Episode 26 - Experiential Immersive Entertainment

Welcome back to another exciting episode of Behind the Whiskers! In this episode, this episode is a must-listen for anyone obsessed with how high-end haunts and immersive worlds are built. We’re joined by Jon Harp, makeup artist and creative director of Haunted Harvest, to break down the science and soul of experiential entertainment.

In this episode, we explore:

• The Architecture of Fear: Jon shares his process for designing immersive environments that blur the line between reality and the "harvest."
• Beyond the Jump Scare: A deep dive into why sensory details—scents, textures, and soundscapes—are the real keys to lasting immersion.
• The Future of Haunted Attractions: Discussion on where the industry is heading and how to keep audiences coming back for more.

📲 Follow us for more behind-the-scenes content:

Instagram: @twistedwhiskersideshow Facebook: @twistedwhiskerfx

📲 Follow Joh for more haunt fx and costuming projects:

Instagram: @johharpfx and @haunted.harvest

Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review our podcast on your favorite streaming app. Your support helps Mitch and Harley keep the lights on in the workshop!

#Podcast #BehindTheWhiskers #HauntedHarvest #ImmersiveEntertainment #HauntDesign #ExperientialArt #TwistedWhiskerFX #JonHarp

Transcript

SPEAKER_05 0:01

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to episode twenty-six of Behind the Whiskers, the podcast where we dive into the strange and unusual and typically ramble off in a direction that you may or may not find helpful, which we do on purpose, that you have to listen to the whole episode to get the helpful stuff out of it. We are very excited to bring you guys for the first time in the podcast history a new bit.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Yes, uh, we have one of our fan favorites, the man that plays Typhoon, is going to be sharing with us some of his uh musical inspirations when it comes to the sideshow and circus music in general. So we're just gonna let Hayden go ahead and take it away from here.

SPEAKER_05 0:48

Yeah, you guys sign up to listen to our resident metalhead and musician talk about some music that he really, really likes and give his feedback on it. We would love to hear, after the bit, your guys' thoughts on the song. Uh we'll include a short clip of it here for copyright purposes. Obviously, we just are including a snippet. We encourage you to look it up uh in its entirety and enjoy it.

SPEAKER_00 1:31

Sorry to interrupt your podcast, but we are doing a new segment in the podcast called the music segment, and your host is me, Hayden Downs. But most people know me better as Typhon Clown. Yes, the only tall clown that everyone loves, but not here to talk about me. I'm here to talk about music. And the song that I chose for today is a song called Puppy Show by the band Avatar. Let's get started. So let's let's talk about the band's history first. The band was formed back in 2001, and the the drummer needed to find someone to be in the band. So you got vocalist bassists and two guitars. The early release was a demo, Thoughts of No Tomorrow, released back in 2006. Didn't get that much motion. Personally, I didn't like it that much. It was part of the hardcore scene. Or it's mainly high-pitched vocals, never liked it. Then the breakthrough was in 2012-2006 with Black Waltz. And that's my personal favorite. And they changed their whole look to like a carnival vibe. And that carnival vibe is really what shows throughout all of them. And it really shows in the group as well. I think of them as the Twisted Whisker show. They all have a um vibe, and then the singer has makeup on his face, they all have their suits on, and they're from Sweden. They're Swedish. Every from what I noticed from every Swedish band or any band that's from Europe kick. I'm telling you, people, they kick so much back in Europe, and they you don't even know. And that's just a little history about Avatar. And there's not that much history about them. And probably from their breakthrough, the biggest help was from Metallica. Metallica took them on tour and gained a lot of motion from that, and they're still touring till this day, making big numbers, have been on billboard and all of that. Avatar is such a great band, I totally, totally recommend checking them out. And now now let's talk about the song Puppet Show. Puppet Show, the song is mainly about control, manipulation, and a downfall of a leader. And there's like there's this lore in the band where the singer is a leader, he's like the king. And the song explores the idea of a puppet king who's authorizing and suggesting that his system's in control falling. And that's really all it is about the song. I don't really focus on that with the song as much. It's mainly what the song sounds like. Once you listen to this song, it's like you're in a whole nother world. It sounds just like a carnival vibe, it's like the little peel, like, and there's all there's just so much buildup, like it's like this little buildup in the beginning, but then you add the guitars and it starts getting heavier and heavier, and there's a little breakdown, but then in the middle of the song, it starts to get slower and slower, and then they bring out a trombone. You don't see that, you don't see that at all. No one just whips out a trombone. I've seen Avatar Live, they do it, they bring out a trombone, and it's like a little melodic moment with a trombone going with the guitars, and then they start to build up the song again, gets faster and faster, then the whole band's going at it, and the two guitars are like battling it out, just like soloing out, and they just keep on going, keep on going, and they go back to the original rhythm, and then the song ends. It's such a great song, guys. I'm telling you. Please check out the song, it's such a great song. When I found out this I found the song when I was checking out Avatar the first time. I already knew some of their songs, but Puppet Show, man. I'm gonna when I first found out Puppet Show, it was a from a live from a live show back in like Europe or something. I don't know what it was. And the whole crowd was just going insane with that whole when that fast part comes on. I'm telling you, listen to the song and you know what I mean. Anyways, this is the last of the segment. Thank you for listening, and have a good day. Peace.

SPEAKER_05 6:16

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that bit with our uh good friend Hayden Downs.

SPEAKER_01 6:21

Yes, thank you very much, Hayden.

SPEAKER_05 6:23

And uh now we are very, very excited to get down to the meat and potatoes of this episode's content. We have with us in our sh lovely shop studio, um, thanks to Catholic Farms, uh our good friend and artistic colleague, Mr. Joe Harp. Will you say hi? Hello, friends. Pleasure to be here. We're really excited to get to talk to you today. Uh, for those of you who have not met him, uh, you're certainly missing out and should try to remedy that at your nearest opportunity. Uh Joe has functioned as in many entertainment corners of the world as you could imagine there to be, but primarily got his start as a special effects makeup artist uh and performer. He is a talented magician and has worked in all sorts of entertainment. Uh currently, Joe is in residence at Haunted Harvest, which is the haunted house that shares the property with our shop and the barn that we mentioned earlier, Kathis Farms, which is kind enough to host all of these wonderful creative endeavors. And he functions as their creative director. Yes. Joe has agreed to come on to the show with us today, and we're kind of broadly, as you know, we will all we will ramble and go many different places on our conversational journey here, folks. But we are broadly here to to touch back on the perspective of immersive entertainment and to discuss maybe some of the sort of DIY, lower budget, poor theater ways of accomplishing really compelling pieces of immersive entertainment.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

It's a topic that we've touched on many times, the immersive entertainment side of things and the perspective that can be forced out of doing stuff that may be deemed unconventional by the industry, but Joe has quite a bit of experience with just pulling stuff out and making stuff work with whatever he has going on and laying around his shop. Care to elaborate, Joe?

SPEAKER_02 8:31

Yeah, that that that's very true. Um, I suppose that like early days of special effects makeup kind of gave me uh an opportunity to do that because I'm like a a little kid working out of my dad's garage and stealing items of clothing from my parents or going in the kitchen and getting, you know, uh items that you might find in the grocery store to create special effects with. Um so I I I learned uh to build the best art I could on limited supplies and budget, uh, just because that's where I I was. So um I did develop quite a skill at that. And the interesting thing to me about that is that if you can present that art uh as best as possible, you still can be moving to your audience. You can appeal to them and uh give them inspiration or uh encourage their mood or attitude. Um and I think that's sort of the fun of make-believe and masquerading is offering offering folks an opportunity to enjoy something that is, you know, clearly make-believe, but everyone agrees to accept it as a reality for a shared experience and so that's fun. I've always been really fascinated by uh emotionally moving an audience. You know, for the good, for better, even if that uh emotion is fear, because sometimes that can be pretty cathartic, you know.

SPEAKER_05 10:04

You like much like us, uh spend a large portion of your early days in the entertainment world cutting your teeth at haunted houses. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_02 10:14

And I've never gotten rid of that. Uh I I love haunted house entertainment because to me a haunted house offers more than a specific genre. Let me explain. Um if I go and see a comedian, I expect they'll tell jokes and I might laugh. If I go to uh a dramatic uh theatrical show, I expect I might laugh some or cry some. With haunted attraction, you're diving into tested and sometimes negative experiences, and you're doing them in ways where your audience can it's more palatable for the audience, and they can kind of appreciate that journey and experience it in a slightly more safe way, and uh it can be a good way for people to test their own emotion and experiences or even phobias or fears. So I think it's in a in a strange way you're offering a service to an audience by giving them an environment and an opportunity to feel not just one emotion but a roller coaster of emotions. And there's a lot of value in that. You can get so much more experience out of a haunted attraction, in my personal opinion, than you can for other very specific uh theatrical experiences. And that that doesn't, you know, mean that those aren't fun and I don't enjoy them. I do, but the the openness, the wide range of experience that you can have from a haunted attraction, big or small, is exciting to me, and it always has been, and I I I've never let go of that.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

I thoroughly agree with you there, Joe. There's so much that you can do with a haunted attraction. It doesn't just have to be fear, it can be comedy, it can be uh a little bit of that drama. You can take it from a really high point to a really low point really quickly and make it somewhat jarring to the person. And I've always followed the concept of art doesn't have to be perfect, but good art will make you feel something.

