The area is top territory for Halloween haunt attractions, full of scare-me-please and scare-you?-glad-to types.

By Yvonne Jones
For The Inquirer

Published Sunday, October 22, 2006

It’s hard to project menace while wearing a tube top, pink velour sweatpants, and flip-flops, but Lisa Michelle Tornetta manages to pull it off.

The slender 21-year-old Norristown resident had some to open auditions at Eastern State Penitentiary, which selects approximately 130 actors for its annual haunted attraction, Terror Behind the Walls. She has only a few minutes to make an impression before Eastern’s panel of judges.

Asked to improvise as either a prisoner or a prison guard, Tornetta goes all out. “I’ll pick up your eyeballs, and I’ll eat them, too!” she screeches, nibbling on a disturbingly realistic plastic skull. Finally, she bounces the skull off the penitentiary’s historic walls, tugs at her tube top, and steps back in line.

The judges exchange purposely neutral glances. Then Eastern State Penitentiary program director Sean Kelley asks, “Lisa, I’m just curious. What’s your availability?”

Tornetta is about to become a small part of Philadelphia’s thriving haunt scene, one of the most vibrant in the country. Boasting a collective cast of thousands, area haunts such as Field of Screams or the Bates Motel lure performers to their rusty doors each fall, most eager to shed dull day jobs to come to life each night as, say, a cadaverous Philadelphia Flyer or Ghoul No. 17.

While most haunts started with little more than some fake blood, a flashlight, and a dream, major players such as Shocktoberfest and Eastern State Penitentiary soon realized that Halloween was no longer a day. It’s a season, and, as trick-or-treating goes the way of the phone booth, a scarily profitable one at that.

The go-to man for haunted and other themed attractions across the globe is Lynton V. Harris, the Australian-born founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the New York-based Sudden Impact! Entertainment Co. The company made a name for itself with the hugely successful debut of Madison Scare Garden in 1996, and produces large-scale live attractions year-round in Australia, Hong Kong, Singapore, Amsterdam, Las Vegas, and the United Kingdom.

While the challenges of haunt productions are similar around the world, Harris says Philadelphia is special.

“Philly’s got this interesting and tough personality which I really love. People here are just up for it! They get pissed off and annoyed if you don’t put on a real show,” he said.

Harris is also the creator, executive producer, and director of Nightmares X-treme Scream Park featuring Prison Break Live, which is in its third year at the Wachovia Spectrum. The annual event debuted in 2004 as a way to repurpose the Spectrum during a seemingly endless NHL lockout.

“Haunted attractions only get bigger with each passing year. Who doesn’t want to be scared in a safe but completely entertaining way?” Harris asks.

No one, it seems. Halloween spending is expected to reach $4.96 billion this year, according to a study released recently by the National Retail

Federation, up significantly from the 3.29 billion spent just one year ago. And of the nearly two-thirds of consumers who will celebrate Halloween this year, more than 17 percent plan to visit a haunted house.

Brett Bertolino, assistant program director for Eastern State Penitentiary’s Terror Behind the Walls, thinks many of them are coming his way.

“We’ve seen our attendance grow from what we thought was an all-time high of 60,000 in the year 2003 to last year’s new high of 74,000,” he said.

“They just keep coming.”

Pat Konopelski, president of Shocktoberfest, a Reading-based haunted hayride and haunted house attraction now in its 12th year, agrees.

“People are increasingly desperate to be entertained in an interactive, heart-racing kind of way that’s not passively sitting in front of a TV screen or a computer monitor. Here you are in the video game, and our business gets bigger every year. People just love the language of Halloween.”

Ah, but it’s not that simple. The “dark amusement” industry, as some call it, is a unique society with specific lingo, where figuring out how to maneuver a smoke-belching 400-pound gargoyle is just another Tuesday.

Haunt professionals rely on trade journals such as Haunted House Magazine and Haunted Attraction–which features helpful articles such as “Build a Talking Skull”–and network via organizations like the International Association of Haunted Attractions.

Serious haunt professionals who skip the annual Chicago-based National Haunts and Attractions Show can expect some razzing. The trade show boasts a dizzying exhibit floor featuring the latest in animatronics, special effects, prosthetics, sound and visual effects extravaganzas–all of which help haunters move their attractions forward.

