Archive for the ‘What Scares You’ Category

Shock Scare 101: The Education of a Haunted Mansion Alumna

Posted: February 3, 2012 in Uncategorized, What Scares You
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The former Haunted Mansion on the boardwalk in Long Branch, New Jersey.

Finally saw Super 8 last week.  While it had some nice elements – great special effects, late ’70s nostalgia, wonderful performances from the young cast – I was disappointed with the screenplay.  There were red herrings that didn’t pay off, cliché depictions of Machiavellian military types, and a father and son reconciliation that was rushed and emotionally flat.   If J.J. Abrams really wants the moniker of “the next Spielberg”, he’ll have to hire better writers or get someone to doctor his own scripts.  Otherwise, he risks getting pegged as “the next Shyamalan”.

My favorite moments in the movie were the shock scares.  You know there’s a monster out there beyond the trees.  Don’t know what it looks like, but it’s capable of crunching the front end of a police cruiser.  In total trepidation, a gas station attendant emerges from his post and calls out “Sheriff?”  A moment of stillness.  And then boom! Some crazy shit happens.

Tension.  Shock.  Scream.  Release.

Shock scares are the best.  Think about Ben Gardner’s head falling out of the boat in Jaws.  Jones the Cat hissing from behind a crate in Alien.  The bedroom door from hell opening and slamming shut in Poltergeist.  You’re either not expecting it, or you know something’s going to happen, but you don’t know what.  A face in the mirror.  A hand from the grave.  A shot from a gun.

I learned first-hand the simple joy of the shock scare when I worked at the Haunted Mansion in Long Branch, New Jersey.   Being a high school thespian in the late ’70s, I wanted to work at the Haunted Mansion the moment I saw the TV commercial.

Finally, during the summer between high school graduation and my freshman year of college, I got my chance to don a black shroud and wear white grease paint.

Located on the Long Branch Amusement Pier, the Haunted Mansion was an event to savor slowly, or barrel through like a runaway freight train.  Similar to Halloween attractions that now run seasonally, the Mansion was a walking tour through three stories of pitch black hallways while gothic organ music blasted overhead.

As a member of the cast, I would arrive at the beginning of my shift, get my character assignment and go right into make-up.  During my two-month stint I got to play a variety of ghouls such as Lizzie Borden, “Morgue Doctor”, “Rat Professor” and “The Headless Woman”.

I expected the job to be a non-stop thrill ride.  Instead, there were many late nights and rainy afternoons that found me doing nothing but standing for hours in the dark, bored out of my mind, waiting for someone or something to come by.

Another part of the job I didn’t like was the “Code 5″.

For security purposes, an intercom system ran throughout the building.  Whenever a customer became hysterical or was so frightened or claustrophobic they just wanted the hell out, a cast member would go to the intercom, press the button and say something like, “Code 5, Jack the Ripper.”  A security guard would arrive promptly and escort the distraught patron to the nearest exit.

Code 5’s were actually something many cast members strove for.  I guess they figured if a customer was completely traumatized, it meant they were doing a good job. Incentives were even provided.  Whoever got the most Code 5’s in a week was entitled to take extra time on their break.

To me, Code 5’s were something to avoid.  Often they involved young children who were already terrorized by their bullying parents.  Mostly they were people who were not having any fun at all.  They may as well have been at the dentist.

But the shock scare was different.  There were many ways to achieve it, and although skill was involved, it required very little effort.

During the day, customers would step from the bright sunshine into near total darkness, and for several minutes were virtually blind.  I could stand six inches from a person’s face and they couldn’t see me at all.  All I had to do to elicit a hearty scream was whisper, “Boo.”  The scream was always followed by laughter and a nervous release of energy.  Kind of like a horror orgasm.

There was one section in the Mansion called “The Swamp.”  A wooden, seemingly rickety bridge passed over a floor painted to simulate water.  There were fake palm trees, stuffed birds and a soundtrack they must have gotten from a Tarzan movie.  I used to crouch low next to the bridge and as patrons crossed over, I pulled lightly on their pant legs.  I got more gasps than screams, but invariably someone, usually a girl, would yell, “Oh my god, there’s something down there!”

It was just me.  And on some level my victim knew they were probably being scared by an 18-year-old, pimply-faced college kid.  But on another level, they believed it could have been…

or

Another favorite shock scare op was in the Lizzie Borden scene.  The room was decorated to look like the Bordens’ parlor in the infamous murder scene photos.  There was even a fake corpse laid out on the settee.