SPEAKER_03 12:29

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Absolutely. And that's the whole aim with this immersive entertainment to make you fit in that situation and be a part and feel what you want them to feel in that moment.

SPEAKER_05 12:45

Yes. Essentially, kind of emotional engineering, just like any other kind of show. Um when dealing with immersive entertainment, I feel like a lot of people are very quick to write that off as something you can only experience at a theme park like Universal Studios, where absolutely ostensibly money seems to be no object, uh, which does sound like a delightful place to work in some ways. Uh but if we distill that down and put it through a mental still, um, which is really just saying ATM machine on the air. Uh but what do you think in your experience, which is not small, although I recognize you to be a very humble person and you're very kind um to take the time to speak with us today? Uh but you have a lot of spent a lot of time creating these kinds of experiences for people. If you took all those experiences and put them in a pot and looked at them, what are the most important elements of an immersive entertainment show from your perspective?

SPEAKER_02 13:44

Well, we did speak about this a bit before and in passing. We it's come up so many times. I believe Harley, you said it that you know it it is subjective. Everyone's gonna have a different experience or uh expectation for what that really means. So I think the real key is to not focus on one element that you personally feel works best, but try and hit that broad range so you're actually, you know, I'm building a Sunday with all the flavors in it, so to speak. You know, I want to give you I want to give my audience uh a buffet to choose from because I might like one flavor, but one flavor doesn't fit for all. So I think the key is don't don't do a little uh don't do a lot of one thing, but do a a little of a lot of things that can help. Uh but also if you have a specific goal set in mind, say I w I want them to be scared, I want them to cry, I want them to laugh, there are a couple guidelines that can help facilitate and flow uh and funnel sort of the emotional tunnel uh of your audience so that you can make sure that they're getting the experience that you've set out for them to feel. So I I think that for looking back at my experience, the truth is there were lots of things that didn't work. Uh lots of tests, trial and error things that I thought, well this sure, surely this will work. And I think that um I actually spent too much time trying to make sure the idea I had in the beginning I had would would work, and because in my mind surely this thing will make everyone feel X, Y, Z this way. Um that didn't that wasn't the case, and it isn't the case, and people are different, so they're gonna experience it differently. I I think that um broad attempts at that sometimes get lost, and the more I've done it and the older I get, the more I realize that lots of subtle atmospheric elements are actually what bring it to life. And it it isn't in huge broad strokes, which is generally what you'd experience with a very large show. Sure, they they have these more subtle elements i mixed in, but the subtle elements um piled on top of one another really they do more for most people's mindset than really big uh like slaps in the face of a lot of something. It's it's kind of like you're making a dish if I if I over apply sugar or a specific seasoning that I like, then that's all you end up tasting. And I you can't hide the flavors for a flavor. So um yeah, uh the subtlety on lots of small things is really what brings the atmosphere to life because in the end, my experience, let's say I've been camping and I wake up and I stretch my arms and I hear birds chirping and I can smell the smoke from the fire pit and these little things that make up this world around me, uh, to create an experience that I kind of ignore on the day-to-day. Well, that's the kind of stuff that we have to pay attention to because those little elements, those subtle elements, are actually what will persuade the audience into feeling more deeply uh the emotions that you've set out to give them.

SPEAKER_01 17:29

I find there's something really like warming about your approach to immersive entertainment and I guess evolving from this cookie-cutter haunted house theming that most bigger haunted houses tend to follow and ultimately overpopulate the market with, if we're all doing the same thing constantly, then the show's just gonna wash out and be boring.

SPEAKER_04 18:01

It's kinda becomes kind of predictable, frankly, that you're gonna have your your spooky hospital and your spooky clowns and then your spooky pirate ship in one place, because that makes sense quickly.

SPEAKER_02 18:16

If you're yeah, if the if the target you have set for yourself is like, well, what's our theme? Okay, well it's uh it's a haunted hospital, and then alright, well, what's in a hospital? That that's cool, that's not the wrong approach.

SPEAKER_05 18:28

Um but I think if you stick to the hospital, sure.

SPEAKER_02 18:32

Right, well I think that people get caught up on the big picture and the really elaborate and more fancy elements to the environment. They actually miss out on the little bits of trash and muck and dirt that exist in the real world, and I I think that that's what actually creates the atmosphere. It's a it's a cigarette butt that's burnt out in an ashtray, it's a half drunk cup of coffee, it's uh a plant rotting on the window seal. You know, these little elements that kind of create realism are often overlooked. And so when you can incorporate these more minute details, um still a detail and potentially it's generally not something that your audience is just gonna focus on and go, Well, look at that after drunk cup of coffee there, you know, that that cigarette in the asteroid. They're not gonna think about that. But if the the space is full of those elements, along with other elements that are leading your audience down this uh mental um construct of a new world you're putting them in, then yes, you have to say what does the audience anticipate when they're going into the hospital. So sure I want to put in things that everyone agrees they might see, hear, smell.

SPEAKER_05 19:55

Maybe a nurse and whatever.

SPEAKER_02 19:58

Yeah, yeah. You you want to add those elements in, absolutely. But I th I feel like uh, you know, one element is people seem to get caught up on those broad strokes and then the more subtle things just they feel like, well, we don't need all that. We don't need all of that. And um I think uh some a lot of times that might come from like, well, we don't want to spend tons of m money and time, which is money, on all these little things because it's just it's not necessary, it's not needed. And yes, um if that's not what you want from the experience, no, it isn't necessary. Broad strokes are fine for some people, but the art that I tend to uh excite myself with and involve my time towards it it has all of those things. Uh even specifically down to really subtle iconography. Symbols mean a lot more, um, just like the Egyptian culture uh with symbols with you know share information and stories. So symbols help. Symbolism is very important.

SPEAKER_05 21:02

And it's still visual art, which means your audience doesn't need a lot of time to to process it necessarily.

SPEAKER_02 21:09

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 21:09

You're not asking them to read forty pages in the middle of their experience. No. You can put a picture on a wall or a certain symbol that they might be familiar with and then communicate to them.

SPEAKER_02 21:19

That's right, that's right. Small things like that, I think often will get overlooked and they hold a lot of weight. Um we know people's mindsets can be chaotic, and oftentimes when someone's buying a ticket for entertainment, they're actually trying to escape things. They're not necessarily trying to live out or live in uh a shared negative experience in the sense that uh um shared negative experience that is actual terror because if you look up the word horror it it's like repulsion. So I don't want someone to buy a ticket and say, Well, I vomited halfway through and now I've had to leave. And I'll never come back. Um okay, if that's the goal, fine, I did my job, but generally I don't aim for that. My uh goal with the experience is to create a world that becomes more magical the longer they're in it, and it m makes them want to say goodbye for a little while to their own life and their own experience and try and involve themselves in this world that I've created and and get lost in it a little bit. I mean, that's kind of the fun. I I want them to feel like they can let down their guard and get lost in the world. And then I think they they open themselves up more to that, and in that way they can be more open to the experience. If I initially come at the audience with something that is very overflavored and saturated, and you know, sure that works, in a small stint, they might remember it, but it it isn't it isn't the immersive goal that I have set out to achieve. Um it's not wrong. I just don't prefer it. My objective is to give someone an escape, and the escape should be not just frightening, but also fun and and feel like they're achieving something. Uh if they don't feel like they've conquered something or achieved something within themselves, I believe it's a little less fun. I I think you they're buying a ticket to experience because they genuinely want to escape what is negative in their world and find something new, even if what I'm offering is something far more negative than what they're experiencing. So by comparison negativity. That's right, still fiction and and surrounded. I mean, I I love horror fantasy. I love combining those two worlds, and to me fantasy is uh something we don't get enough of because the r the real world can be harsh and depressing and and difficult and especially in the haunt industry specifically, I have to ask myself, well w it with current events or negative things going on in someone's life, why would they want to think about death more? Why would they want to think about the horrors? So the way I combat that is I come at it from the angle of supernatural. What to me, supernatural says there there's something beyond our world, there's another world out there, there are other elements and and you can touch them, you can smell them, you can interact with them, and that is special because for a moment, even if it's just for a moment, I do aim to make the audience forget their world and just solely exist in mine. And there is fun in that for me. I I like that.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

It's it sounds like you approach art very similar to the way I look at video games. Like, you can have this whole world created with facades and foliage and whatnot, but it's gonna be the little bits of trash that litter the streets, the chicken scratch in the fields, the bottles and half-eaten bread rolls on the table, the half-burnt-out candles that really bring that world to life and allow you to have this uh sort of cathartic escape from reality.

