Thread: Interaction During Your Haunt

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How much are you able to interact with the TOTers/adults at your haunt?

I don’t mean when you’re in costume scaring them, I mean when they ask questions or offer feedback/comments.

We have a problem with this because we’re so busy keeping check on things or running remote props that we don’t get to talk to the people as much as we’d like to. Everyone seems to have a million questions (where’d you get that, how long did this take, is that real, etc.) or want to thank us for doing this. Mr L and I want to be able to chat a bit with the neighbors and TOTers and would welcome getting more detailed feedback from them.

We thought we had the problem solved last year when relatives wanted to come help. They were helpful in handing out candy but created some other problems that again took up our time.

We’re hoping to change for the better this year by not having areas that need almost constant attention and will assign certain tasks to relatives to keep them occupied and out of the way of props and guests.

Are any of you able to do this or is it too much to expect to run the haunt and be able to answer questions, chat, etc?

It is not too much to expect, if you fill the place with people as dedicated as yourselves.

Since I am open almost every night and this is my sole source of income, I take customer communications seriously. Unfortunately in October on a weekend night I can't have many real conversations with most of them coming here. I basically ask them where they are from? If they have been here before? How they found out about this place?
I realise that some people are not going to have a good time no matter what I might do or say, even though I still strive to accomplish this impossible task.
Last night the first people here was a young man and his girlfriend, she was scared I eventually discovered (I couldn't determine what her reactions actually were expressing in that dark room) After the lights came on I told her that I didn't realise what she was feeling and I began to have "the Talk" with her that I will have when people aren't in the house yet if I pickup on the fact that they seem to be having a problem coming in the house.
Her main fear was from another haunt in which people shove themselves into your face...this doesn't happen here, even in October, I instruct my Oct. helpers to never get closer than arm's length to anyone.(And basically not to act this way)
I then told her that she would probably be alot happier if there were a few others in their tour so she wouldn't feel picked on or targeted(Which is what that last haunt did to her)
Just then the doorbell rang. There were another ten people to join them.
During the rest of their tour she was smiling and laughing , she had a great time!
During the 90 minutes most tours take I do try to pick new targets for the scare to equalise the fun of laughing at your friends and they at you.
At the end of alot of tours I inquire as to what the neatest, or scariest or most memorable thing was that they had ever seen in another haunted house?
I am not happy to report here that unfortunately a large percentage cannot think or remember a single item in a tour that would fit this bill.
Sad.
...and then they wonder why nobody comes back?
Haunted entertainment is compeating with TV, movies , and the price of a bottle of booze (with the under-age drinkers)

Personally, as an actor, I NEVER break character. I can not begin to tell you the amount of times a kid will try to engage me in idle chatter just to see me step out of character.

As far as legitimate questions from people who actually want to learn something, we usually have our ticket taker tell people that we are more than receptive to talk AFTER the haunt has closed.

I say be polite and hope that the person asking the questions will understand how stressed you are when the haunt is running. If nothing else, print up some business cards and tell the person that you will be more than pleased and willing to chat during off hours.

Some counselors and a psychiatrist wanted me to "break character", but I couldn't, not that I didn't want to but I just couldn't.
If I cut off all of my limbs then I might be a different breed of fish then?

Is it my face? Is it my makeup? Costume? My voice? Personality?
I use no makeup, no real costume..........
Me not playing the part really upsets some people...it becomes too real for them..maybe?
It might be called underplaying?
hahahaha!

Gym:

Me not playing the part really upsets some people...

That's what's probably most scary to them, that you can comfortably slip back and forth without ever changing. Everyone likes a nice thick line between their nightmares and reality, and you seem to be someone who (like Freddy) could come at them in their nightmares. Just my .02.

O/T: Maybe give them a phone number and a time they could contact you after the haunt? Hey, if you have a camcorder, you could set it up and let people leave messages (like they do at weddings) - unless they'd be to scared ...

As I am telling them about the house and it's haunted history I think some people begin to see me as being of an elevated level of intelligence and here they are seemingly prisoners inside my big , very strange house!
I'm sure not any super-intelligent person , but I have seen and heard almost every question or reply that they will be making in response to them being here so my answers come quickly (same question, different day)
I do see things differently and relate to life differently than may be commonly accepted or praticed so maybe this makes a feeling of unease too?
Last summer a young man who fancys himself as an entertainer was very complimentary after the tour had ended saying he was amazed at how I controlled "the room", "Had everyone's attention", then he asked how do you do that? I mean like when you were pretending to be mad ?
Then I truthfully informed him that I had not been "acting", I actually was mad. Numerous people in his group, who also fancy themselves as entertainers didn't have the common intelligence to respect me enough to give the common courtesy of listening, in my own house as I was performing for them for no charge.
I told them the hows and whys of how it was going to be, I calmed down, they behaved and the show continued to it's normal conclusion.

For the most part, I'm usually just too busy on "the night" to interact with people coming through. I'm either fixing/adjusting a prop, running a prop or playing my fiddle out in the graveyard. I've had aquaintances show up and want to hang out. I just don't have time for them, and resent them just showing up when they know it's the busiest night of the year for me. Where were they last week when I needed help painting all this stuff? My new rule is, "If your here, your in costume and working it."

But to be honest, most of my guest are kids and teenagers looking for the quick score and on to the next place.

I once had a helper who would walk up to me and want to tell me all about some tv show he saw recently, it was 6:55, we are open at 7:00 and there are 150 people waiting for me to open the house!!!
Many have advace reservations which they have pre-paid for and it is all on a time schedule........
Sure, let's sit down and tell me all about that tv show.
(Insert maniacal screaming here~) Mine, of course.

This year I had a newspaper reporter from Italy visiting some friends in the neighborhood and she had a million questions for me. She wanted to do a story about how Americans celebrate Halloween. I kinda blew her off as I was busy. Later that night when the TOT's were finished she came back and took a lot a pictures and interviewed me. It was an ego lifting experience. I don't know if she ever ran the story or not but I like to think my cemetary is now world famous.