The cast member playing Lizzie wore a dress and wig (probably looking more like Tony Perkins in Psycho than the alleged 19th century murderess), and wielded a Styrofoam ax.  Everyone had their own shtick they came up with for playing the various roles in the Mansion.  What I did with Lizzie was stand in the middle of the room as patrons timidly entered the space.  I stood perfectly still, moving only the hand holding the ax, trying to convince them I was animatronic.

I must have done a good job, because usually someone would come up to me, poke me in the arm and say, “Is she real?”  At which point, I suddenly turned toward the prodding patron with my ax raised in the air.  And this is what always happened next.

Hhe or she would scream, fall back in horror, and if there were people standing behind him or her, they would fall like dominoes.

Within seconds I was standing there with a half a dozen people lying on the floor at my feet.

Good times.

There was no way to control the flow of traffic through the Mansion.  If a new group came into the room while everyone was still scrambling to get up, there was no way I could reset to go for another shock scare.  That’s where the high school drama training kicked in.  I had made up some lines for Lizzie that I would use when I couldn’t go for the shock scare.  They went something like:

All the kings horses and all the kings men can’t put Daddy together again.

or

And when the bough breaks I’ll creep to her bed, and I’ll find my Mommy and cut off her head. 

Okay, it wasn’t Shakespeare, but I like to think I creeped out a few people.

In a strange role reversal, a customer once freaked me out.  I was in the Cathedral, dressed like a monk and carrying a book I pretended was a bible.  The Cathedral was dressed to look like the sacrificial altar of a satanic cult.  As audience members walked through, instead of going for shock I spewed forth the most blasphemous gibberish I could think of.  (My high school acting teacher did tell me I was going to be the next Meryl Streep.  Nowadays I’m more inclined to cast myself as the next Estelle Getty.)

A woman entered the Cathedral.  The moment she saw me, she grabbed the crucifix around her neck.  I said something like, “Get down on your knees and tell Satan you love to sin!”  She began shaking her head, then motored like she couldn’t wait to get out of there.  Just as she was going out the door, I shouted, “Armageddon is upon us!”

Just then, the woman stopped and turned around.  She looked me right in eye, and with a very calm and knowing smile, she said:

“No. 1984.”

I was physically repelled by her surety.  The end of the world was coming, and she was happy about it!  Scariest moment I ever had in the Mansion.  Frankly, I was shocked.

Well, 1984 came and passed without incident.  But I did spend most of the ’80s worried about nuclear apocalypse.  I’m just glad she didn’t say, “No, 2012.”  Knowing me, I would have spent the last 30 years waiting for her prophecy to be fulfilled.

Maybe I deserved my decade-long case of low grade anxiety — for taking my creative impulses too far and going beyond the bounds of good taste.  Looking back and remembering the joy and psychological harmlessness of the simple shock scare, I should have just leapt from behind a pew and shouted, “booga-booga-booga!”  I’m sure we both would have had a much better time.

Clowns to the Left of Me: Exit Stage Right

Posted: December 10, 2011 in Uncategorized, What Scares You
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Are we still afraid of clowns?  Really?  People usually don’t like to cop to their phobias.  And if they do end up screaming at the sight of mouse, they’ll have the decency to be embarrassed afterwards.

Yet there is something about hating clowns that renders one cool.  Whether its wearing a tee-shirt that says “Can’t sleep, clowns will eat me,” or begging out of kid’s birthday party by using the “clowns freak me out” excuse.  Everybody doesn’t like something.  Seems nobody likes clowns.

Some say it’s a recent cultural phenomena ignited by the lore of serial killer John Wayne Gacey and pop culture depictions of clowns in the 80’s and 90’s. You can’t go to zombie walk these days without seeing a dozen or so psycho clowns.  Heath Ledger’s final portrayal as the Joker in The Dark Knight did what I thought could never been done.  Bested Tim Curry’s performance in It as the most malevolent creature to ever wear white grease paint.

Many scholars trace our collective aversion to clowns as going back thousands of years.  In Greek mythology there was Hermes the trickster.  In ancient cultures the court jester.  During the great depression it was the seedy tramp.  These characters existed on the fringes of society, eschewed cultural norms and were sexually provocative, if not at times deviant.

I wouldn’t say I suffer from a full-blown case of coulrophobia.  (See, even the official term for fear of clowns has the word “cool” in it).  But there are a few funny looking fellows – why no female clowns? hmmmm – who definitely set off my creep-o-meter.