SPEAKER_05 25:44

Yeah. The word that we would use for that, at least from the like living history museum presentation days in my career, would be material culture, which is essentially the stuff that like That sounds pretty unlike. It sounds like a very formal like word, it's very justifying. Yeah, but material. It makes us sound smarter than we are. It does, it does. Uh I didn't make up the word, I didn't invent it or the phrase, but basically material culture in a reenacting setting, um, if you're not just some of it's for you, but some of it's for your audience, it's to make the place feel real, like the environment you're presenting to them. And that is, like in an 18th century context, that is broken piles of pottery and broken pipes and things that they would have thrown in as trash, it's scraps of thread, it's dirt on the floor, the same stuff you're talking about, like the evidence that human beings have lived in a space beyond the apparent. Like the building is kind of a oh, okay. Well, clearly there were people here, it didn't erect itself, yeah, but the material culture proves use. Um, and you can see that in every level. Like Pompeii has great material culture that's buried in the volcanic ash from that disaster that tells them a lot about how they lived their lives. I mean, and even religious iconography falls into that too. It could be a lot of things.

SPEAKER_02 26:53

Oh, absolutely, absolutely does.

SPEAKER_05 26:54

Like all of that kind of stuff. I think, and that's a huge part of what we've done with the sideshow that's been really important to us in the beginning is like, okay, I'm gonna present this environment, I want you to feel like it's a real place. It may not be your time and place, but for a moment, just a precious, fragile, delicate little moment that at any moment I could say the wrong thing. I could look at somebody and call them dude, and then I break the spell. So it's so fragile. But if you carefully construct it and love it, I think that you can create really massive immersive pieces of art that say massive, I mean in their impact, not inherently in their budget, um, or even the time, really. Uh you had talked about um kind of combining this fantasy and horror elements, which I've seen in a lot of your work. And you guys can see more of Joe's work on his Instagram, uh Joe HarpFX, that's correct. Um, it's a good place to get a sampling of Joe's work. Uh, there's some really, really awesome pictures. Phenomenal stuff. Really cool stuff. But and in that you can see your fantasy track. You're very welcome, uh, the whole time. With your current project, Haunted Harvest, how is that breathing uh how is that artistic train of thought breathed into life in this environment?

SPEAKER_02 28:10

That's a great question. Um Well I wish I could say, well, after perfecting it over these years, I've but if that's not the case, that's not that's not true. Uh it it's still you you have to go, well, what is the audience, what does the local market want, and what do they respond to? What's their time frame, what's their expectation? All those things are relevant because we talked about before atmospheric and immersive elements are subjective. Okay, so m my uh aim here is to uh first of all uh with this haunted attraction try and purposely uh misdirect expectation. So I am using, purposely using to my advantage, what anyone that has been to a haunted house in the past few years, what their expectation of that experience is. And then I say, okay, it will not be that. It is not that. And that is the aim. If I can do it different and present it in new light, the audience, whether they've experienced a haunted attraction or not, what they're seeing when they come to this show is purposely a different direction. So I am kind of uh I'm I've been obsessed with magic for my entire life, and one of the elements in magic is misdirection. So I am purposely misdirecting the audience. And uh one of the other things that um is the combination of fantasy and horror in this show, or supernatural elements, is to first of all offer a world that seems very uh familiar. Um it is it is presented to the audience as kind of a a timeless space, uh uh a space that um sort of exists on its own merit and doesn't follow any rules of the outside world. So that already gives me an opportunity to do it different, right? Um and then the other thing is if I can create a sort of expectation based on just repetitive visuals, sounds, and interactions, then you build rapport with your audience and then they continue to expect that the ride and experience will stay and feel the same. When in fact it doesn't, I will then purposely and quickly deviate from that world, and then you become confused, but not so confused that you go, Well, I don't know what that is, so I don't know how I'm meant to feel about it.

SPEAKER_05 30:54

So you just constantly return them back to an indication of how they should feel.

SPEAKER_02 30:58

Yes, you you find a base. So in this uh way I'm creating a baseline of experience and expectation for the audience, with uh at first the knowledge of what uh others are doing. I don't want to say everyone else, because everyone doesn't do it the same. But often there is a lot of repeat in the industry. So, and that's not wrong. I love it. I love the industry. I love that those things are out there. Uh my brothers and I, we will buy a ticket to go see those things. We love those things. I'm not saying they're wrong. My objective is just to present something different because I feel like audiences deserve it, and I want to uh I I I want to have the opportunity to move audiences into a different mindset. And so my my job is to surprise you. I want to surprise you.

SPEAKER_05 31:55

So you constantly subvert expectations. So so you kind of kind of lead the audience one way, and then all of a sudden the bottom's dropping out.

SPEAKER_02 32:02

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 32:02

And they're like, wait a minute.

SPEAKER_02 32:04

Yeah, this is what I'm saying. This wasn't what I expected. So after I've done that a few times and you've built sort of this I call it a baseline of expectation, uh then when you when you start adding supernatural elements to a world that seems so far very natural, then the supernatural elements actually seem special. Because if I start out showing you lots of really wild supernatural things, you're gonna go, oh, well, that's what the whole world is, and it sort of loses its value by the end of the experience. It's no longer having the effect. So when I get to my big, you know, uh the big big end to the fireworks, the grand finale of the fireworks, right? It's not fireworks, but you you know the crescendo. Yeah, when we get to that point, if I've already used up all of those elements early on, you they're not special, they don't do much for the audience. So I purposely will uh sort of cherry-pick the opportunity, the right moment to drop that surprise of the supernatural world in, so it actually feels special. It actually surprises you because up until that point you've really only experienced something that seems very natural.

SPEAKER_05 33:19

So you're so you're playing it in a way that you're building an environment that although it includes fantasy elements, yes, and it is mystical by nature because that's what's underlining your story, you're still presenting it in a way that feels very believable.

SPEAKER_02 33:35

Very real.

SPEAKER_03 33:36

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 33:36

Very possible. And so by that you're allowing your audience to actually get their immersive experience. There are plenty of shows I've seen where they if we take the flash and I'll call it frankly, the flash and flash and trash is a word we use in the lighting world a lot for rock and roll lights. There's not a lot of nuance to it necessarily, even though there is on the back end, but it's a lot of strobing lights and flashing colors, and that's like that's what people want to write. They're there for the music, right? But it's still contentless crap. You're there for the music, the lighting is just there because people expect there to be lights, and a lot of haunted houses, I find, make that same mistake. Where it seems to please some of their audience, but I would argue, um, from my I would argue, you know, slightly egotistical perch here in the corner, that haunted house's mistake is that their audience is willing to accept the flash and trash crap, the spooky clowns, and uh which is ironic for me to say, uh but look, our spooky clowns have a plot point, alright? Like they're important. Uh but they they will accept that uh because it's all they're offered. Yeah. And so if you build them an environment they're immersed in, I would argue that most audiences, if you ask them objectively what they wanted, they may not know. But if they come to your show and see it, the reviews you had from patrons are overwhelmingly positive. Yes. And so it proves that their your methodology does work. Like the audience is satisfied. They're like, we feel like we experienced something beyond just Woogie Woogie, Woogie, Woogie, Woogie Woogie. And when I say Boogie Woogie Woogie, of course, I'm picturing the ghoul from Porky's 2, I think. The dude that they like hit with the car. I don't know if you guys have both seen that movie.

SPEAKER_02 35:12

I'm familiar with it.

SPEAKER_05 35:14

Um but a really goofy moment where it goes comes out dressed in rags and it just says boogie woogie woogie woogie a bunch of times and then passes out drunk on the hood of the car. And that's I used to show that in Haunted House training seminars, where I was like, okay guys, this is what you're not going to do.

SPEAKER_03 35:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:28

Because it doesn't develop anything with the audience. I think you talking about the audience with a relationship is interesting to me. Because I also find that even some performers forget that. That it's a it's an exchange. And it goes beyond the you paid for a ticket, so I'm going to show you something fancy. That's relatively easy to do. You can buy a subscription to Netflix and have that relationship. With live entertainment, in a world that a lot of live entertainers and buskers are very scared right now because you know, TikTok seems like the new wild west to conquer. You know, do you feel like there's a strong enough footing in the world where live entertainment shows like our side show and your haunted house are gonna do okay?