“You can’t just do the same thing over and over again for 70 minutes,” Harris insits. “Freddy Krueger masks, demonic pumpkins, roaring chainsaws–our visitors have been there and done that.”

Known throughout the business for avoiding words and phrases such as ‘haunted house’, ‘terror’, and ‘horror’, Harris strives to make his haunts as non-cliched as possible. New attractions this year range from Edgar Allen Poe’s Gothic Nightmare and Dead Elvis in Concert to Snakes in a Tomb.

“My fake-blood budget will once again be one of the smallest in the industry,” he says. “But I’ve dramatically upped my live-snakes budget this year.”

Money isn’t the only symbol of success in the haunt industry: Scaring the bejesus out of visitors is important, too.

“It sounds a little gross,” Konopelski admits, “but a scream, a faint, a brief loss of bladder control or worse–that’s one of the haunt industry’s biggest applause.

At Terror Behind the Walls, Bertolino and Kelley keep a nightly score of similar incidents of “applause” in the performers’ green room. Last year’s tally: 20 people lost bladder control, and one, er, did worse.

Killer set design, Hollywood-caliber make-up, and costuming and atmospheric effects–such as the 250-plus gallons of fog and haze fluid Nightmares X-treme uses each October–help get visitors to that losing point.

But mostly, the success of the scare rests with the 100-plus performers that each haunt hires each season. The majority are regulars–65 to 80 percent of the performers at Terror Behind the Walls, Fright Factory, Nightmares X-treme, and Shocktoberfest return each season.

Who are these people?

“Counterculture folks, straight arrows, and South Street-frequenting kids with heart,” says Aven Warren of South Philadelphia’s Fright Factory.

“Soup to nuts,” says Konopelski. “Doctors, students, administrative assistants, accountants, fast food managers, everybody. Our actors realize that working in a Halloween event is a perfect way to step out of society’s norms in a safe and socially approved way.

“How often do you get to scream at the top of your lungs in public and get paid for it?”

“We don’t treat performing here as a fill-in job,” Harris warns. “Nightmares X-treme is not a substitute for McDonald’s.”

Not that haunt performers necessarily do it for the money; pay typically ranges from $6 to $12 an hour. But those who inspire customer raves and repeat visits to see, say, “that creepy little guy who skitters around like a giant spider” might find a little extra in that week’s paycheck.

“It’s way different from my regular life.” says Jabbar Wright, a historical reenactor by day who has rotated through several roles at Terror Behind the Walls since his first stint in 2003. “Everyone here wants to scare or be scared or both. Scaring people is like a high.”

Comparing notes after the show over drinks at Jack’s Firehouse, just steps from Eastern State Penitentiary’s administrative offices, is a big highlight, Wright says.

But he also looks forward to the show’s seasonal reunion with like-minded coworkers that allows him to spend weeks hanging out with them in the green room, fighting for pizza, Cup O’Noodles, and handwarmers.

“It’s cool that I get paid for this,” he says.

“We love what we do,” says Shocktoberfest’s Konopelski. “But the haunt business is such hard work, all year round, that it’s a relief and a pleasure to work with performers who also love what we do enough to rearrange their lives and schedules so they can come back. And they know all the rules, written and unwritten.”

Rules like “go after the guys,” says Dave Smith, a longtime Fright Factory actor who cheerfully donned oozing makeup to help wannabe haunters get in the spirit of things during September’s auditions. “Girls are easy to scare. Not that I want to be sexist or anything.”

“Move on after the scare,” Bertolino says. “”If an actor…just sort of lingers, staring into their eyes after spooking someone, you completely lose the effectiveness of the scare. It’s the definition of awkward.”

And all staff members, not just the actors, have to be reminded of the importance of scaring all night long.

“We remind actors they can’t just let the costume do the work for them,” says Warren. “No one wants to go to Disneyland to see Mickey Mouse take off his head to smoke a cigarette or use a Port-A-Potty.”

Philadelphia-area haunts have a strict “no touching” policy. To do otherwise not only invites lawsuits, it’s the mark of a haunt that is, quite simply, lame.