Pennywise

At some point I plan to write more about my evolution as a Stephen King fan.  While many relationships start out in love and end in hate, my relationship with Stephen went the other way.  And It was definitely a factor during the hating years.  I never read the book or saw much of the mini-series.  Pennywise filled me with so much terror and dread I didn’t want to go anywhere near it.  I also had a small child at the time of the original airing of the mini-series and had a low tolerance for seductive clowns who had a propensity for tearing limbs off of small children.

Red Skelton and Weary Willie

These famous sad sacks were similar in they both came out of vaudeville during the depression.  When I was a kid my parents must have watch the Red Skelton Show because I can remember seeing him on TV and thinking, “I know this is supposed to be funny, but I just don’t get it.”  Maybe it was because he didn’t talk when he played Freddy the Freeloader, something about him made me nervous. The not-talking part reminds me, next on our list of things we’re genetically pre-deposed to hate – mimes.

I only recently came upon the story of Weary Willie, and I can’t help but wonder why a movie hasn’t been made about this iconic clown.  Emmett Kelly’s portrayal of tragic tramp Weary Willie made Red Skelton’s Freddy look like a poster child for Prozac.  Three generations of Kelly’s played the Willie character.  The first two had marriages that ended in divorce because their wives thought Emmett Kelly Senior and Junior were too obsessed with Willie.  The grandson of the original Willie committed double homicide and named Willie as an accomplice.  One wonders if Willie is still out there inhabiting someone, and if he might be running for the GOP nomination.

Pagliacci

Killer clown wielding a knife. And he sings. Nuff said.

Tillie

Long time Springsteen fans and those who grew up on the Jersey Shore are familiar with Tillie.  Technically, Tillie isn’t a clown.  Tillie isn’t even a character.  He’s the face of Palace Amusements, a historic arcade in Asbury Park, New Jersey that was demolished in 2004.  Tillie was so beloved by those with cherished memories of Asbury’s heyday that before the building went down, the wall bearing his face was removed and preserved.

What Tillie has in common with the clown persona is an association with fun houses, games and loud frivolous entertainment.  I love Tillie.  I grew up with him.  But there was something about that smile that always put me on edge.  That maniacal gleam in his eyes that suggested something sinister was lurking underneath.

My suspicions were confirmed when as adult I went to Coney Island.  There grinning on the walls of the arcades was Tillie’s evil alter ego. This incarnation originally appeared on the signage of the Coney Island Steeplechase Park, and was inspired by the park’s owner George Tilyou.  This Brooklyn Tillie looked like he’d just as soon bite your face off than sell you a Steeplechase ticket.  I’m glad I grew up with the friendlier, less cannibalistic looking Tillie.  He creeped me out but never kept me away from the bumper cars.

 

 

What Scares You: Could it be….SAAAAAATan?

Posted: December 3, 2011 in What Scares You
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When I was a teenager growing up on the Jersey shore, I was invited one night by a group of friends to take a car ride up to Atlantic Highlands.  The destination of our journey was a place called Bud’s Grave.

This is how the story of Bud’s Grave was related to me that night.  A little boy named Bud had drowned and his parents buried him just down the road from the house where they lived.   Every night Bud’s ghost would return to his old bedroom and play with his toys.  His parents were tormented by the nightly visits, so they removed all of his toys from the house and placed them in a yard across the street.  There, Bud would be free to play with his stuff without disturbing his parents’ sleep.

I was young and impressionable, yet remained skeptical – all the way up until the point where we turned down a dark lane and came upon what looked like a religious alter, set virtually out in the middle of nowhere at the foot of a dark, wooded hill.  It also looked like it could have been a barbeque grill, except it was covered with statues and religious icons.  It was pretty creepy.  And still, it did not prepare me for what lay ahead.

As we cruised slowly down the narrow road – again, dark, dense forest to the right, a few small cottages to the left, our headlights discovered a clearing in the woods.  In that  clearing was an eclectic collection of stuff animals, toys, road signs and well, a lot of junk.  If I came upon such a location now, without any preconceived notion of what it was, I’d probably say something like, “Oooh, somebody needs to call the show Hoarders.”

Of course the fact that the place existed as it had been described to me didn’t mean any part of the story was true.  But I do remember one item in the lot that was pretty freaky. There was a stuffed panda doll that had been nailed a tree  in such a manner that it looked like a crucifixion scene.  Whether not or not there was a ghost lurking about, it seemed to me that at the very least a twisted mind was behind all this.

