understand it...!" I said, "Let me call and find out."

I spoke to Michael, who didn’t want to know, and who said, "Talk to the lawyers." Basically what happened was, when Vincent came in the first time [for the album], he was given a standard recording contract and he was paid--I'm guessing--three or four hundred dollars. It was a buyout, which means that you get no residuals, no profit, nuthin'. And when he came in to do it again for me, for the video, he signed the same type of contract.



Q: And he ended up with two piddling payments.

I just felt the whole thing was terribly unfair, especially since (as I tried to point out to their lawyer), if you look at the video, we really exploit Vincent's name. Anyway, the bottom line is that Vincent didn’t get any real money, and he was very distressed about it, he really was angry.

Okay, fade out and fade back in again, and it's now even later. I couldn’t tell you the exact date, but I'm in the Tower Records store on Sunset Strip with my son. It was about the time of the first scandal with Michael [the child sex abuse charges], when I was about to sue Michael myself because I hadn’t gotten my money for Thriller. (And still have not!) But then the scandal broke and I felt he had enough problems at the time, so I didn’t sue him. Anyway, I'm in Tower Records and I hear this voice, "JOHN LANDIS!" It booms out--he had that amazing Edwardian theatrical voice. I look up and there's Vincent Price, who was quite a tall man, very imposing, two or three aisles over. I go, "Hi, Vincent, how are you?" and Vincent booms out, "What do you think about our friend Michael?"--there's like 300 people in the store, and now they're all listening [laughs]! I said, "Well, I think it's terrible what's going on...it's a tragedy for everyone...I certainly hope it's untrue--" And Vincent Price said in his best Edward Lionheart voice, "Well, he CERTAINLY +*$!$! MEEEE!"



Q: [Laughs] Still shouting from two aisles over?

Yes! One, he was being funny, but two, he was really pissed off! Which I understand; I'm involved still in a lawsuit with them. It's ridiculous. Michael was always surrounded by crooks, and he was crazy, so [laughs] that creates a difficult situation.



Q: If Price had made a good deal for himself originally, how much would he have gotten out of Thriller?

Oh, listen, he'd probably be like me and be in court [laughs]! When we made the video, the album was like the biggest selling album of all time--and then the album, I think, tripled its sales after the video. The video sort of regenerated a huge interest.



Q: Was that the only time you met him?

No, I met him three or four times, including when we did The Horror Hall of Fame [1990], some kind of bogus TV award show where Rick Baker, Joe Dante and I gave Forry Ackerman an award. Vincent Price was the host, we spent time talking to him then and he was really funny. But the Thriller video was my only time actually working with him.



Q: As a Monster Kid, what does it mean to you to have Vincent Price on the list of people you’ve directed?



I really didn’t direct him; he came in and it was all written down and I said, "Can you do this again?" and he did it. One take, and then I asked for some Vincent Price laughter, and that was it. It couldn't have taken more than 20 minutes! I've always been a fan: He was a charming, interesting, elegant man, very, very funny, and a much better actor than some people give him credit for. A lot of the reason [that Price isn’t more highly esteemed] is because he did a lot of green slime performances [laughs], but he was capable of great work. I'm thrilled to have actually worked with him. <<