Photograph by Ashley Gieseking
• A haunted house is better than a movie. “My goal is for you to walk into an experience,” says Kelly. “We’re providing something you can’t find anywhere else.”
• Haunted houses are doing things you thought only Disney could do. “These days we do everything to the extreme,” says Kelly. “Because of the detail of movies and video games, our customer is desensitized and hard to please. So we really have to take all of our scenes to the fullest degree. Everything has to be in-your-face.”
• You figure it out as you go along. “You’ll get ideas from movies, props, something that someone said. Sometimes I’ll wake up in the middle of the night with an idea.”
• Haunted house owners around the world look to St. Louis for advice. In the mid-’90s, Kelly and co-owner Larry Kirchner started selling videos called How to Create Your Own Haunted House at trade shows. They later launched hauntworld.com and produced HauntWorld, a trade magazine. “There are still old-school haunters who won’t let you into their houses or tell you how they did it,” says Kelly. “But it helps everyone in the industry to share the secrets.”
• You can’t go wrong as a crazy clown. “You can act weird and goofy, and it totally fits the part,” Kelly says of his favorite Halloween costume. “You can get out of the typical serious mode that you’re always in.”
• The Darkness and Creepy World are only the tip of the iceberg. Halloween Productions has built haunted houses and “dark” rides for amusement parks around the world, including Six Flags, SeaWorld and recently Kennywod. Kelly and Kirchner also own Blacklight Attractions, which creates glow-in-the dark haunted houses, miniature golf courses and laser tag courses.
• Scares are serious business. There are trade shows, consultants, magazines—you name it. “It’s like anything else—there’s still stress,” says Kelly.
• It’s the tough guys who get scared the most. “We’ll have Rams players who run through here like little girls and come screaming out the back,” says Kelly.
[SIDEBAR] Handling a Haunted House Like a Pro
You would think navigating a haunted house would be a no-brainer: Keep your eyes open, remember to breathe and try not to scream like Janet Leigh in Psycho. But is there a better way to visit a spooky attraction? Kelly shared his advice.
1) Visit on a slow night. “We’re forced to put people through more quickly on busy nights, so you don’t get the full theatri-
cal performance.”
2) Bring someone who you know will get scared. “It’s no fun if you just bring a bunch of guys who play it cool. Plus, it adds to the entertainment.”
3) Go through more than once. “It’s impossible to see everything with one visit—even during the daylight. People
come back five times and still spot something new.”
4) Don’t worry—it’s safe. “We take every precaution possible. But it’s like any attraction: People with certain health conditions shouldn’t go through.”
Wanna Go? The Darkness, 1525 S. 8th Street; Creepy World, 1400 Old Hwy. 141, Springdale, 314-631-8000; scarefest.com, hauntworld.com