Flash forward 30 years.  Reminiscing about the silly things we did as teenagers prompted me to do a little googling on Bud’s Grave.  Proximity of the legendary site to the Atlantic Highlands Ferry, where I on rare occasion  indulge in the pricey boat to Manhattan, got me to revisit it in person.  What I found on-line, on Weird NJ  for example, explained away the spooky array of toys as an eccentric collector’s ( hoarder’s ) practical joke.  One account actually included an interview with Bud himself, who was still very much alive and shocked as hell that this tale grew to such epic proportions.

Still, I wanted to see what remained at the site, which hasn’t really changed that much over the years.  Yes, the toys, the junk, the panda, are all gone.  But the little white bungalow where Bud’s family allegedly lived is still there.  And also still there at the foot of the wooded hillside, is the religious monument with 3 figurines on the altar.

As I was taking a photo of it, a man passed by walking his dog.  I felt a little self-conscious, and way too old to be doing this.  So I did what I usually do in an awkward moment, I started babbling, “Hi, do you know what this is?”  Like, what would I be doing taking a picture of it if I didn’t have some inkling of what it was supposed to be.

The man said, “It’s a monument built for a little boy who drowned.”

How cute, and at the same time so very creepy that the local residents are still perpetuating the myth.  That’s what I thought at the time.  Also in the back of my mind was the idea that for some reason I shouldn’t be taking a photograph of the monument.  Like the time I was at Area 51 and wanted to take a photo of the sentry gate in spite of the many warning signs not to. My partner grabbed the Iphone out of my hand and threw it to the back of the car.   Certain photos are taboo and one should have the good sense to know that.

I didn’t get the picture at Area 51 but I did take the picture at Bud’s Grave last night.  Mostly because I knew I wanted to blog about it, and also because I wanted a keepsake to remind me of a scary late night excursion with a group of friends from long ago. 

Confident I had managed to dodge a supernatural bullet,  I was a little startled this morning to open my email and see this message :

Satan is now following you on Twitter!

I was worried for a moment that by going to and photographing Bud’s Grave I had unlocked a portal to hell.  Then I remembered I had started following Satan the night before, as he is into horror and posts reviews and such.  Of course, if life were a movie, I would be totally cursed with demonic possession and before long my head would start spinning and the walls would be plastered with split pea soup.

So glad that movies are movies and life is not.  I think  I will now friend Bud’s Grave on Face Book.

I Ain’t Fraid of No Dog

Posted: November 14, 2011 in What Scares You
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I just finished watching an episode of “My Extreme Animal Phobia” on Animal Planet.  The show featured three adults who were traumatized as children by encounters with such benign creatures as millipedes, bees and sharks.  Okay, sharks aren’t so benign, but the woman seeking help hadn’t been attacked by a shark; she’d seen Jaws on TV.  Now she feels afraid whenever she looks at Manhattan’s East River.  There are lots of reasons to be afraid of the East River.  Sharks isn’t one of them.

The show made me think about whether or not I have any animal fears.  I have plenty of silly phobias about fairly harmless things:  dark hallways, Kathy Lee-Gifford, cole slaw.  But as far as I’m aware, no hidden or unhidden fears of animals.  And that’s curious to me, because there were two events in my childhood involving dogs that had the potential to scar me for life.

One day when I was four years old, my Mom and I went to the supermarket, and I suppose because I was  so well-behaved, when we arrived home she opened up the box of Scooter Pies we had just bought to reward me with marshmellowy chocolate goodness.  Inside the box, in addition to the Scooter Pies, there was a toy surprise: a hand puppet.  I don’t remember which popular cartoon character the puppet was supposed to be.  Probably something along the lines of Casper the Friendly Ghost, Top Cat, or one of the Banana Splits.  It was plastic, shaped like a glove, and because my sister was at school, it was all mine.

I’ve always had this thing: if I get a cool new toy, I want to show it off.  My little four-year-old heart was bursting to take to the streets with my Scooter Pie puppet.  I put on my new winter coat.  I hated that coat.  Besides the tweed material being scratchy, it was way too girly.  But when you’re four, what can you do?  I put it on and went out to play.  This was back when you could run out the front door and disappear for hours without your parents issuing an Amber alert.  Days of yore.