SPEAKER_02 36:14

Ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha. I I haven't laughed at that. That was a pretty fake laugh, but um it is amusing to me. It's an amusing concept. Uh am I afraid of that? No, I'm not. I'm not at all, actually. I'm not in the least bit scared because um so far I haven't met anyone that uh, you know, um needed the internet to eat or uh breathe. So uh, you know, if they're if they're human and they're using it, then they still exist in the real world. And that is where live theater and the hot uh uh world exists. It's it's it's live action, it's in the real world and tangible. Yes, so um and sure there are you know there are uh artificial versions and they're you know you can there are plenty of cool video games too that you can play. They're very realistic, very creepy, and there is a market for that. I'm not against that either. I just think that I don't believe that live theater will ever go away. I don't believe it will ever go away. I let me explain. Um you mentioned the beginning poor theater. That was something you brought up when we were first. Yes, yes. So what's really interesting about poor theater is it at first glance, you know, um you'll look at poor theater and it's okay, well it's a theater with no money. That that sounds like a theater with no hope to survive. Uh that's not actually accurate. I mean, it can be you could argue that, uh, but I'd I'd say look at it like this. In ancient times, we were told stories, and information was shared uh uh through theater. So we'd we'd gain knowledge about stories and experiences and supernatural elements through storytelling, and that storytelling became theatrical. And they said, Okay, well let's do this th storytelling. We're gonna have every townsperson come in and and you're gonna sit here and watch this. So when might we do this? Well, they didn't have lights, they had candlelights or torches, so they'd have to do this when the sun shined at just the right moment of the day with just the right amount of light to create the atmosphere they needed for their show. And then they'd burn incense and have uh wine and food and battles on stage and and in theater and the realm, and those are real elements. They're outdoors, they see the natural world around them, they can hear it, they can smell it, they might taste it. So the natural world is a part of that experience, and a lot of shows tend to try and cut every bit of that out and create a world from scratch, and that is fine. I'm not saying it's wrong. I'm just trying to point out that when we're on our phones, you know, that world may be recorded from a reality, but if I'm looking at uh an ocean, I'm not smelling it, I'm just seeing it, I might hear it. The experience in poor theater in ancient times is described historically not just as entertainment, but as ritualistic experiences held by groups of people that moved these groups of people into collectively changing their mindset. What does that mean today? That means if someone's having a bad day and they come experience the show that I've set up for them, I don't aim to just scare them. I aim to put them through a nearly ritualistic, emotional, and religious experience. Because they are feeling and sensing things that generally they tend to ignore because that's just the way we exist. We're born and we go, wow, gravity sucks. I fell down a bunch of times yesterday, I don't want to hit my head again. So I'm gonna start tuning all that nonsense out. The world around me is really loud, so I'm not gonna let that scare me because I still gotta try and eat and sleep and move about this space, so let me ignore those things. So we we we shut ourselves off from so much external knowledge and experience and just parts of the world we just tend to ignore it. And so what I'm doing is I'm trying to, through my theater, reintroduce these things that are around us all the time and show the audience that there's value in them, that they matter, that they're special, and we should appreciate them. Not only can we appreciate them, but again, back to the ceremonial or religious aspects, uh, it it feels so much more powerful, and that becomes the supernatural realm. In fact, it isn't actually super at all, it's just that you've ignored it. So I sure I'm gonna intensify it. I'm gonna exaggerate it for my audience to make it seem more magical and really showcase it for them. You might feel the same kind of thing when watching an old Kung Fu movie, and you see the sky. How do we see the sky? Well, this beautiful tree has these petals of flowers that these cherry blossom petals float through the sky, and we say, now I know that the wind is blowing, because I can see the movement of nature itself. So to me, nature is a part of the experience. Nature is dangerous, and the world around us can be, you know, challenging. And I don't want to ignore that by putting you in a building and and showing you lots of emergency exit signs. It's safe in here, and there's a way out.

SPEAKER_05 42:12

You know, but does your work as you're doing it, it kind of undoes it. And for the poor theater concept, where the goal isn't so much about not having money, I would argue the goal in poor theater is to make impactful statements without spending a lot of money. Um nature is it's an element there.

SPEAKER_02 42:31

Yeah, it's already there, and uh a lot of our show is built upon what we have. What do you have? That is, you know, a basis of poor theater. Look around you, what do you have? Work with that, make that the root of your story arc and put value in it. Don't ignore it, don't say, Well, I don't want to look like this, I want to try something different. That's okay if you can afford to rework everything from the ground up, including the soil we stand on. But my aim isn't to do that. My aim is to respect the natural world that the show exists in and make that a part of the experience. And I want the audience to respect the land that they're walking on for one main reason that is it an actual working farm, and we don't want the animals eating trash that people throw out, so we're very adamant about making sure to keep the property safe and organic and natural. And I'm not trying to preach on that, I'm just pointing out that the show already has uh the landscape already has a real necessity for a natural environment to stay that. And I wanted to capital capitalize on that and say, well, yeah, I do respect nature. I do think this beautiful, very old tree is older than I am, it's been here longer than I am, it's a character in. The show. It is a character. And and so is uh the animals and the the insects around you, the ants in the field. I don't get rid of them. I'm not purposely putting people through piles of snakes and spiders either, but polite of you. Yes. Well, I don't want people getting hurt, but I I want them to respect and appreciate the natural world and in that way understand that there is something beyond us there, and there there is real magic in the world. So I don't have to make up the magic. It's actually there, and I just want to showcase that.

SPEAKER_05 44:39

You almost give people a platform or time. Part of your immersive tack with this show has been, if I'm understanding you correctly, that you're almost creating a space, uh, one could argue a temple in a way, where people can get back in touch with things that we have a people with our high rises and our giant causeways and our damned traffic circles. Traffic circles are stupid.

SPEAKER_01 45:03

Anyway, all those things. That is so American of you. I'm raising the room. I disagree. I think this is bottom, right? I have to make more decisions.

SPEAKER_05 45:12

Traffic circles, the hell of them. Okay. They are faster, I will admit that. But you know, just cut that part out of the episode so that they don't know.

SPEAKER_01 45:19

Anyway, so that being said I think I'm gonna raise the volume so people hear it better.

SPEAKER_05 45:25

Traffic circles are dumb. 2026. I'm running for president. Alright, so the gist is that you've created almost a temple for people to be able to forget about all those things and all the asphalt and all the tar and the crap. And for a moment, is I going through your show last year at the end of the season, there were several moments where there was not nothing happening, but there was breaks between, you know, being uh interacted with by characters, where I'm walking from one location to another, and what I'm surrounded by, I remembered all of a sudden I could hear the crickets. And it kind of spooked me because all of a sudden, when the crickets are in that much volume, you feel very small. The trees are towering over top of you, and you realize that if the universe decided in that moment to send a bear out of the woods, you're cooked. Like, tiny puny human, you will not make it from here. Like, and and you're like, well, I'm in a show. Uh Joe's not personally following me around through this show with a gun that'll take out a bear. All right. Like, but in that moment, like those are all the like natural things. Is that stuff you think you think it's it's it's it's naturally in us. I I mean, more than think, I assume you would agree that like our natural fear is of the dark and the woods and the uncivilized places. So we become arguably content to exist in those spaces. And so your show does. Without you having to spend a dime, you didn't go out there and import the trees from Borneo. Like they were already awesome and they were already here. I I just I think that's an impactful and interesting way to take it, is you're working with what's around you. Your guys' show has a lot of rural theming because it is a functional farm. Yeah. So you guys have access to those resources, the resources that you already need here on this property.

SPEAKER_02 47:14

Um Yeah, we don't actually use any of the animals in the show because I don't I don't think that's fair to be.

SPEAKER_05 47:20

They do act for free from the sides where the cows are.

SPEAKER_02 47:24

We record the sounds of the animals and we replay them at higher volumes, and sometimes we alter that sound. So yes, you hear it, but sometimes that's uh it's more extreme, is what you're hearing.

SPEAKER_01 47:35

Now let me not a forced uh use of the animal. No, just no, it is not.

SPEAKER_05 47:40

Again, again, grabbing what nature's offering you.

SPEAKER_02 47:43

Yes. Yeah, it it's already out there.

SPEAKER_05 47:45

Cows make some really frightening damn noises. Yes, they do. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:49

They're very vocal, very vocal, and you can really distort those sounds, and that's that's fun to play with.

SPEAKER_01 47:54

Um they're also really playful animals.

SPEAKER_02 47:57

They are.

SPEAKER_01 47:58

They're always dangerous. Very dangerous. I've been kneecapped by quite a few of them. Yeah, yeah, they they kick. They jump and kick.

SPEAKER_04 48:07

Yes, they do.

SPEAKER_05 48:09

If you could um sorry, I'm thinking back to my uh childhood memory that I have where I was being chased by a goose, which was incredibly pleasant and terrifying.

SPEAKER_02 48:20

They bite too. They're mean.

SPEAKER_05 48:22

They're mean as hell. Um geese do not like being bothered. Uh so I guess what I'd like to ask you next um is a goofy, silly question, if that's okay. If you could only have, you had to build a show, and let's put an arbitrary timeline. You've got two weeks to build a show. You you can pick what kind of show you'd like to build out of this, but I'm assuming a piece of an immersive theater, people are walking through it maybe. And you could only have four resources resources. So that's a person, place, or thing. You get four that you must have to pull that show off. What would that be?

SPEAKER_02 48:59

Four resources. Um person, place, or thing? Yep. Any of those.

SPEAKER_05 49:08

Uh I would say we're assuming the advertising's done for you and the ticketing is handled.

