Spooky Spotlights
In our first-ever Spooky Crew Spotlights, we're taking you behind the scenes to meet and hear stories from the talented crew that bring the chills and thrills to life on the big screen. We asked our crew to tell us about their favorite moment working on set.
Tatjana Bluchel
THE MEAN ONE
Creature Designer / Creature Makeup Artist
my favorite moment working on set was...
Seeing my creation come to life by the amazing acting skills of David Howard Thornton.
Andrea Mona Bowman
LOVECRAFT COUNTRY
Key Hairstylist
On episode two we worked hand in hand with the SPFX team to create looks for the ten ghosts that were haunting the basement of a house. One of my favorite ghosts was a woman that was from the 1800s...and we had to create her normal look and her ghoul look. Which was her scalp pulled back and her brain left exposed. The neat part about my job was making sure the hairstyle was period-appropriate but matched the same lame period look. Once SPFX applied the brain apparatuses, it was amazing and was one of my first experiences making that kind of movie magic.
Niko Colón
HALLOWEEN ENDS
Costume Production Assistant
Witnessing the process of the Ager Dyer to create different versions of Michael Myers’ coveralls that started from clean to very bloody and distressed.
Nicole Dillard
THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER
Special Effects Technician
Hiding under the hospital bed working the blood rig, it was my first time doing it. It was a pressurized line run up to the sheets that was meant to pool red blood on white sheets. When I went to work the rig the first time, the line popped loose and sprayed fake blood all over me and the floor! In a quiet panic, I called my coordinator under the bed to help me reset it. He kept me calm, and the crew couldn't see the blood spray and had no idea of the chaos under the bed. The rest of the takes worked great. The crew was excited thinking it went off without a hitch, until I emerged from beneath the bed covered in blood, looking straight out of a horror scene! I still laugh about that.
Alyson Moore
GHOST SHIP
Foley Artist
In one scene, there is a party on deck, and a wire cuts loose and slices the partygoers in half. I had to make the sound of the wire and then the bodies falling apart.
Alexander Stamm
FATAL AFFAIR
Art Director
We ended up shooting on Halloween and someone mysterious had taken a knife and sliced through a piece of artwork on set, leaving us all wondering "who did it?"
Jamie Worlds
THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER
Production Controller
Cast and crew were amazing! One of my favorite moments was when we shot the scenes with the demon Lamashtu. Though this character was cut out entirely from the film, the SPFX makeup and the actor were incredible and undeniably terrifying. Very little rattles me in the horror genre but this character carried a surrealism unmatched. Many took selfies with her! Same with the girls, Olivia and Lidya, when they'd pop in for crew lunch in full Exorcist makeup! That was fun and disturbing at the same time! Good times!
Lawreen Yakkell
DEVILS DEN
Unit Production Manager
While I've worked on many spooky productions, this story stands out in my memories. Devil's Den was a spooky story about vampire strippers and it had a pretty high body count. Our SPFX team stored all of the bloody corpses to be used throughout the film in one room at the warehouse where we were shooting. One night we were locking up and our security company sent a brand new officer to watch the place after we left for the night. He was very nice and started walking the place as we finished up and prepared to leave. Suddenly, we heard a very high-pitched series of screams. We all ran in the direction of the screaming and by the time we got there he was running out the door towards his car. He had happened upon the "bloody corpse" room!! The company had to send us a new guard to replace the poor man; he never returned.