“I’ve been to haunted houses that let actors touch patrons,” Warren says. “And they do that because they’re truly bad at scaring people.”

But haunt visitors aren’t always hands-off with the performers. Some, especially women and children, can’t help but reach out and explore a ghoul’s blistering face or dangling chains.

“Scare people can knock you out,” Warren says. “Happens every season.” He says his business partner, Robert Dudzieck, “got a bloody nose from a 110-pound job applicant who got freaked during the haunted house walk-through.”

Which is why those auditions are so important. Scaredy-cats need not apply, though they do, in droves. “This isn’t the place to be if you don’t like darkness or loud noises,” Warren says. “We really try to spook the hell out of people. You can’t do that if you’re too scared to be scary.”

Lewd isn’t good either. When asked to creatively get the judges attention at the final audition for Nightmares X-treme, one woman stunned the panel by flashing her breasts. She wasn’t hired.

Massaging his ears at the second audition for Terror Behind the Walls, Kelley wishes auditioners understood that while a voice that projects is a plus, it’s not a contest to find the most deafening scream.

So what do haunted house owners, managers, and directors look for?

Unflagging enthusiasm and a natural comfort with going with the flow are key. Bonus points for unexpected talents like running in place while wearing Rollerblades, being double-jointed, or simply whispering sour-nothings in a foreign language. Two thumbs up if you don’t even need makeup to look menacing.

“Can you scare me or creep me out–and then make me happy you did?” asks Fright Factory’s Dudzieck. “That’s what we look for, what it all comes down to.”

By Yvonne M. Jones
For The Inquirer

Published March 5, 2006

If you’re one of the many people waiting to be seated during the always-bustling Sunday brunch at Figs, gazing at the one empty table smack in the center of the window might just drive you mad.

But don’t complain to owner Mustapha Rouissiya, owner of the Fairmount BYOB. He’s holding that spot for some very special people – and he doesn’t listen to hungry customers who petition the staff to open it up.

“I can’t help it,” he says unapologetically. “I have to save it for two of my favorite regulars.”

If you’ve always had the nagging suspicion that habitual patrons at your favorite restaurant get treated a little better than others, well – you’re right.

Beloved customers can garner free drinks, desserts, their pick of seating, free previews of new dishes the kitchen is working on, wait-list upgrades, dishes that haven’t been on the menu for months or even years, and more. Plus, there’s an ego boost that comes with walking into a restaurant and ordering “the usual.”

But it takes more than visiting your favorite eatery repeatedly to get the fringe benefits of being a die-hard patron, local restaurateurs and staffers say.

Not surprisingly, the quickest way to the staff’s heart is with a little extra green.

“Big tips always help,” says Amanda Congar, a waitress at Zocalo, a West Philadelphia restaurant serving contemporary Mexican cuisine.

“Tip more than the standard 15 percent and you’ve definitely got my attention,” she says, noting that some of her regulars often tip about 25 percent. “One generous tip probably gets you the recognition and devotion equivalent of four or five visits from a so-so tipper.”

A married couple who returned to Figs to take photos celebrating the anniversary of their first date there didn’t tip or even dine that night. But they had the right idea.

“I can’t help but be deeply flattered when my customers choose to spend a special occasion like an anniversary, a birthday, or a graduation here,” says Rouissiya. “They’re telling me Figs is a special part of their lives, and you can bet I’ll be on the alert for ways to reciprocate when they come back.”

Ian Moroney, chef and co-owner of Pumpkin in the Graduate Hospital area, will never forget the regular who went far beyond flattery just a few months after the Mediterranean restaurant opened.

“We were short-staffed that night, and a little stressed because we were getting dishes out by the skin of our teeth,” remembers Moroney. Things became tense in their tiny visible kitchen.

Suddenly, relief appeared from the dining room, in the form of a regular named John.

“He washed his hands, and just started prepping, chopping, basically pitching in to do everything we needed to be done in the kitchen that night. He pitched in here for the next week or so,” Moroney said.
“There’s no Pumpkin Hall of Fame, but if there were, he’d probably be in it.”

Sarah Johnson, who owns Majolica in Phoenixville with husband and chef Andrew Deery, says that adventurous eaters take the express train to the chef’s heart.