SPEAKER_02 49:20

Person place. Um would be a uh very realistic portal. Uh something that forces the audience to reset their brain, which is why in the show we have these breaks, because if you're bombarding your audience, um you can overwhelm them chemically speaking in their emotions, and I don't aim to do that. Uh that that's fun. But it's also distracting. But it's it eventually it doesn't work anymore because the brain will kind of fizzle out and use up that chemical and back to the ignoring you were talking about. That's right. It it it loses its value if we overdo it. Uh so some kind of um s archway, portal, uh, light, fog, that creates an idea that you're leaving your world and entering another one. Um and uh place. I want a place that has both. Um an a very old uh stone structure, uh, preferably one with little to no roofing, so you could still see the sky, and then the remainder of that environment would be an all-natural environment, something with very large trees, uh large rocks, rolling hills, and water, which we have a lot of that here. Um the the sound of, you know, the water and the reflection of the sky and the moon in that water is it's really brilliant. It's magical and um worth keeping. Uh and I suppose the the last thing uh would be um you said a person. I have to pick a person or something. Well, it it can it can be a person, place, or thing for any of these four. Person, place, or thing. Um well I I would have to say a person then. Uh I want a character that feels like they are from a realm beyond your understanding. Um obviously the the performer would be very, very strong with their voice and physicality. I'd w so I'd want a really strong performer, but I would hope that that performer would be presented in the nude. Uh and the reason for that is they're not actually naked. Uh the costume I would put them in would cause you to see every bit of their supposed flesh and have no clothing because in the animal kingdom, um, you know, we that generally they don't wear clothes. So uh I I think humanoid, um through a lot of religious uh description of beings, they're they're they're relatable to humans by appearing human themselves, so uh kind of a hybrid of animal and human, sort of a mixture of this humanoid uh thing that just speaks to you. Uh I think it would be really magical if the character could speak to you at the same time as music uh uh is is played. Um but I can't pick both of those, I think so.

SPEAKER_05 52:44

Well, technically I think you did three, right? So so a portal, a place with a stone structure, a person who's in the garb of relative nothingness, because that also makes them kind of intimidating because they're not hiding behind anything.

SPEAKER_02 53:00

No, and with clothing we've gotten the sense that like I can show who I am through my clothing. Uh uh, but i if you if you separate the the character from you know garb, you don't know where they lie. Like I don't know if they're in a robe because they're a monk or they're in a robe because they're a priest. I don't I don't know. Uh and I just I see this garb on them that looks like, well that's they're just clearly trying to hide the shorts and sneakers underneath, you know.

SPEAKER_05 53:30

See, take that away. Create a a a im implacably may have used that word wrong, I do that a lot, uh implacably believable character because they're not hiding it.

SPEAKER_02 53:40

No. I would want them to almost uh speak to you like they were your grandmother or grandfather.

SPEAKER_05 53:49

Almost uh advising advising, yes.

SPEAKER_02 53:51

So I I think that to me that's more impactful, way more impactful, than having a character just rush out of darkness and be really loud or even scream and have this monster sounding voice. Like, yes, that would be startling and scary. I have experienced that in real life, uh, not with a monster, but um a human being, and and and that I'm not gonna get into that story, but shit, yes, that kind of thing can be jarring when it's real, when you really experience it, yes, it's jarring. But uh if you remove the more human elements where I can understand, you know, the hierarchy or the value of of wealth and and uh uh a job title for this person, like if you if you're a creature, if you remove these things, it becomes more unknown and strange, but still something that is directly interacting with you and offering you words of advice and and knowledge, I think that to me is way more impactful because truthfully, that's the kind of thing that I'm gonna think about when I get home. And the opposite of that, what I experience generally in haunted house, is the most talkative actor in a haunted house, they're only talkative because they have a lot of smart alecky things to say. So you'll say a comment and then say some smart aleck things. And that's fun, you know, that's fun. I can get a laugh at it, and my friends laugh at me, that's fun. I get why they do it. It also puts up a barrier. It it shows them, it shows me that they're putting up this wall and they're saying, Well, I want to be smarter than you, so I'm gonna outsmart you, and I don't want you to say anything that makes me feel dumb, so I'm gonna combat that by being the smart person in the room, and also a rude person in the room, so you can't insult me back, and that's fine. I see the bottom.

SPEAKER_05 55:39

But it also snaps to some degree, even if they're in character, that snaps the immersive bond because it it violates that transaction with the audience. That's right. Where the performer feeds them something and the audience feels something.

SPEAKER_02 55:54

That's right. They're they're they're ending that interaction. They're saying that's forcing it to to not. Yeah, yeah. And I don't I don't think that sticks with you. Only the only thing it's gonna do is make me go back to my car, and when I'm driving back, think that person was a bit of a jerk. I don't like the way they spoke to me. And maybe that's what they want, maybe they want me to not think about them anymore, and that's fine. I'm not saying it's wrong. I'm just saying, as far as I feel and see it, like more impactful is something that's going to make me think. Because remember, going back to a poor theater, the ancient world of theater, is meant to change minds and emotions. Not to put up barriers between me and the performers. It it is a bridge between me and this world, and one that I get to join in and and become a part of. And I well, if you close your audience off to that, you're you're actually not letting them have fun with you. And I don't think that helps. I don't think that makes or encourages people to want to buy a ticket.

SPEAKER_05 56:54

It doesn't encourage the impact of the art by any means. I think that if you have a rude character, there's a place for one. I prefer a character though that's kind of standoffish, but gives you little pieces that that like you can grab onto. But the character, if like like if I'm playing a character who's frightened of dealing with people, assuming it's not something like abject terror, right? Where they're just terrified of you, like, for a moment, but that character is kind of a throwaway if that's what they are. They're there maybe for a plot point or telling a story, but they're not going to impact the audience. They're just, oh, people should be scared. Got it, cool. Moving on. But having a character that's kind of maybe a little closed off is fine. But I think the object rudeness, unless it's part of a longer interaction that does have back and forth, or even, dare I say, conversation between the performer and the the patron, is pointless. It doesn't actually do anything. But that does mean you've only used three, you've got a fourth one.

SPEAKER_02 57:45

Well, that fourth one, I think, what because I said a a space with no little to no ceiling that was very ancient. That was a structure, and then the next one was the forest itself. Ah, okay, two separate pieces of the place. Yeah, like I I would want a part of that experience to be outdoors and another part indoors.

SPEAKER_05 58:02

Something, something that could feel and I like the idea of it of an old stone structure because that can be many things and does feel also like, you know, we get this chill, and stone, limestone in particular, has a really nice habit of being very cold when you're next to it because it has natural moisture content, and as the sun falls, that moisture turns it it's still evaporating slightly because the stones are left hotter than the environment around them, and so it will feel chilly and almost otherworldly to your point with your other.

SPEAKER_02 58:30

The lack of roof is also it's important to see the sky. I feel like that really matters, and not always, it's not always important, but uh I I think I think seeing the stars in the moonlight, if you can, if you're like where we are, we're in such a rural area that you can see the stars. In fact, I got a lovely story, I'd love to share it right now. There was a group of um young men that came to the show last year, this past season, and they were visiting. I was standing with them right before they went into our show. We were in the field and they were from uh New York. And there were brothers visiting uh here, some family, and they came to our show, and just as we were standing there in the field, I told them to look up at the sky and was pointing out how you know the stars are beautiful here, and they said, We're from New York, we never get to see the stars like this, this is magical. And at that very moment, no lie, a shooting star cascaded across the sky, and they were blown away. Just at the moment I told them to look up, they see this shooting star as bright and vibrant, and they said, This is the first time I have ever in my life seen a shooting star. And I said, Well, I'm happy I was able to share the experience here tonight with you all. And yeah, because magic still exists in the world, and I we take it for granted, we overlook it, and if you allow that to be a part of the experience for people, they can take that with them because they're gonna see it again.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:01

So by creating an environment again, you have created a uh essentially a temple in the track to create a theatrical show. You've you've aligned that with a temple where people can experience something spiritual that we all have available to us. We just often in our busy lives don't choose it, which is sad. Um, and that's that the things around us are beautiful. We just have to stop and smell the roses. That's right, that's right. I love the in your case, not the roses, no roses.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:29

I love the almost contrasting perspective from you to our last episode with Kerry, where he touched on the use of cliche to do majority of the legwork for you, whereas this character that you described, you want to avoid that cliche to give that air of mystery, to give that air of unpredictability to drive the motion forward. I think sometimes we get lost in cliche, and sometimes cliche is great, but when you're experiencing something different, like the lack of a cliche, the lack of that foundational uh artistic point, it makes you think a little bit more about your surroundings and the performance and those little things that you mentioned earlier, the cigarette butt and the half drunk coffee on the counter. And it really brings home that magical experience.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:39

Yes, I um well, I I grew up in a rural area, so I've I've had a lot of experiences with wild animals, and uh even um dogs, uh coyotes and fox and deer. I I've had a lot of interesting experiences with wild animals, and there's something, there's a moment, and you may have experienced yourself where you run across an animal, let's say uh a dog in the neighborhood, or you're out for a walk, and you there is a moment where you and that animal are looking at one another, deciding how are they gonna respond to my presence, and in turn, how will I respond to that? And I think that unpredictability is skipped over with a lot of character actors because their main objective is to get you to scream. And so I often train the actors, I tell them, don't base your merit of performance off of how many yells you get, because you're not actually gonna get that. Everyone reacts differently to fear, and sometimes the most you'll get is a little bit of pupil dilation. And that's it. I'm not seeing that in the dark.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:54

Nobody gonna have like somebody outside the scene checking their eyes and flash and mark that.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:58

