"A 'movie for your ears,' with immersive soundscapes, music and the kind of engaging performances that would be at home in a big-budget theatrical release." — Illinois Times
HORROR COMEDY | FULL-CAST AUDIO DRAMA | NEW EPISODES EVERY SATURDAY THROUGH OCTOBER 24 — START WITH EPISODE 1
A snarky, entitled emo musician inherits his parents' farm and discovers a bottomless pit that grants wishes — but only when suckers are chucked in. Now his WILDEST DREAMS are just a few "accidents" away.
Today, Ned Fischer's precious little life pretty much crapped the bed: Dumped by his girl, booted from Mothers of Misery, and let go by his boss who is a "Dickless dick." "Could this day get any worse?," he moans. RING RING. – Mom and Dad's plane went down. No survivors. Everything is upside down.
Back in the Midwest to settle his affairs (ugh), he finds a liminal creepy farmhouse, a cousin with golden retriever energy, oh... and a BOTTOMLESS PIT to HELL in the middle of the corn field! At least drinks are cheap at The Busted Bottle.
Things go from bad to PLEASE STOP. After a freak "accident" involving the hole, (YIKES) a dark wish comes true. That's when an old-timey stranger in a vintage suit turns up with advice Ned didn't ask for. Ned rekindles some sparks with his old crush, Lenore... who just happens to have a boyfriend the size of a tank. Drowning in sorrows and not afraid to tell everyone, Ned turns to the town psychic. Moonglow doesn't have enough sage to ward off this Emo boy's DEMONS... which are freaking REAL and stalking him at night.
Can atheists go to hell? Ned's probably going to find out.
Darkly funny and viciously satirical, ILLINOIS HELL HOLE is a supernatural fable about ego, and the price of getting something for nothing.
Nine episodes. Full cast. Immersive soundscapes. Best on headphones.
"This is in my top 10 audio dramas. It's such a good story, you will not be able to put it down." — Dylan from Horror.Kult
For fans of What We Do in the Shadows, Beetlejuice, Tucker & Dale vs Evil, Army of Darkness, and The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror.
Originally broadcast on NPR Illinois 91.9 FM.
Contains strong language and occasional violence.
CAST & CREW Written and directed by Matt Brookens
Corey Burton — Narrator (Count Dooku from Star Wars, Transformers, Disney) Daran Norris — Rabin (The Fairly OddParents, Team America) Matt Brookens — Ned Reggie Guyton — Moose Meghan M. McDonough — Lenore (The Ice Harvest) Keith Compton — Rucker Kassandra Escandell — Moonglow John LaFlamboy — Bill / Satan (Hell's Gate Haunted House) Nitin Sil — Hortense Goodbody (Flashpoint History) Maria Libri — Sheryl Doug Lussenhop — Gary (Tim & Eric, Office Hours) Jeska Bailey Forsyth — Sheena / Buella Guy Forsyth — Roberto / Fred Mindy Turano — Mother / Macy / Nora Jeff Williams — Bathrobe Guy / Driver Patrick Russell — Ned's Dad / Banker Gina DeCroix Russell — Ned's Mom / Wendy
Brian Magrum — Sound Mixer Adam Kunselman — Editor
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Illinois Hell Hole
A Movie for Your Ears
A snarky, entitled Emo musician inherits his parents' farm, discovering a bottomless pit that grants wishes… but only when people are chucked in. Now his wildest dreams are just a few dead bodies away!
A feature-length horror/comedy full-cast ASMR immersive audio extravaganza by Matt Brookens — starring Daran Norris(The Fairly OddParents), Corey Burton(Star Wars, Disney) and Meghan McDonough(Dark Matter).
As featured by
NPR Illinois, Illinois Times, Horror.Kult
Illinois Hell Hole
A Movie for Your Ears
A snarky, entitled Emo musician inherits his parents' farm, discovering a bottomless pit that grants wishes… but only when people are chucked in. Now his wildest dreams are just a few dead bodies away!
A feature-length horror/comedy full-cast ASMR immersive audio extravaganza by Matt Brookens — starring Daran Norris(The Fairly OddParents), Corey Burton(Star Wars, Disney) and Meghan McDonough(Dark Matter).