“Sometimes regulars are regulars because they love one or two specific dishes you make and they order it almost every visit,” says Johnson, a Phoenixville native who met many of Majolica’s regulars during years of bartending at area restaurants.

So when a regular puts down the steak knife and goes for the sweetbreads, the staff takes notice. Chef Deery will often reward such daring diners with a complimentary middle course not found on the menu, like the savory carrot sorbet with cilantro.

Moroney’s most adventurous eater at Pumpkin doesn’t order anything out of the ordinary. He’s a vegetarian who frequents the restaurant in spite of a menu heavy with veal loin, pheasant and lamb.
“I was surprised and flattered that he kept coming back,” Moroney says. “Now keeping him happy – and still vegetarian – when he comes in is a challenge I kind of look forward to.”

Some regulars earn more than a gratis cocktail, mid-course treat, or extra consideration from the chef – although Rouissiya can be extreme.

“One of my regulars knows that I’m from Morocco and that I go back for visits whenever I can,” says Rouissiya. “Last year, he asked me for advice on where he should go and stay during his Moroccan vacation.

“I sent him to my house there.”

Johnson admits that she occasionally scans Majolica’s wait list and bumps up favorite customers.
“Some of our regulars are such a treat to deal with, and so genuinely appreciative of what we do, that I don’t feel too bad about it,” she says. “I’ll do the same for any customer who comes in all the time, gets to know us, and makes us love them.”

Rouissiya, Johnson and Moroney have all made good, sometimes close, friends of patrons who have followed them from restaurant to restaurant over the years. In fact, Congar’s boyfriend is one of many Zocalo regulars who followed bartender Tracy Judge there from previous barkeep gigs throughout the city.

Are all regulars lovable by default? No, but most are.

“I don’t want to call it assertiveness,” says Moroney, “but the regular customers who make a point of introducing themselves, and make it clear – without being obnoxious – that they care about food and are vested in your success really stand out.”

Johnson agrees. “Our regulars are so gracious. Mistakes are rare here, but of course they happen at any restaurant. Our favorite customers understand the work that goes into everything we do here, and the ones who are patient with occasional mishaps and delays immediately win you over.”

But not all regulars are created equal. There are those whose repeated presence elicits groans and sighs.

“There are definitely grumpy regulars every restaurant staff loves to hate,” admits Congar. “But their grouchiness can be entertaining, even something you look forward to, like the grumpy relative you only see at family holidays.

Atomic Fireballs. King Vitaman (yep, I spelled that right) cereal. Hires Rootbeer soda. Bit-O-Honey candy.

When I’m in the throes of a serious snack attack, I don’t always make it easy on myself by craving the usual–and easily accessible–comfort foods. Sometimes I get nostalgic for edible pieces of my past that haven’t graced Philadelphia’s stores since I was too young to even reach most supermarket shelves.

Even though I’ve had to accept the demise of certain foodie favorites (Entenmann’s English Muffins, anyone?) while watching the resurgence of others (Hello, Peanut Butter Twix bars!), I periodically turn to my favorite online source for oldies but goodies. Because HometownFavorites.com has taught me that some of our favorite eats don’t necessarily die. Sometimes they just move to different geographical markets.

Whether you’re looking to stock up on a childhood favorite or snag a regional goodie you discovered in your travels, it’s worth logging on to see if you’re just a quick online order away from taking a bite out of some tasty nostalgia. Or, in the case of the Atomic Fireballs, having them take a bite out of you.

It took Stephanie Thompson, an education consultant from New Brunswick, NJ, months to figure out that her copy of Mollie Katzen’s Still Life With Menu cookbook was a newer edition than the one her former roommate had used.

“Mollie Katzen eliminated entire recipes when she updated the book. I thought I was nuts because I kept remembering recipes my roommate had made, and then when I looked them up in my copy of Still Life, I couldn’t find them.”

It wasn’t Thompson’s memory that was at fault. In recent years, authors like Katzen and publishers of kitchen classics such as The Joy Of Cooking, have responded to changing times and health concerns by altering many recipes or removing them altogether. This has induced buyer’s remorse in many a cook seeking to replenish their collection or introduce an old favorite to a friend or loved one.