So, you know, what I have to trust is this magic of interaction, and if I try and just snuff out the interaction by going, well, I just gonna I'm gonna make a loud noise, I look scary enough, and that should be it's over. That's it. It should be good enough, and that'll stick with them. Well, the problem is that doesn't, because they've already experienced that, and they can experience that with their phone or television or in the theater, uh, and i it it it exists. Uh it's there. It's been done a lot. It's been done a lot. And I think that the audience needs to be challenged a little more. They're getting a lot smarter than some might give them credit, and as technology spreads, knowledge spreads, and uh people's understanding and expectation for entertainment is very high. Their expectation is very high. Uh and you can try and, you know, meet them halfway or overwhelm them with so much that they're just t over-stimulated, and that does work, but what tends to happen with people when they're overstimulated is when you ask someone that goes through a show that is overwhelmingly full of stimulating elements, what was your favorite part? You know what their answer is? They don't remember. They'll make something up generally. Oh, it was this guy in there with this thing. Well, were you sure? Because that doesn't sound right. You know, I've had them lie to me and like describe things that are not in the show.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:42

And I lie to themselves, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:44

Right. So y to me what that told me is they they and this is not this show, this is uh previous shows that I've worked with. Very big budget, very big crowds, and they're fun experiences.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:58

Lots of uh lots of investment in their show. Which I think is an amusing turn of phrase.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:07

That's good that I mean that's not wrong. I'm not saying it's wrong.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:14

That's right. Or I should say not unhelpful, unimpactful. Yes, better way, yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

They're not if if your objective is to move your audience and make them sort of resonate with the experience, I don't think just rushing out of the dark and screaming is gonna do it. Not anymore. I don't sure that that worked in the eighties and it was exhilarating for me and my brothers, and I didn't care that that actor was wearing blue jeans and sneakers at the time. You know, I was just excited to be in a world that had cobwebs and capes, you know? But that's not enough anymore, and it it's not it's not really going to impact the audience in a way that makes them go, you know what? Next year I want to go experience. Said again. You know what? Before this season is up, I want to take my friends or family to experience this with me. Because another thing that I'm very proud to say that we do here at Haunted Harvest NC is we continue to change the experience throughout the season. So we literally have a different performance and set of what we call rituals as you go through the season. And the reason we do this is because the rituals that get us to Halloween night shouldn't be repeated. So the ticket is for a new experience every night our show is open. And it's not completely different. The story arc is still there, but the presentation and the way our audience is fed through that experience does change. And I don't do that just because I want people to come back. I do that because it makes the most sense to me. If I am performing a ritual, it doesn't make sense to perform the exact same ritual in the same way over and over again. That that's not how it would be done. It doesn't make sense. So the sacrifice is different, the action, the herbs used in the experience, all of these things are gonna change, even down to the direction I'm pushing the crowd. The flow of traffic is the same, but I'm not going to keep them on the same path. And that changes the experience every night. And not only is that fun for our audience, it's extremely fun for the actor. Because they don't have to be like repeating, repeating, repeating. Like that can get droning and aggravating to an actor too.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:12

It helps to keep people motivated uh when performing to keep trying different things. I noticed a lot of the time, like managing the previous haunt that Mitch and I both worked at.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:29

God rests its soul and hell.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:30

God rest its soul and hell. A lot of the actors there was a lot of turnover, especially in my particular attraction that I was managing, because it was so cut and dry. This is what you do, jump out, scare them, the trailer moves on, your scene's over, you walk back to place, and you repeat.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:54

I get that, and you know what, that's not wrong either. I mean I I I worked I've like I said, I've worked big big shows and seen that um in North Carolina and Texas and a couple other states that I I guess spotted at, and they were fun shows, but it it was about repeating because they have nearly a cus there's so many people want to buy a ticket, there's so many people going through the show, and you have to continue your flow. So your performance has to be sped up, it has to be repetitive to get your angle, to to get your part in the show, y you know, yes, you gotta speed through it. We actually don't suffer from that here, and I hope we don't get bombarded to the point we feel that we are forced into something that's nauseatingly repetitive.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:43

I I and that's again, it's not wrong, it's just not right for us.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:47

The repetition isn't wrong, it's just uh hard to maintain motivation repeating the same action. Yes, I think it's a good thing.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:54

Well, it's very different too, because if you're in a theatrical show, although I even I find like prop formally staged theater to be a little difficult sometimes because to tell the story you need to tell the audience. You might be on for a few seconds. Um, because we're not in a theater, I can say it out loud. Macbeth is a great example where like you don't actually know what all those characters are doing for the proposed timeline that you're experiencing the show from the audience. And even with Sleep No More's presentation, where they had the actors doing something the whole time, you just couldn't see them. And that in my brain made more sense.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:10:28

When I perform as a character, one of the things I like about the sideshow is when I when I step into that environment for the evening, if I've done my work right, I've done all the things that Mitch would do to support the show before the show starts. And by the time that I step in to quote unquote run the show from the theatrical perspective of the audience, I can be that character and respond as he would throughout the duration of the evening. I don't have to do something that takes me out of it. And that's something I really liked about your show is that when we've got to walk through, um, and I think the audience uh that's listening uh should be ha filled with enough context to understand what we're talking about here, but all of the people that I interacted with in your show were interacting with me, interacting with me very candidly, air quotes around candid, because they are playing a character, but their ability to interact or bounce off of anything I would say, uh they did have questions that I could tell because I do this stuff too, yeah. They had been given like the things to start a conversation with that were planned, but they had no way of knowing how I would interact with them, and yet they were able to continue the conversation with me, which made it feel very real. And by the end of the show, I was frightened.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:42

Like it's a very personal experience.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:44

It was, it was, and I think there's a magic in that. Um, and hell, when we went through, um, for those that weren't paying attention, don't know, we performed for several weekends at Haunted Harvest this season, which was tremendously fun because their midway is set up to be a uh and and Joe jump in here if I'm not describing this well, but essentially a fall festival put on by the family that's hosting this event.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:07

Yeah. So the family owns the property. Our our story arc is about uh a family, and it's all based on North Carolina folklore loosely, or certainly inspired by that, and actual historic events, whereas the bailouts for the government happened for farmers in the 1920s, and this particular farmer in our story arc did not take the bailout and had uh their family suffered and their family members died. So when their family members were buried on site of the farm, they were haunted by a nature spirit. This nature spirit became a deity that they eventually began to worship and create sacrifices and religious uh ceremonies for, and then they built a commune, a sort of cult, and they collectively lived and made sacrifices and followed the teachings and guidance of this nature spirit, and they continue to do this. So our story arc is yes, it's a cult that deals with a supernatural being, but at first glance that is not mentioned. It is not brought up, it's not pressed to the audience because that isn't the focus. If I am a real religion and I aim to get people to join my commune, then it doesn't do good to scare them off by telling them that we sacrifice things for blood sacrifices and and do all sorts of deviant things.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:38

You could like make that the fine print.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:40

That's right. That stuff isn't important. What's important is we make it palatable and so to get new members to join the commune. Which your patrons are these prospective commands. That's right. We uh we create a fall festival. So that is what the midway is at a fall festival that just is fun and entertaining and family friendly. And that's what it is. It's it's meant to be fun and exciting and enjoyable.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:06

Triangle bunting and and bistro lights and good food, delicious food because it's a farm. Yeah. And a home.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:13

Homemade, uh, we have a store with lots of like actual folk art. It's very cool. Handmade items, uh, and of course, you know, real uh farm-raised meats and things like that we sell in the store. Um homemade candles, all sorts of neat stuff. So it's it it isn't just kind of like we're putting this on, uh it is presented as very real.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:37

And that that's the whole presented not as a piece of fiction. That's correct. But you start the immersion the moment they have gotten out of their car. That's yes. And so you're giving the audience the maximum amount of time to immerse themselves in your environment and to feel at home with the idea. You're giving them the best opportunity they could possibly have to live inside your story.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:58

Yeah, and that that gives us a very good amount of time to set that base tone that I was talking about earlier. You give them this base of expectation and they get comfortable with that, used to it, so that when they're kind of the middle of our show, that definitely deviates. When it's subverted, yeah, that becomes confusing to them, and then they they're like, Well, well, what? I what is this? Then they remember, oh yeah, I bought a ticket to a scary show, you know, because I want you to forget that. I don't I don't want you to think about there's a high school kid hiding a corner waiting to scare you. I want you to think that you're helping a group of religious uh cult members sacrifice um something to their deity. And you are along for that ride, and there is no way out. Once you're once you agree to join in to that ritual, you cannot get out of it. There is no backtrack, I'm gonna leave. No. Which is you're now terrifying of the ritual. You don't get to just walk through it and see it, you have to be involved in it, and that's what we're continuing to do growth towards more and more involvement from the audience in the ritual. And I think that's that's the fun part.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:27

So that also helps with the immersive content of it. The more involved the audience is physically, mentally, verbally, yeah, the more that they can become meshed into the environment that you're building for them.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:38

And once you do, you know, a bit of that, it it's all like, oh, there's a ritual behaviors and stuff like that. They just go, okay, I'm doing lots of ritually things. So when I start subtly or slowly introducing the supernatural elements, the magic takes hold because then you realize, oh, well, the things that I've done actually have some sort of effect. And now I get to involve myself, I get to observe and feel and see and smell and hear the effects from this ritual. And I I think that's really fun. You actually give them a payoff, and again, that goes back to magic and illusions, we're performing stage illusions and things like that, kind of create these atmospheres of magic is real, and you get to see it right in front of you.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:23