I ended up at the Sorianos’ house.  They weren’t really my friends; they were my sister’s friends.  Lisa, Gary and Jeanine.  Lisa was the cool teenager; she wore construction boots and a leather hippie watch.  Gary reminded me of Eddie Munster without the widow’s peak.  Jeanine was the youngest and the one my sister hung out with the most.  Of course, none of these kids were home during the day in the middle of the week, but somehow that didn’t matter to me.  I would show Mrs. Soriano my Scooter Pie puppet and she would be so impressed.

When no one answered the front door bell I was undeterred.  I went around to the side of the house and unlatched the gate to the back yard.  The Sorianos lived in an ultra mod ranch house and were the only family on the street with a swimming pool.  So what if it was above ground?   It was better than running through the sprinkler.

The Sorianos also had collies.  Two of them.   I’m sure at least one of them was named Lassie.  They pounced upon me as soon as I was inside the gate and couldn’t have cared less about my puppet.  I was a bigger and better toy for them to play with.  Soon they were dragging me through the dirt and ripping my new winter coat to shreds.  They never bit me, but their play was violent.  I screamed for help and tried to run away but they would knock me down again and toss me about like a rag doll.

Though I was absolutely hysterical, I was never in any real danger.  The scariest moment of the episode took place when I climbed the ladder of the swimming pool in an effort to get away from the collies.  (And in hindsight, the pool was probably the only real threat to my life.)  It was winter, so the pool was covered.  When I got to the top of the ladder, I started to crawl out across the tarp. 

That’s when the back door of the house opened and Mrs. Soriano appeared, clad in only a towel and a plastic shower cap.  Apparently when she turned off the water, the first thing she heard was my screams from the back yard.  I remember she looked absolutely horrified and ran out to rescue me before something really tragic happened, like me falling through the tarp into the frigid water. 

I don’t remember if I ever got a chance to show Mrs. Soriano my Scooter Pie puppet.  Or if it even survived the mauling.  I do know that neither I nor the doggies got into trouble.  And to my relief, the tweed coat was unsalvageable and was replaced with a little suede number with cowboy fringe. 

Is the reason the horrific collie attack didn’t scar me for life because everything turned out well in the end? Or maybe if I explored my subconscious, I’d discover I’m really afraid of above ground swimming pools.  Yet no fear of pooches. And this wasn’t the only childhood backyard dog trauma I was to endure. 

When I was a few years older we were visiting my mother’s relatives in North Carolina.  While at my cousin Doris’s house, I was out back playing with their new litter of roly-poly German shepherd puppies.  Adorable.  Until one of the puppies threw up his Puppy Chow, and all of his siblings decided the vomit would make a great late morning snack.  Once their little puppy lips, snouts and whiskers were covered with puppy vomit, they turned their attention to me.  Somehow, getting chased by ten relentless German shepherd puppies with their faces covered in vomit was far more terrifying than being mauled by a pair of collies.

I ran to the back porch and discovered the screen door was locked.  I banged on the door and cried, “Cousin Doris, let me in! One of the puppies threw up and all the other puppies ate it and now they’re chasing me! ”

The puppies were closing in.  Soon I would have that gray, pasty, smelly gunk all over me.  But suddenly the inside door opened and Cousin Doris stood there, looking at me through the screen.  I repeated my plight and she said, “Wait here.”

I was dumbfounded.  Wait here?  Didn’t she understand the gravity of what was happening?  A moment later she returned.  The door cracked open a few inches and out stretched her hand with a paper towel.  “Here you go,” she said, and shut the door in my face.

I must have repressed what happened next.  I can’t imagine I actually cleaned the vomit off the puppies’ faces, because if I’d had the intestinal fortitude to do something like that, I would’ve had the wherewithal to go into some brave line of work like nursing, forensic medicine, or college dormitory maintenance.

Did the experience have its long-term effects?  It is curious that I don’t really have close relationships with most of my cousins.  Is that where my phobia lies?  Fear of extended family?  Because I still like dogs a lot.  Maybe it’s because I had a dog in my life from the time I was one year old until I went away to college.  She was a fat woolly-haired poodle named Suzette.  This was not a shi-shi foo-foo animal.  In fact, we didn’t even pronounce her name the French way.  We called her SUzette.  She was my buddy and my constant companion.  How could I be afraid of dogs if she was a dog and I wasn’t afraid of her?

I wish I had a dog now, but my partner is allergic to most furry creatures.  We dream of winning the lottery — not so we can quit our jobs and buy a big house.  (Okay, that’s not true.)  But also, so we could afford to buy one of those ultra-expensive, genetically engineered allergen-free dogs.  A Frankenstein Dog.  Actually, that sounds kind of scary.  But I bet it isn’t.