“People want that carrot cake just how granny used to make it,” says Jeremy Emmerson, executive chef of San Francisco’s Four Seasons Hotel, founder of GlobalChefs.com, and an avid cookbook collector.

Call it nostalgia if you like, but there were recipes in the older versions that people loved, and many cookbook lovers are slowly realizing they may not find them in revised versions of cookbooks published during the last 25 to 50 years.

“I have a 1946 edition of The Joy of Cooking that I would take to a desert island with me,” affirms Liz Waters, editor of The Cooking Club, an online hub for home cooks. “Of course I practice the normal safety precautions, and alter ingredients as needed for health concerns. But I still use the old recipes.”

Amateur and professional cookbook collectors like Waters and Emmerson know the value of culinary nostalgia. While more whimsical kitchen tomes like the 1954 Alice B. Toklas Cookbook, which includes the author’s infamous recipe for hashish brownies, can fetch up to $200, readers like Thompson crave original editions of more populist cookbooks — like the most requested out-of-print cookbook in Betty Crocker history, 1963′s Betty Crocker Cooky Book–and not just for what they can fetch on the open market.

But revised cookbooks are not always a bad thing. From Julia Child’s 1984 update of her iconic Mastering the Art of French Cooking to accommodate the invention of the food processor to Katzen’s recent revisionism, cookbook authors and publishers often have good reasons for changing–or deleting–what is often someone’s favorite dish.

“No one is perfect,” says Waters, “and sometimes a writer discovers a better way to do something after the original is published, and finds a revision necessary. There are times, however, when cookbook revisions are simply a means to profit again from previously successful material.”

Emmerson agrees. “We don’t remove classic literature from our lives, so why do it with cooking? If the publisher wishes to generate market appeal, I feel that they should consider re-photographing the book to give it a modern feel and offer substitutions for healthier eating.”

So what’s an old-school cookbook lover to do when the cookbook section of their local bookstore bulges with the “new and completely revised”? Thrift stores and flea markets often turn up hidden treasures, but can be hit or miss for someone seeking out an original copy of, say, Pates and Terrines.

Cookbook stores such as The Cook’s Library in Los Angeles or Kitchen Arts and Letters in New York are a great start, but the Internet is a better one. Sites like Bibliofind.com, Powells.com, and the ubiquitous Ebay.com and Amazon.com have made it likely that your dream cookbook of yesteryear is just a few keystrokes away.

But your passion may cost you. Used editions of contemporary kitchen classics can run anywhere from $40 to $200. And while online used booksellers are generally candid about the condition of their wares, Thompson notes that, “These books aren’t easy to find in good condition. People use them to death.”

Still, “new and revised” are not always fighting words. Cooks like Thompson have made publishers happy by embracing–and purchasing–multiple editions of their favorites. Despite initial disappointment with Katzen’s revised Still Life with Menu, she is the contented owner of original and recent editions of the same author’s perennial favorite, The Moosewood Cookbook.

“I like being able to compare,” she says.

• Gary’s Wine and Marketplace
• Ideal Tile
• Zack’s Oak Bar & Restaurant

MOONSPINS BETWEEN LAND AND SEA
(Giro di Lune Tra Terra e Mare)
Italy, 1997, 105 mins, Italian w/English subtitles, 35mm, Color
Director/Screenwriter Giuseppe M. Gaudino
Producer Isabella Sandri
Prod. Co Gaundri Film
Dir. Photography Tarek Ben Abdallah
Editor Roberto Perpignani, Giuseppe M. Gaudino
Music Epsilon Indi
Print Source Gaundri Film
Principal Cast Aldo Bufi Landi, Tina Femiano, Salvatore Grasso, Antonio Pennarella