I think the a big difference from doing it on a stage where the magician is separated by the audience, and obviously the the classic black legs and borders of a stage allowing you to see many things, you guys don't have that benefit. That that that floor has well dropped out on you, and you're doing largely magic that they may walk beside rather than behind, but still um without the legs and borders, which means that the magic tricks you guys have chosen to include in the show have to follow that same platform of immersion. And it has to be really believable, which I would imagine is a pretty great challenge.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:01

It's it's an extreme challenge. So to solve that, really what I what I had to do is I had to go back and uh research different cultures, uh ceremonial practices, and things like the spiritualism movement and how people kind of became involved in that and what they did and the things that um uh they they all agreed was the the right way to do it. So uh uh those elements are a part of our show. And it it's actually you you don't you don't start out heavy-handed. That that's the trick, you know, you gotta go more subtle, uh simple things that people generally just don't want to involve. They overlook small things like taking a herb like uh rosemary and and crushing it, and making them crush it, and then they can smell it, and then become kind of involved in that experience, and it's sort of pleasant, you know, like oh it's this smells nice, I'm getting my hands kind of in in here involved, and you you make them get comfortable touching these items and interacting with you, and and then subtly start introducing things that are a little more challenging and uncomfortable, that becomes the distraction. Uh the really key is to if I can trap the audience into watching how their friend or date or whomever came with them, that's what people do. They'll say, Well, how is my friend gonna react to this? And they look at one another instead of trying to watch you because I'm not I'm not telegraphing that I'm doing a magic trick, so you don't look at me going, Well, I'm gonna he's not gonna fool me, I'm gonna see how I did this. So you don't you don't think about its performative magic. You you just see something that happened, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, that that kind of caught me off guard. I didn't expect that, but then we push our audience and involve them in another element, and immediately the brain becomes this is very late in the show, but the brain becomes occupied and then overstimulated, so we're now we're subtly challenging you more, and then they look at themselves and their friends to say, you know, how am I gonna respond to this, or how are how are how is my buddy or my date gonna react to this? And then they become concerned and um involved in the experience collectively, and that's really what I want. You know, that that ensures that they're gonna go talk about it and think about it later, because they're that will come up again. How did you feel when they put that thing in your hand and said, Go do this, that I would probably never do? You know. I was uncomfortable and I didn't want to do it, is generally what happens. Um, and we introduced that at the beginning of the show. It's really subtle. I don't want to say what it is, but at the very beginning, as you enter our show, we immediately engage and challenge the audience. We immediately start our audience members with giving them an objective and a goal and kind of forcing their hand to um if you want to proceed, you have to do this task. And then the show kind of picks up, it gives you more challenges, more, you know, confusion, and uh then you're just trying to figure out like, well, where is this going? Um and I I think that's fun. I like that because your audience can't just walk through and shrug their shoulders and go, I guess it was something. You know, indifference is the worst thing I could get.

SPEAKER_05 1:21:39

Oh, I agree. I think if you're making a piece of art, love it and hate it are things that I will take in equal measure. I mean, unless you hate it because I'm objectively an idiot and created something that was so sad and pathetic that you're just making fun of me. I suppose I don't really love that. But short of that, if you hate it because I did something striking to you, that's just as good as you loved it. I still got you to interact with it.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:05

You still got them to feel something.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:07

Yes. On that note, I I think I have heard this a whole lot. There are plenty of people that nowadays it's kind of like it's uncool to try really hard. And I get that. I can be uh I could be a really annoying, overly emotional theater kid in my performance. But the way we train the performers, and as you notice, and our audience tends to notice, um, we don't we don't train them to be a theater person and talk to the next end and travel you know, it it's not it's not overly theatrical, it's not presented that way. That doesn't actually make sense when I'm standing next to you. Like I you sure some characters speak loudly and are very energetic, but that's that's later in the show. The the the the challenge with that is if you're overdoing it, it it equally puts people off because it's like it's really try-hard and kind of cheesy.

SPEAKER_05 1:23:08

It pulls them right out of the immersion, same problem.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:10

Same problem, it pulls them out, same problem. So there that is hard, that is not easy. It is genuinely a tricky blend of how far to take it with your audience, and it takes training and repetition because again, everyone's different, everyone is responding and reacting and interacting in a different mode and speed and mindset with different pacing and expectation experience. So it's a case-by-case basis. So the actors are trained to respond to the audience. Sure, they generally will initiate the interaction, but from that point on they are reacting to the audience. Um, and that is very necessary because the audience feels heard and involved, and they have a say, and they get to experience and have an opinion. And sure, you'll get people that just want to be aggravating and mock the performance, but the truth is let's say this is a real religious experience. It is a real religion, and the sacrifices are real. For argument's sake, if that is the case, what do I care if you mock it? I mean, if I am getting what I want from the deity, and I am rewarded in very special special and magical ways, then I don't really care that you mock it. I don't care that you don't believe it's real, because I know it is. So I can pretty easily, with most characters in the show, we can ignore that behavior because there's plenty of churches that get mocked all the time. And you just keep doing what they're doing. Yeah, they keep doing it. So I don't I don't see how I need to be affected by that.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:12

One of the things I wanted to touch back on is your use of the history of the area we're in and the folklore to really ground the immaterial to the material plane. Like it's a big thing I used within the creation of my personal character.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:37

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:38

Using a lot of the indigenous folklore and stories from Australia, like the Great Emu War, to sort of build up the character, which a lot of it may sound ridiculous and insane, but it's that history that gives depth to the overall experience of interacting with that particular person, that particular scene, that area, whatever it may be. And you've really presented that in a nice way. You can tell there's a lot of care taken to uh not uh use that material in an offensive way, which a lot of haunted houses get tremendously wrong. Yeah, yes, yes. It's it's a fine line to tread using that, but you've done really well with that in the show. You can tell there's a lot of care taken to tell it properly.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:40

Right. Well, you know, we we want to use that source material, it's valuable, and at the same time I want to respect it and not mock it. I guess, you know, so I I hold reverence to it and and I uh treat it as such. And then, you know, some of the s folklore from here we have uh the overtaking of kudzu. Uh that you know, again, the government told farmers, yeah, plant kudzu because it's a good thing for your crop. It helps repurpose, it helps heal the soil, and it does, but it also takes over spots, and if it's not maintained, it will overtake that area. Um, and so there are parts of North Carolina and South Carolina that are completely covered in Gulf in Kudzu to the point where no other plant and some animals cannot survive in that environment because they're just stifled out by it. They can't choking it's choking. So that was the inspiration for the deity. It was this this being that would root beneath the earth and could expand and travel out and pretty much overtake anything it wanted. Um, and I just took that concept and removed the plant and put physical and and you know, added some combination of uh demonology. And uh put in a little bit of uh cryptozoology uh mixed into it. Uh so I I could create something that w you know it it is supernatural, but it's also physical. And um or for Harnett Count County, there's the galley nipper, and that that's sort of a silly story. Some of them are, but the galley nipper is it's about a uh it's at its root about a creature that it's described as an oversized um mosquito, uh, but r really what that is, it's uh to me it's a vampire.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:48

So then then I get to introduce the idea of bloodletting and blood drinking, and then you follow along that with a little bit of cannibalism, and then human or blood sacrifices. So these are things that actually have happened in a lot of you know religions and and and groups like that, and um folklore-wise, I'm I'm I'm not ignoring the source material, I'm actually just expanding off of it. I'm I'm I'm using it as a springboard, and I'm saying, how can I make this real? And not kind of jokey and like a story we tell kids to keep them you know behaving, but how do I make it something that it's like in the darkness of the forest is a legitimate concern and it could hurt you. And that that is fun because North Carolina it actually has quite a bit of creatures like that, and there's a wide range. There's also a couple stories from North Carolina that are about environments that defy gravity and other scientific um anomalies. Uh sound and um and these are these are stories that exist. You could look them up. My audience could go online, they could look them up, they were documented, some were documented by the president. The president uh had people investigate these stories, yeah. Um, and so it's it's documented information, it's real. You could look it up, and some of it there are anomalies that to this day are still baffling. We don't know why. They're mysteries. And again, uh going back that natural magic, these are things that we still to this day don't know why. So I think that is way more exciting than saying, you know, uh, well, let's let's get the the cannibal redneck and the uh the the the vampire from you know Transylvania, and that that's cool, that's cool, but I'm not in Transylvania. So if I go doing all that gothic stuff, it's like, yeah, I'm inspired by that. I like it. I like those things, I do. Um, but I don't they don't work for this story.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:31:13

So I really have to find what what is believable, what works for our story. So yes, thank you for noticing that. I appreciate it. That's that's one of my favorite things. And to be honest, I never thought growing up, I always thought, well, I want to do stuff from like other cultures. I didn't spend much time looking into my own culture and my own experience because I'm I'm from North Carolina, born and raised, and I've I heard ghost stories growing up. Lots of them, tons of them. We have a lot of them, and I they inspired me to like more scary things, but I never thought that I could use those things to create a story, but now that is my focus, to say, you know, what is what is documented and how can I use it.

