Here is the Haunted Attraction Industry News for June, 13th.
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Haunt Associations
Best Static Prop:
Christopher Pressley – Christopher Pressley Haunt (Cary, North Carolina) – Hand of Glory
Best Animated Prop:
Bartley Busse – Haunting on Gibbs (Swift Current, Saskatchewan) – Grabby Granny Coffin
Best Set Design:
Matt Lipke – Brooklyn Fright Nights (Brooklyn, New York) – Neibolt Courtyard
Best Static or Animated Prop – Best Set Design Hall of Fame:
Bob Kowal – Attic Hatched INFESTATION (Clinton Township, Michigan) – Monster Scorpion
Best Female ScareActor:
Samara Goyette Chikhani – Haunted Boardwalk of Saint-Hubert (Saint-Hubert, Quebec)
Best Male ScareActor:
Andrew Grant – Scaresdale Manor (Oakville, Ontario)
Best ScareActor – Hall of Fame:
Jody Bienert – Nightmare on Athapaskan (N.O.A) (Leduc, Alberta)
Best Canadian Rookie Home Haunt:
Chris Sparrow – Sparrow’s Haunted Halloween (Sherwood Park, Alberta)
Best Canadian Yard Haunt:
Brendan Boyd – Boyd Haunt (Olds, Alberta)
Best Canadian Yard Haunt – Hall of Fame:
Christopher Arnott – Dunnett’s Dark Lair (Barrie, Ontario)
Best Canadian Walkthrough Haunt:
Pat Chikhani & Julie Goyette – Haunted Boardwalk of Saint-Hubert (Saint-Hubert, Quebec)
Best Canadian Walkthrough Haunt – Hall of Fame:
Thérèse Hansell and Hugh Flesher – Rutherford Manor (Edmonton, Alberta)
Best International Haunt:
Jennifer Dunahee – The Haunting of Storybook Hollow (Comstock Park, Michigan)
Livestreams
The next Haunter’s Toolbox Haunt Master Class is scheduled for Wednesday, June 22nd. This month’s topic is “Hiring & Training Actors: From Application to Opening Night”. Sign up for Haunters Toolbox Membership to access each month’s live session, past recordings, and more.
Auditions / Casting Calls
Halloween Nights at Eastern State Penitentiary (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is hiring 200+ performers and staff for their 2022 season. Available positions include actors, dancers, singers, circus & specialty performers, retail & customer service staff, parking lot attendants, costumers, custodial staff, makeup artists, educators, and more. Pay starts at $15/hour. Auditions and interviews take place select dates from July 11 through August 25 at Eastern State Penitentiary. Details vary by role, so please be sure to read all descriptions carefully.
Theme Parks
John Carpenter’s classic 1978 slasher film Halloween returns to stalk Halloween Horror Nights in a terrifying new house this fall. Guests will come face-to-face with Michael Myers beginning September 2nd at Universal Orlando Resort and September 8th at Universal Studios Hollywood. On both coasts, this year’s harrowing experiences will transport guests to the infamous town of Haddonfield, Illinois on Halloween night, when Michael Myers first donned his notorious mask to embark on his brutal rampage. As guests make their way through his dilapidated home and iconic scenes from the movie, they’ll narrowly dodge attacks from the knife-wielding Myers as he stalks their every move. Myers is the embodiment of pure evil who unleashes terror at every turn, and guests will quickly realize that he will stop at nothing and no one to take his bloody revenge. Tickets and vacation packages are now on sale for HHN at Orlando and Hollywood. Both events will run select nights through October 31st. More houses and scare zones will be announced in the coming weeks – stay tuned!
Following a two-year break, Halloween Horror Nights will return to Universal Studios Singapore for 19 select nights September 30th – November 5th. Celebrating its 10th year, the event is set to feature new haunted houses, scare zones, laser tag, a dining experience, and a behind-the-scenes tour. Also returning for 2022 is the park’s daytime family-friendly event. which will run September 7th – November 6th and includes a park-wide parade and meet-and-greet sessions. More information will be announced in the coming week’s on the park’s official website.
Efteling theme park (Holland) will become creepier than ever with the new themed area and attraction – Danse Macabre. Danse Macabre will replace the existing Spookslot Haunted House – which is set to close after this summer to make way for the new dark ride. In the Danse Macabre attraction, named after the famous piece of music by Saint-Saëns, visitors will be transported into the story with the unforgettable music from the Spookslot Haunted House as the main theme. Efteling designer Jeroen Verheij explains: “For Danse Macabre, I was inspired by the original sketches and ideas for the Spookslot Haunted House, among other things. It is of course a great honor and a challenge to be able to think up something suitable for such a historic place. The attentive visitor may see some familiar elements in the future. But it will be all new: we will completely immerse visitors and they will experience the ‘Danse Macabre’ like never before. We will keep the creepy theme and extend it through all the details in the themed area.”
U.S. Haunts & Events
Michigan’s Old West Stagecoach Stop at Irish Hills in Onstead is being transformed into a year-round “HorrorTown” by filmmaker Nate Thompson. Thompson has signed a three-year multi-property lease agreement to transform the area into multiple horror-themed attractions. Included in his plans are a museum for horror artifacts, collectibles store (with general merchandise and horror memorabilia), an area to view black and white horror films, and a year-round haunted house. Thompson’s goal is to have HorrorTown up and running by August 1st. He says people can follow along on the progress and his film projects on his website.
