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The Haunted House False Facade
For several years, our company - Jordan's Caterers - was the house caterer for the Richmond Gateway Theatre. Then, having professional expertise at hand, I enlisted them to do the original false front. It had the same general shape as it does today, however, it was flat with the windows and such painted on. It did have a real front door from which to enter.
In the upper right corner was a Witch in a window. My neighbour, Neil Hynds, came by one day to check on me and to give his advice - "you should cut that witch face out and put a light behind it". I said, "Sure Neil I'll do that for you." Neil, over the years, was always there to offer advice or to lend a hand - he also let me plug into his house to help light everything up - a tradition carried on today by my new neighbour Lynn Braun. Neil suddenly passed away only days before our display of Beauty and the Beast opened and so we decided to dedicate it to him.
When I built the current facade , which I did over 2 years, the idea was to have real windows with real characters in them and a real two story tower with a flying crank ghost in the top. There was also no question that Neil's Witch would remain. She is now 3D and I think much more beautiful. The facade today, far from flat, has residents in every window and even a pepper's ghost illusion.
How Do You Get All of That in There?
"How do you get all of that in there?" A question I get often as my amazed guests exit the display. The secret, which I adopted the third year in the garage, was to build maze-like pathways through out my garage and tents. This created nooks to display all of the different vignette scenes. The twists and turns deceive the guests perception of space into thinking it is much bigger than it really is, especially the first time through. The space I have is at a premium, but I do keep walk ways as wide as possible and always leading to a safe exit point every 20 - 25 feet. The walkthrough display includes the garage - 15'x21', 3 tents - 10'x26', 10'x20' & 10'x19', and 2 -8'x8' faux mausoleums.
The TUNNEL
I have a former part-time employee and friend, Stephen Cholakis, who was managing a movie studio and one day he had invited my son and I up to see the set for a horror picture that was filming there. When we arrived, he introduced us to Barry Rennie & his carpenters who had built the set. After chatting awhile with him and picking up a few set building tips, he suggested that should two cases of beer happen to appear at the right moment that he might consider leaving the tunnel materials out of the dumpster when the set was torn down. When the day came, I delivered the beer and we filled my van to the roof - I figure we got great value from someone else's garbage. The tunnel material is called vac-u-form, 4'x8' plastic panels that are put on a machine that heats it up then pulls it out to look like rock. The bonus for me was that it had also been professionally painted so all I had to do was install it. I also got three medieval looking doors that can be seen on the Munster Mausoleum, as Frankenstien's back board, and the front door of our new Casketorium. Two rock wall facades, again professionally painted, topped the pile and this year will become one of the major features of the Casketorium. The tunnel was originally occupied by Indiana Jones but is currently the home of Jack Sparrow.
Many Little Mannequins
Beauty and the Beast, Peter Pan, The Phantom and the little boy on the bike in E.T. were all former Stars of a I.C.B.C. television commercial many years ago. I picked them up from Tibour - a guy who used to have a F/X workshop in our work complex. I still have one left - I wonder who she will be? I also got the monster face in the Magic Mirror from him.
Alien Factoid
The grey alien in the cryogenic chamber in our alien display spent many years on display at Bizaar Novelties on W.2nd in Vancouver. I just happened to go there the day they wanted to sell him. For $125 I scored a awesome prop for a fraction of it's original value.
The E.T. story
Years ago when I decided that I wanted to include E.T. in the display I searched everywhere for a E.T. already made. One night while watching TV I saw a story on a store in Portland Oregon that sold real movie props. On a shelve in the back ground was a real E.T. . I just had to phone and find out how much he was. Through the long distance operator I got the store's phone number. I called and explained I had seen the E.T. in the back ground of the TV spot ans asked how much he was......$30,000US was the answer. So I spent the rest of that summer making E.T. myself. He turned out to be a big process. His core is carved styrofoam, covered with foam rubber, covered with cheese cloth, covered with 3 coats of latex, painted and clear coated. LED's for eyes and his RED finger. He turned out pretty good I think and I saved about $29,750US. E.T.'s moon in our display is a poster of our real moon that I mounted on a round light box I built with blue lights inside.
...to be continued...
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Our Haunted House Story