SPEAKER_01 1:31:58

It's almost like we fall into a level of complacency where if we are constantly experiencing these stories, we tend to look outwards to find something different.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:11

Yes, something different, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:13

But sometimes just attacking close to home really makes the experience go back to that more immersive state.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:26

We get to enjoy our own culture, our own history, but in a way that uh makes it a little more fantastical. Yeah. Drive it into the fantasy realm and again bring that immaterial plane back to the material world for us to experience.

SPEAKER_02 1:32:49

Yeah, uh, that's that's a great gift. I cannot do it alone. So finding a group of people, uh both the actors and you know, the the property owner, David, is is very supportive, and I when I first started talking to him about building this show, he said, yes, I will take that risk. Everyone else that I mentioned these concepts of to before, I said I'd I'd never thought of them, but I I have used folklore before. It wasn't the folklore from here, but I tried that before and it was met with a lot of uh I I really had to convince people and then they didn't want to try it again. Um and maybe I didn't do it a hundred percent right uh then, but again, time tells and and helps us understand. Um so I feel very lucky. I'm very happy that I'm working with a group of performers that are willing to try something new and different, and I'm very, very grateful that I am working with uh a group of artists and um passionate people that say, let's offer our community and others that want to visit our community something different, something new, and at the same time just appreciating what we have and and not going, well, let's start from the ground up and build it all new. Like, there is a lot of waste in the world, and again, I'm not trying to preach, but we do our best to recycle everything we can. I will recycle wood, paper, plastic, tin. A tree falls down out here, we cut it up and we use the parts from it if it's not being used as a nest by an animal. You know, I I'm I'm making use out of what we have. And that is not just a means to save money. It is hard to run a special effects lab without having tons of waste. I mean, yeah, it's there's a lot of waste in that. And so I I am always looking at how can we upcycle the things that we have. And I'm proud of that. I'm I'm proud um that we could make use out of materials that are kind of forgotten and ignored, and go, well, that's just refuge, you know, that's trash, we don't we don't need to use that for anything. Let's ignore it. I mean, I I could do that, but I don't, you know, I'm uh right now I am going through uh uh relatives and collecting as many animal bones as possible. I I know a bunch of uh family members and extended members that are friends um that hunt or are on large property where animals naturally pass over and and we can utilize respectfully utilize um parts of uh of that animal. So I that's again another way to uh recycle and give new life to things that are generally meant to just rot or become trash.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:08

To honor the world around us in a very respectful way.

SPEAKER_05 1:36:11

Yeah. Really, really cool. I uh wanted to thank you again for taking the time to speak with Harley and I today. I think it's been tremendous. We are unfortunately coming up to the end of our episode, but I dare I say, perhaps this is not the last time you folks will get to hear uh the melodic indulcent tones of Joseph Harp's voice on the air. Um one final question for you, and I love asking this question of other artists. If you could, and you can through this show, offer a piece of advice, or maybe it's a couple of words, whatever you think, um, to a young creative, if you were picturing that creative was you, like if you were just rifling through podcasts and you had somebody tell you what you wish you could have heard as a child, because many of us as artists didn't have anyone around. We were kind of stuck in these little creative bubbles and everybody going, get a real job, like unhelpful, right? If you could say something to inspire the creatives of today, what would it be?

SPEAKER_02 1:37:14

Well, uh, thank you for having me. It was a pleasure. I'd love to come back and talk again. Uh my my general uh I was that person. I wanted to hear this knowledge. I had a couple people that inspired me when I was young, but it was few and far between because there weren't many options for me growing up. I really, really had to search. I mean, I'm I'm talking I was in a library looking through old books with monster makeups in them and stuff, trying to figure out how they did it. Yeah, I'm an old guy. Um, so I didn't I didn't have the luxury of the internet growing up, so I I really did had have to search it out. And so my advice um is that uh for one, you do need a real job. Um you do need a way to survive, but that doesn't mean you have to do things that crush your spirit, and that doesn't mean you have to do those things all the time either. And look, there's a time and a place for all things. There's a time to eat and sleep and have fun, joyous adventures with family and friends. There's times to cry and hide and reset yourself, and we have to make time and balance our energies in the right way so we don't burn out. So just always rushing towards an end without goals set for yourself isn't really a smart way to do it. I would say put more time into planning with the understanding and expectation that what your goals that you've set for yourself, they will not be short goals. What I mean is don't expect instant gratification. That seems to be a consistent mistake. Let me explain further. One inspirational thing that I have learned over the years is looking back to the people that built castles and cathedrals. Let me explain this. They had families that would build these structures. So my kids' kids will be building these structures. These designs were created by people that were artisans but didn't have the money to build them. They they had other people say, I want this thing, and it's gonna take your entire existence and beyond to complete it. So these structures they were working on, they knew they would never see them completed. But they were setting the stepping stones for the completion. So they did have a hand in it. That doesn't mean with today's technological advancements you won't find the end results to what you seek. I believe you will. But the truth is in the set mind of the world around us being instant gratification, don't aim for that. Know that it will take mistake after mistake and lots of work to get to that moment of gratification, to reach the goal you have set for yourself. And understand you're not always going to be happy with it. There will be times of struggle. But looking past all that, the payoff is your drive to do it. If you continue to push forward and believe in your own objectives and your own dreams, you can bring them into reality. But don't expect to do it quickly. Because if you rush through it, it's not going to satisfy you. The true means of satisfying you for that goal is to really take the time to make it right. And sometimes that means making lots of mistakes. But don't let that stop you. The drive, the drive and dedication, the pursuit to complete your goal is in you. So if you allow others or slight hiccups or mistakes to stop you from feeling that drive and energy, you're stopping it. You're shutting yourself down. You're blocking yourself from that goal. Don't expect it quickly, and you can actually reach it. That's my advice. Don't try and rush through it. Do it the right way. And do it the way that's going to work best for you. Because the truth is, I wouldn't be where I'm at without making more mistakes than I have successes. My mistakes brought me where I am. Not the things that everyone said, that's great, you're incredible, which didn't happen a lot, but sometimes does. But I don't think about those times when I'm struggling and frustrated with a project. What I look around and see is my mistakes, and that's a trap. Don't get stuck just focusing on the things that you can't do. Believe in yourself to work past the things you're struggling with so you can truly get to the satisfying part. That, you know, cheese at the end of the maze. Okay? That's my advice. That's long-winded.

SPEAKER_05 1:42:39

I can be that way, but I I think we can all be beautiful. I'm not guilty of that, but I think it's about the content what you said. Thank you for sharing that with us and sharing this wonderful conversation with us and with our patrons. Uh thanks for coming on the show, Joe. That was tremendous.

SPEAKER_02 1:42:54

Thanks for having me, and I can encourage you, if I may, um please at least visit our page, Haunted Harvest, North Carolina, Haunted Harvest NC. Uh we are a three-year show. We are growing and trying to expand.

SPEAKER_05 1:43:14

And it's worth noting that Haunted Harvest opens for this October season. At this time, it is spec to be September the 25th, is their opening day.

SPEAKER_02 1:43:24

Okay. Uh we generally will be open uh in October, Fridays and Saturdays, um, with an expanding date either in November or September. So uh the the show doesn't have a wrong run, but uh we would love to have you come visit our show if you find the time or share it with friends that could come visit us and share the experience uh that we've built.

SPEAKER_05 1:44:00

And dare I say, if you are careful, though I think you'd have trouble recognizing him, you might even run into Mr. Harp himself and some of his phenomenal magic, perhaps, if you take the time to pay attention and see the things around you uh when you're at the show. Uh definitely check their website, hauntedharvestnc.com. I believe that they're under Instagram at least, and probably Facebook under the same hand. It should be at Haunted Harvest NC. And then you guys can see their calendar as it firms up and they post dates and tickets for sale. Definitely a great place. If you want to get some spooky theater in that is not conventional, that will subvert your expectations. Uh, this is the place to see it, folks. So, with that being said, this brings us to the close of yet another episode.

SPEAKER_01 1:44:45

Indeed. Also, don't forget to check out Joe's personal effects page. He's got some really phenomenal work up there, some insane costumes that look like you've spent years perfecting, which I know. He's like, yeah, that's gonna happen.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:05

Lots of mistakes. Yes, I only show you the things that look good because I'm too ashamed to share my struggle. No, that I I accept the struggle, but um I you're right. I thank you. I would love for people to look at it.

SPEAKER_05 1:45:19

I'm not Joe at Joe Harp FX.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:22

Yes, uh spelled J-O-H. Joe J-O-H, that's my artist's name. Harp. H A R P like the instrument or the beer.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:33

We love our beer.

SPEAKER_02 1:45:34

Alright, folks, don't forget to give us a follow also.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:37

Yeah, at Twisted Whisker uh Sideshow on Facebook and Instagram. Don't forget to like and share the podcast. And again, if you're willing, share some of your art with us. We'd love to see what you're working on. We love seeing other creatives in the industry uh daring to try.

SPEAKER_05 1:46:00

Amen. Amen. And with that, thanks for joining us. Ciao