Faint of heart beware!

A ghoulish cast of characters waits eagerly to greet those who dare visit The Haunted Barn this month. The Halloween scare, to benefit Hall’s Prairie Elementary and the food bank, was co-ordinated by (below, left to right) Earl Marriott Secondary students Sebastian Galina, Amanda Sigouin and Chantelle Adamson.

Haunted Barn a scream

How do you groom a ghoul? Or give zip to a zombie?

Just ask Earl Marriott theatre students Sebastian Galina (Gr. 11), Amanda Sigouin (Gr. 12) and Chantelle Adamson (Gr. 12).

They’re becoming experts in the fine art of throwing a scare, in their second year of working with Barnyard Phantoms’ Haunted Barn attraction at Dyanna Zimmer’s South Surrey farm.

Graduated now from last year’s humble zombie status, they’re the committee co-ordinating all the student performers and staff for the barn, drawn from the ranks of the EMS theatre department with the blessings of drama teachers Rick Harmon and Candace Radcliffe.

“Ms. Radcliffe asked us to organize it since we had so much fun last year,” Sigouin said.

Zimmer’s gloriously creepy barn venue, and the fright-inducing scenery and stomach-churning props she has been accumulating for years, have taken on an unnatural life of their own, far beyond the scope of most ambitious Halloween displays.

And the attraction is giving more than the heebie-jeebies to the community – it’s giving back by raising funds for a new playground at Hall’s Prairie Elementary, as well as equipment and supplies for the EMS theatre program, and collecting food bank donations.

But the faint of heart should be warned. With some 10 shocking set pieces in the winding tour through its labyrinthine interior – including mad scientist’s laboratory, the Dragon’s Den and the new 3-D room, the barn is not set up to be your standard backyard frightfest.

“She (Zimmer) has played a lot with shadows, with floors and ceilings that are not parallel and walls that are not perpendicular,” Galina said.

“It makes it easier to hide – that’s what builds suspense and helps us as actors.”

For prospective visitors, perhaps the poster says it best: “Are you tough enough to take the scare?”

Judging by Galina, Sigouin and Adamson’s experience last year, not everyone is.

“There are some groups of late elementary school-age girls who don’t make it beyond the first room,” Galina said.

Hysterical reacations don’t always come from the most likely targets, the students point out.

“You get these biker-type guys who look so tough and then scream when you do something,” laughed Sigouin.

“Some guys get really upset when we scare them because they’re trying to impress their date with how brave they are.”

“I like seeing people’s reactions,” said Adamson, who also enjoys guiding tours through the barn as much as being an actor charged with leaping out at the unwary.

“It’s good experience both ways.”

“Last year a lot of people wanted to be actors and we didn’t have enough to be tour guides,” Sigouin explained.

“From my experience, it’s almost as much fun to watch people get scared as to scare them.”

A shortage of students to staff the barn – even handling the concessions – is not a problem this time around.

“Last year we had between 10 and 15 people,” Galina said.

“This year we have 40-50 people on our e-mail list. On our busiest evenings we need around 20 people.”

Characters can have their own alarming idiosyncracies, but most are in zombie make-up and dress, he said.

“It’s a lot easier to be a zombie than be Dracula,” he said.

“All you basically need is some raggy clothing. You can go to a thrift store and for $10-15 you’ve got your costume.”

If it seems a bit light for the impending cold weather, it doesn’t stay that way.

“After we’re jumping around spooking people it soon gets warm,” Sigouin said.

While it is a good exercise in building improv skills, being an actor in the Haunted Barn is not just a case of freaking people out at random, the students said.

“We have a set of rules for what we do,” Galina said.

“One is we don’t harass customers.”

“Another is, we don’t touch you, so don’t touch us,” added Sigouin.

“Most people are pretty good, but once in a while you get kids who are trying to be funny.”

A lot of the skill is in reading the crowd, which can range from young children to adults, although the majority of visitors tend to be tweens or young teens.

“After doing the barn for a couple of nights you get a sense of how much distance to keep,” Galina said.

Adamson and Sigouin also said communication is good between the various stations – thanks to secret passages linking the ‘backstage’ areas.

“You can tell the actors to tone it down if there is a younger or more sensitive group going through,” Sigouin said.

Whether staffers are younger students being encouraged to get more involved in theatre, or older grades accumulating volunteer hours, the three-hour nightly stint at the Haunted Barn ends up being a lot of fun, she added.

“It goes by so fast,” she said.

“It’s not even about the time – you forget about it, and then your parents are waiting in the car saying ‘where were you?’”

The Haunted Barn is located at 3048 - 192nd Street in South Surrey, BC, Canada and is open October 11-13, 18-20 and 24-31.