Mom's Basement

As our readers may know from previous Geeks Onstage posts, I am a freelance stage manager in NYC. And I love it when my theatrical passions and my geeky passions collide, as they do with my upcoming project: The Steampunk Haunted House.

I started with Third Rail Projects, the creators of this unique haunted house experience, 3 years ago as their Production Stage Manager. Every year, we work to create a fully immersive, site specific haunt that incorporates modern dance and amazing steampunk imagery. What does this mean? It means that we utilize existing architecture (the century old playhouse, Abrons Art Center at Henry Street Settlement) to create choreography and interesting audience interaction moments, as opposed to solely relying on the a more familiar style haunted house that has a labyrinth of constructed walls and people covered in blood and gore hiding that jump out and go “boo!” (Don’t get me wrong…I love those haunted houses too. I fly down to Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Orlando, where I’m from, every year because I can’t get enough of the cheesy horror goodness, but sometimes the artist in me yearns for something more.) The video below features footage from the playhouse, as well as a lot of our imagery from our first year of production.

The Steampunk aesthetic has been growing in popularity over the last few years. This anachronistic future idea fantasizes what would’ve happened if the world of the Victorian era progressed using only steam powered machinery. With comics like “The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen,” video games like “Final Fantasy,” the gnomes of “World of Warcraft” and animes like “Trigun,” Steampunk is now considered to be a mainstream geek genre.

If you are new to Steampunk and are still a little confused, check out this awesome PBS Arts Special clip that explains what Steampunk is as well as how it has affected different types of art (Third Rail Projects is featured in the Theatre section!)

As I mentioned, the Steampunk Haunted House is designed in an interesting manner. This year, we’re focusing on the ideas of darkness and isolation to help drive the sense of uneasiness, while all around you hear and see notions of Wonderland. The theme this year is “Through the Looking Glass,” and with it, we explore the dark side of Wonderland and Lewis Carroll’s mind. Below is a video of a previous incarnation of the the “Looking Glass” theme, developed by Third Rail for other site specific performances (this one in LA). Many of the performers featured in this video will also appear in the haunted house.

If you’re in New York City anytime during Oct 22 thru Oct 31, this event will blow your mind. We sell tickets in 15 minute increments online and at the door, but they always sell out quickly at the door (come early!). Tickets can be found here. If you want to support us, you can ‘like’ us on Facebook too!

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Tags: alice, alice in wonderland, broadway, dance, events, fashion, geek, halloween, haunted house, lewis carroll, modern dance, nyc, nyc halloween events, nyc haunted house, performance, performance art, punk, site specific, sphh, steampunk, steampunk haunted house, theater, theatre, through the looking glass, vacation, victorian, wonderland