The Shakespearean allusion in the punning title of this macabre 1964 farce, written by Richard Matheson and directed by Jacques Tourneur, is embodied in the character of John Black (Basil Rathbone), a wealthy townsman who has the habit of quoting from Macbeth, even performing bits of the play hammily while reading the text in his bed-chamber.
Black is the landlord of Waldo Trumbull (Vincent Price), a boozing undertaker who took over the business by marrying would-be opera soprano Amaryllis (Joyce Jameson), the daughter of its long-time owner Amos Hinchley (Boris Karloff). Trumbull, who loathes Amaryllis and tries repeatedly to poison decrepit Amos, is barely making ends meet, scrimping on costs by repeatedly using the same coffin, dumping the corpses into their graves after the mourners have left.
So when Black demands immediate payment of a year's rent, Trumbull hatches a scheme to create clients by murdering them. Forcing his assistant Felix Gillie (Peter Lorre)—a sad sack besotted with Amaryllis, whom Trumbull keeps in thrall by threatening to reveal his past crimes to the police—to help, he aims to kill two birds with one stone by doing away with Black. The inept duo breaks into his house and, after a frenetic chase, he falls—apparently dead—and they take the body back to the funeral parlor.
What they do not realize is that Black suffers from catalepsy—another Shakespearean device, borrowed from Romeo and Juliet—and his “corpse” is revived by Trumbull’s pet feline, not the only time he will appear to return from the dead. Meanwhile, Gillie, concerned over Trumbull’s treatment of his wife, rebels and offers to take her away. That leads to a frantic finale in which Black chases Trumbull and Gillie with an ax. Trumbull and Gillie have a sword fight, Amaryllis and Gillie depart, and Trumbull unwittingly takes the poison he had disguised as his father-in-law's medicine.
Matheson’s script boasts some clever ideas and witty lines of dialogue, but Price exaggerates badly and Tourneur’s direction is heavy-handed; a laugh track might have helped. And while it is certainly agreeable to watch such a quartet of horror icons play off against one another (and enjoy Joe E. Brown’s cameo as a stunned cemetery keeper), Lorre and Karloff are so infirm it is often painful to watch them (the use of a stand-in for Lorre in the action scenes, which goes so far as to shroud his face with a cloth, is obvious).
Still, The Comedy of Terrors has amusing moments—especially from Rathbone—and extras on this disc include the theatrical trailer, an audio commentary by film historian Tim Lucas, and a ten-minute clip of Matheson talking about the making of the film. A strong optional purchase, especially for horror buffs.