Moonspins Between Land and Sea is a lyrical meditation on the history of Pozzuoli, an ancient town built in the shadow of a volcano overlooking a bay near Naples, Italy. In the 1970s, the son of a poor Pozzuoli fishing family narrates his family’s struggle to stay one step ahead of the earthquakes that could force them to move at a moment’s notice. In his first feature, director Gaudino’s obvious affection for his native city doesn’t prevent him from underlining its physical and moral decline. Combining experimental dissolves and overlays with dramatic narrative, he alternates stylized re-enactments of the Roman Empire’s decline with the neo-realistic tale of the contemporary family, suggesting a temporal co-existence throughout the city’s historical ages. Taking his cue from the film’s highly original screenplay, cinematographer Ben Abdallah’s camerwork is eclectic, incorporating grainy swishpans, varying filmstocks and camera speeds with a stark set design. Ben Abdallah and producer Isabella Sandri are two of many holdovers from Gaudino’s previous film work, including the performance group Epsilon Indi, whose score evokes a haunting quality that conjures up Pozzuoli’s ghosts.

BODY AND SOUL
U.S., 1925, 80 mins, silent w/live accompaniment 35mm, B&W
Director Oscar Micheaux
Print Source The Douris Corporation/ The Rohauer Collection
Principal Cast Paul Robeson, Mercedes Gilbert, Julia Russell

Body and Soul marked Paul Robeson’s first screen appearance after years of success on the stage. In Oscar Micheaux’s silent melodrama, Robeson plays both the preacher who seduces and betrays a young woman in his congregation, and the preacher’s brother. Robeson brings such zeal to his portrayal of the villainous minister that his performance cannot be diluted by the confinement of celluloid or the absence of a soundtrack showcasing his remarkable baritone. Like most of Micheaux’s films, which were made for black audiences and ignored by a still emerging Hollywood, Body and Soul tries in ways both blatant and subtle to “uplift the race.” Still, many in Micheaux’s audience saw Robeson’s hard-drinking, womanizing minister as blasphemous, particularly since Micheaux frequently used black churches to screen his films in lieu of more problematic (i.e., white-owned) theaters. Though both Robeson and Micheaux were perceived as multi-talented “race men,” Body and Soul was their first and last film collaboration, and the only film Robeson made with a black director.

THE EMPEROR JONES
U.S., 1933, 72 mins, 35mm, B&W
Director Dudley Murphy
Producer John Krimsky, Gifford Cochran
Screenwriter DuBose Heyward
Cinematographer Ernest Haller
Editor Grant Whytock
Music Frank Tours
Print Source The Doris Corporation/ The Rohauer Collection
Principal Cast Paul Robeson, Rex Ingram, Ruby Elzy

Based upon Eugene O’Neill’s seminal play of the same name, The Emperor Jones remains Paul Robeson’s most memorable film. Robeson portrays Brutus Jones, a church-going Pullman porter who is seduced by fast money and faster women. His descent into temptation leads him to kill a man in a poolroom brawl. Sentenced to a chain gang, he escapes and makes his way to a Caribbean island. There he preys upon the superstitious inhabitants in order to become the autocratic Emperor Jones. Shot on the painted sets of Paramount’s Astoria Studios in Queens, New York, the film’s stark, surreal quality undoubtedly reflects the material on which it is based, but should also be credited to cinematographer Ernest Haller’s innovative approach to filming in a paper jungle. Though it remains Robeson’s most acclaimed film, it was such a financial failure that its producers were forced to retire from filmmaking. Still, the fact that it was made at all–despite major distribution problems faced by a film made with a black leading man and a script that condemns racial segregation–makes it a bold and unique creation.

The would-be Philadelphia Film Festival patron wasn’t happy. He hadn’t purchased advance tickets to The Story of the Weeping Camel in the weeks preceding the screening he and his foster brother were “dying” to see, and now it was sold out.

“Are you honestly telling me that a film about a Mongolian family and a camel has been sold out for over a week?! How is that possible?”

The Philadelphia Film Society’s annual Philadelphia Film Festival (PFF) event inspires some variation on this sentiment each spring, exciting the passions of community members who–despite the fact that this year’s festival attendance reached an all-time high of 61,000 patrons–still feel as if the event was uniquely tailored to their individual desires.

We consider this a compliment. Like any arts organization, PFS values sustainable growth as long as it is not at the expense of losing an intimate connection with its audience. As we approach the 14th Philadelphia Film Festival in the spring of 2005, we’re confident that we are fulfilling our mission to use contemporary, historical, and culturally diverse media exhibition to foster community and enrich multiple audiences.