As featured by
NPR Illinois, Illinois Times, Horror.Kult
SPEAKER_09
Matt Brookins presents Illinois Hellhole. It's the winter of 1939. Inside a secluded farmhouse, Raben, a handsome man in his forties, is slumped over the kitchen table, snoring next to a glass of whiskey and an empty bottle. He clutches a framed picture of a sad-looking woman in her 60s, engraved with the word mother. A wooden carton of vials labeled Raben's Miracle Elixir sits next to a stack of cash. A single candle flickers as it reaches the bottom of its wick. The wind howls ominously, parting the clouds to reveal a full moon with a red tint. The farmhouse is bathed in ethereal light as the shutters clatter in the wind. The noise awakens Raven, who looks around, spooked by the ghost-like sound of the wind whistling through the house. He examines the framed picture, caressing its edges. Suddenly he hears a sound.
SPEAKER_07
By the light of moon and sun, protect me till this night is done. By the light of moon and sun, protect me till this night is done.
SPEAKER_09
With a shaking hand, he sips the whiskey. He watches the window. A shadow of a figure appears behind the door's curtained glass window. Is that you, Mom? Stealing himself, Raven stands, pulls his apple jack cap on, and cautiously approaches the door. Finally, he throws the door open. Agast at what he sees, he stumbles back in abject terror.
SPEAKER_07
Come to your mother. Mom, you're back? You're alive? Well, sort of. I'm gonna be honest here. You look a little rough around the edges. Oh, maybe I have a mint around here somewhere.
SPEAKER_09
The rotting corpse of his mother enters with a gust of wind, blowing the money from the table and whipping the curtains around.
SPEAKER_07
No! Of course. Come on in. Something to drink? Being six feet under for a couple months must make you pretty thirsty. Glass of water. Oh, we've got fruitcake. Oh! The old ear pole. Fair enough. Nobody likes fruitcake. What was I thinking? Wow! You still got your grip!
SPEAKER_09
Mother hauls Raven outside into the cold night. She pulls him up the walk and into the vast, empty field.
SPEAKER_07
Where did I go wrong with you? Wrong? Oh, no, no, no, no. I've been the model's son, a good boy. I did everything I could, Ma. So I sold a few questionable miracle tonics, huh? It was all for you. Times were tough. I mean, you know that. You groaked.
unknown
Look!
SPEAKER_07
I just wanted you back. I wished you would come back and here you are! It's a miracle! I mean, sure you're a little rotten, but it's what's inside that counts. Ma! Ma? Where are we going? No. No, you can't. Ma! Let me go, you bust-filled undead bitch!
SPEAKER_09
Stopping suddenly, mother bends Raven over her knees and spanks him like a child. He yelps in pain as his mother paddles him with supernatural strokes.
SPEAKER_07
Such language. My butt's one of my favorite features. Children should be seen and not heard. No! Are you going to mind your manners? Bite me.
SPEAKER_09
Mother has dragged Raven into the field and toward a deep dark hole spanning about 20 feet across. Raven sees it and enters a panicked frenzy.
SPEAKER_08
No! No, Mama! It's your boy, Raven! Your only son! You love me! Please.
SPEAKER_07
I brought you into this world, and I can take you out.
SPEAKER_09
She throws him into the bottomless chasm. An awkward, tall, and lanky lad dressed in emo black knocks on an apartment door. This is Ned, shuffling his feet anxiously, raking painted nails through his dyed black hair. The door opens slowly with the chain on, revealing a scruffy salt and pepper dude in a bathrobe. Ned waves cash at the dude who gestures to a massive vintage synthesizer with keyboard. I see you're ready to pay full price.
SPEAKER_05
The ARP 2600 vintage semimodular synthesizer from Korg. May I hear it?
SPEAKER_03
Oh. How's that sound? You know New Order? Played this baby on tour. Oh Joy Division. You know, check out the stencil. Wow!
SPEAKER_05
You can't fake that! Limited edition. And crafted in Japan duophonic keyboard with added arpeggiator. I won't even have to practice.
SPEAKER_03
Yeah, man.
SPEAKER_09
Easy money. Dude shuts the door. He sits at a table covered with instruments and continues painting Eric Clapton with a stencil on a guitar case. The new order stencil is on the table as well. Easy money. Ned joyously lugs the massive synth through the rundown apartment complex, past the shining pool, and carefully up the stairs to his apartment. This is Starving Artist Hollywood.