Operating a haunt at a historical site can often present challenges tied to the venue’s history. A recent article from the National Council on Public History discussed how The Pennhurst Haunted Asylum and the Pennhurst Museum have aligned to create a haunt that is respectful for the building’s troubled past and helps to educate about about those past wrongs. Nathan Stenberg, a doctoral candidate in theatre and performance historiography, board member of the Pennhurst Memorial and Preservation Alliance (PMPA), and a disabled scholar himself has noted that the asylum attraction, “does not simply commodify atrocity, but offers a space where dis/abled people use performance as both self-expression and knowledge-making in a site once designed for their segregation and slow death.” Several of the haunters also work giving historical tours of the campus when they are not performing in the attraction. Learn more about Pennhurst Asylum and the challenges of walking the line between history and fiction with our Haunted Attraction Network interview with Operations Manager Jim Werner.
Las Vegas Fright Nights (Las Vegas, Nevada) will host “Summer of Screams” on July 15th – 16th from 6:00 p.m. – 10:30 p.m. For two nights only, guests can experience an early sneak peak of the haunt’s two horrifying attractions – Nightmare Manor and Clowns Invasion in 3D. Tickets are on sale now for $20/person.
After three years, The Haunted Dome “Nightmares of Whittier” will take place at a new location for 2022. The free walkthrough maze will now be located at 8330 Flallon Avenue in Whittier, California. The haunt will operate October 29th – 31st from 6:30 p.m. – 10:00 p.m.
It has been 20 years since the release of the Live-Action Scooby-Doo movie. To celebrate, Matthew Lillard (who played Shaggy in the film and has continued voicing the animated character ever since) is renting out the Mystery Machine on Airbnb. Located in Malibu, California, the van accommodates two guests, who will live like Shaggy and Scooby Doo while immersed in Y2K nostalgia. Guests will receive a personal virtual greeting from Lillard, encounter plenty of throwbacks to 2002 (including some rockin’ Sugar Ray on a portable CD player), dine on all-you-can-eat snacks and a dinner selection filled with Shaggy & Scooby’s favorite foods (like hot dogs and eggplant burgers), play mystery games galore, have a late-night re-watch of Scooby-Doo with popcorn, candy, and snacks, and enjoy an outdoor setup with lounge seating and hammock space. Booking opens at 1:00 p.m. EDT on Thursday, June 16th for three stays on June 24th, 25th, and 26th. The price is $20 per night.
International Haunts & Events
Psycho Path (Burnopfield, United Kingdom), recently named “Rising Star of the Year” at the annual ScareTour Awards, will return this autumn with a brand new attraction: the pirate-themed “Cutthroat Island”. Co-director and co-creator Christiano Crawford expects this new haunt to be a crowd-favorite, saying, “We feel that this year is going to be our most spectacular one so far and we have taken the legend of the buccaneers of the Caribbean and created a really unique experience.” Psycho Path will run select dates September 30th – October 31st. Tickets are on sale now starting at £21.00 for Early Bird General Admission and £70.00 for VIP Entry (includes Unlimited front-of-the-line access to all attractions, a complimentary drink, and t-shirt).
Crime
Longtime scareactor for the Bloodshed Brothers (Field of Screams – Lake Elsinore, California), Morgan Delos Fowler (33) was accused by the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department and prosecutors of victimizing fourteen girls and three women. Fowler accepted a plea deal Thursday and pleaded guilty to 18 charges. Fowler was initially arrested in August of 2019 at his home as “part of a sex-ring investigation that involved multiple minors,” according to an arrest warrant for 34-year-old Zachary David Ball. Fowler is scheduled for sentencing on July 21st. The investigation into the Field of Screams “sex-ring” is ongoing, according to the District Attorney’s Office.
Halloween History
Black and Orange are the official colors of Halloween, but how did that come to be? A recent Yahoo!Life article by Kara Thompson delves into the history of this beloved color combination. Stemming from the Celtic tradition of Samhain, the color black was chosen for Halloween to represent the death and darkness associated with the start of the winter season. Orange represents the warmth and abundance of the harvest season, as well as the glow of the bonfires the Celts created to ward off ghosts and unfriendly spirits.
Film & TV
The new teaser trailer for Rob Zombie’s The Munsters debuted this week. While plot details have not yet been released, the film is a reboot of the classic sitcom that aired from 1964 – 1966, which followed the misadventures of a family of friendly monsters navigating life in a typical American suburb. The teaser gives fans a glimpse of Jeff Daniel Phillips as Herman Munster, Sheri Moon Zombie as Lily Munster, and Daniel Roebuck as Grandpa Munster.
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Upcoming Haunt Events
Summer Haunts
Paranoia Haunted House (Canton, GA) – July 9
Vegas Fright Nights (Las Vegas, NV) – July 15 – 16
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Haunt Hacks: Guests with Disabilities (Replay)
A primer on preparing your haunt for guests with disabilities from Scott Swenson.
Inside ScareCON: Europe’s Biggest Scare Convention (2022)
Find out all about Europe’s only trade show for the scare attraction and horror industry, from the seminars and workshops to the awards and ball. ScareCON is the biggest European Scare Convention! Today’s episode is courtesy of our partner station ScareTrack – the UK’s first podcast dedicated to showcasing the Scare Attraction & Haunted House Industry. Their team went on-location to ScareCON 2022 and this is a glorious compilation of all that European haunt and horror awesome.
Creating “SPOOKTACULAR!” How One Haunted Attraction Became a Household Name
Take a behind-the-scenes look at Spooktacular, the new documentary about Spookyworld! This new film takes an in-depth look at one of the original horror scream parks and Halloween destinations in America. This video is taken from a panel the team gave Friday during Monsterpalooza 2022. You’ll hear from the founder of SpookyWorld, David Bertolino, along with the documentary producers. Watch the video here.
Haunted Attraction Industry News for June 7th
Read more here.
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