SPEAKER_05
Friday. I'm in. Love.
SPEAKER_09
The door to Ned's cramped studio apartment is awkwardly kicked open as he lurches in with the synth.
SPEAKER_05
Babe, I got it. The ARP 2600, everything's finally going great.
SPEAKER_01
It's over.
SPEAKER_09
Ned realizes all her bags are packed. Sheena is a pretty waif in her twenties. Next to her, Roberto, a handsome rocker, zips a guitar into its bag.
SPEAKER_01
Let's not make this breakup any tougher than it already is.
SPEAKER_05
Wait, wait, wait, what?
SPEAKER_01
We talked about this. I've been saying I wanted to piece out.
SPEAKER_05
I thought you were talking about like doing yoga or something.
SPEAKER_01
Ned, I'm with Roberto now.
SPEAKER_05
Oh, of course you'd go for the singer. Why? Because he's uh talented, chiseled, has those stupid pouty lips.
SPEAKER_01
Uh yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_05
Don't lip shame me. Point those plumpered up collagen bags somewhere else. I am speaking to my girlfriend.
SPEAKER_01
Sorry, Ned. You'll be great.
SPEAKER_05
Yeah, I will. And you'll be missing out on all the hotness.
SPEAKER_02
The band's dropping a new album this year about the band. I look, we that is mothers of misery and I think that we should go our separate ways to make creative differences and all.
SPEAKER_05
Oh no, no, no, no, no. We have creative sameness. Look at us, man. We use the same eyeliner.
SPEAKER_02
No, you should be hoeing and you're broing. You don't practice like ever. A new synthesizer won't help.
SPEAKER_00
And using the word ho is sexist, you hoe.
SPEAKER_05
Regardless of who is a hoe, the synth plays itself. It's got an arpeggiator, you dumb fucks.
SPEAKER_01
Goodbye, Nedry. Please, respect my boundaries and don't blow up my phone.
SPEAKER_09
Sheena checks her phone. It's a text from Ned which reads.
SPEAKER_01
Don't does this? How did you even know, Ned? It's over. And you should check your computer. Work's been messaging. Come on, Bertie.
SPEAKER_05
Bertie? You can't have pet names yet. Wait, wait, wait. Don't don't leave. I Okay. I love you, Sheila.
SPEAKER_01
It's Sheena. Sheena. With an N.
SPEAKER_05
Since when?
SPEAKER_01
Since always.
SPEAKER_04
Hello, hello?
SPEAKER_05
Boss, please don't tell me I'm fired. Look. Ned. See the customers are all buying guitars online now. We just don't have the numbers to keep you and give the CEO his bonus. We're downsizing. English, please, not British. We're letting you go. Go where? I ain't working in drums. Those guys are dumb. Ned, listen, mate. You're fired. No, you dickless dick. Ugh, could this day get any worse? That's not ominous or anything. Hello.
SPEAKER_06
Hey Ned. It's your cousin Mike.
SPEAKER_05
Moose. Hey.
SPEAKER_06
Nobody's called me Moose since grade school. Look, there's no easy way to say this, but your parents playing a bali. It um well it crashed. They're gone. I'm sorry, cuz. They left you the farm. It's all yours. You gotta come back, man. Come back to Illinois.
unknown
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
SPEAKER_09
Ned's flight leaves warm, sunny Los Angeles International Airport, arrives in Frozen March, Chicago. Clad in his darkest of winter couture, lugging many bags, Ned takes the L train.
unknown
Doors closing.
SPEAKER_09
To Amtrak Station. Takes the Amtrak to Springfield. He watches the desolate flat empty of snow-covered Illinois scroll by until he begrudgingly boards a bus. Deeper and deeper into the monotonous countryside. Nothing but flat farmscape to the horizon.
SPEAKER_08
Oh no.
SPEAKER_09
This is the first day of spring in Illinois. Finally, Ned stands with all his baggage at the edge of a long driveway facing his creepy old family farmhouse.
SPEAKER_06
Okay.
SPEAKER_05
The stupid door is bullshit.
SPEAKER_09
Moose, a good-looking, squarely built black man, plainly dressed, leaps up to greet Ned.
SPEAKER_06
Oh yeah, what's up, cousin? You made it. Rockin' LA look. Nice. I'm so glad to see you made it safe.
SPEAKER_09
Ned slams the door shut, which knocks a bowling ball on a shelf up high loose. It rolls on the shelf, drops inches away from Ned's skull, smashing the floorboards to splinters.
SPEAKER_05
Whoa, Jesus! What the hell, man? That could've killed me. My parents still kept that bowling ball up there?
SPEAKER_06
Sorry, uh, I didn't even notice it. Don't worry about the floor though. Uh that'll buff right out. Anyway, hi Moose. You got tall. Great to see you too, Ned. Uh, cuz I'm so sorry. I love you, and I loved your parents. Yes, yes, emotions. They are important. That means so much. Welcome back. It's uh it's been a minute. You want the speed tour? Look around and see the vastness of your inheritance. Alright, so what's with all this music stuff? It's mine. Uh I've been crashing on the couch. I was helping your peas with the planting around the farm and all. I mean, I love this land and caring for it, and uh this is awkward. They said I could live here in their will. Wait, the house comes with a cousin? I thought it all went to me. It did. It did. Just I get to live here. Only till I get back on my feet and I get some money coming in. You know how it is. Your parents, well, they were like my parents too. This is all just coming at me a little fast. I mean. So what do you think? Place hasn't changed a bit, right?
SPEAKER_09
Ned looks around the room and zooms in on a myriad collection of Catholic religious iconography: crosses, crucifixes, saints statues, Bibles. He grimaces. First things first. Ned dumps a heap of religious knick-knacks into a trash can as the sun sets. The fields are unplanted and span to the horizon.
SPEAKER_06
So long, Jesus junk. I get it. Religion, not for everybody. I think your parents were obsessed with warding off evil.
SPEAKER_05
The only thing the Catholic Church is good at warding off are consequences for pervy priests. Point.
SPEAKER_06
And women's rights. Facts. Taxes. See, they are pretty good at warding off stuff. Huh. Look, I didn't want to tell you this right away, but uh listen.
SPEAKER_05
Spit it out, Moose!
SPEAKER_06
Your parents were in major debt. They were gonna lose the farm this fall. Sorry, man. Big corporations just crushing them. I know you just inherited all this and of course, of course!
SPEAKER_05
Damn it! Stupid family curse!
SPEAKER_06
Uh, don't say the C word. Cund? Curse. Oh. Let's not go down that road. Is that why they were flying to Bali? Were they like fleeing the country to avoid bills? 30th anniversary. But you knew that. Yeah, yeah, right, right, right, right. Mm-hmm. Listen, we just finished the last quarter of the planting tomorrow, and the corn will get you some bucks in your pocket come harvest time. Best we can do. You look thirsty.
SPEAKER_04
Next time on Illinois Hellhole, Ed runs into an old crush at the busted bottle and tries to operate a tractor while planting corn. Let me find something bottomless in that cornfield. And sad to say, folks, it's not a mimosa.
SPEAKER_05
Episode two is in your feed now, so keep going. If you're enjoying Illinois Hellhole, the best thing you can do would be to leave a rating and a review. Wherever you're listening, it's free, it takes about a minute, and it's what makes new listeners take a chance on a show like this one. We're indie and we need your support. By the way, you can contribute at my Patreon at patreon.com slash Matt Brookens. That's B-R-O-O-K-E-N-S. Thanks, guys. Illinois Hellhole Episode 1 stars Corey Burton as your narrator, Darren Norris as Raben, Matt Brookens as Ned, Reggie Guyton as Moose, Mindy Torano as Mother, Jessica Bailey Forsyth as Sheena, Guy Forsyth as Roberto, Jeff Williams as the bathrobe dude. Sound mixer Brian Magram, whose credits include Andor, Barbie, and Killers of the Flower Moon. Just some little movies you might have heard of. Editor Adam Kunzelman, written and directed and produced by me, Matt Brookens. So I want to point out that I did a dramatic reading of The Monkey's Paw. This is a classic literature piece by W. W. Jacobs, and I did a uh a bunch of dumb jokes before it and after it, and did the whole thing with uh sound design and music. It reads like a play, it is truly chilling, and it definitely influenced me with Illinois Hellhole, and I would say a lot of other filmmakers like The Simpsons and Curry Barker with the movie Obsession. So check out my recording of The Monkey's Paw here in this podcast feed.
