Hollywood Gothique

News, Reviews, Previews pertaining to Halloween in Los Angeles: creepy costumes, devilish dinner & recipes, haunted houses, corn mazes, theme park attractions, pumpkin carving, street fairs, etc.

So, you’re Halloween high has ended, and you feel your morose soul descending into the abyss of withdrawal. The zombies have returned to their graves. The vampyres have fled to where the ghouls and Afrits rave. The restless spirits have shuttered up their haunted house. The cannibal crazies have disappeared into the maze of the backwoods. The delusions have disappeared, and the ghosts ships have all set sail. What is left? What is left?

I just wanted to take a moment to offer a brief, belated review of this year’s Halloween & Mourning Tour at the Heritage Square Museum this weekend. Heritage Square, which preserves Victorian mansions built in Los Angeles near the turn of the previous century, has offered this self-guided tour every Halloween for the past eight [...]

Drum roll, please – or should that be a funeral dirge? Whatever soundtrack you choose to play in your mind or on your computer while reading this, it is time to bestow our annual accolades for the Best Los Angeles Halloween Events. As with last year, I will dispense with rigid categories in favor of [...]

The final installment of our 2011 Halloween Yard Haunt Odyssey takes us to a pair of old favorites, both restless and eternal, and also ventures into previously uncharted realms of mishaps and darkness. The wide spectrum of approaches – from shivers to shocks, from simple to sophisticated – is a remarkable testament to the impressive variety [...]

Boo-tiful Downtown Burbank Howl-o-ween
We know you’re out there, you prevaricators and procrastinators, wasting the precious days of October until Halloween Night rolls around, when suddenly you realize: This is it, the last chance to visit this year’s Halloween Theme Park Attractions, Halloween Haunted Houses & Hayrides, Halloween Yard Haunts, Community Halloween Haunts, Halloween Haunts for [...]

After Burbank, Tarzana, and Woodland Hills, the next leg of Hollywood Gothique’s 2011 Halloween Yard Haunt Odyssey takes us from Los Angeles all the way to Simi Valley. The little bedroom community seems quiet and safe, but you never know what sort of hidden terror lies just beneath the placid surface – until now…

The House at Haunted Hill
The previous installment of our annual Halloween Yard Haunt Odyssey took us through two terrifying mazes in Burbank, The Backwoods Maze and Rotten Apple 907’s Space Oddessey. Moving on to Tarzana and Woodland Hills, we encounter a trio of Halloween Yard Haunts that are less interested in shocks and surprise than [...]

Our exploration of 2011’s Halloween Yard Haunts began last week with our trip to Boney Island (reviewed here). Next, we move on to Burbank for a pair of Amateur Halloween Events that display enough skill and imagination to rank along side professional Halloween Haunted Houses & Hayrides in Los Angeles.
The Backwoods Maze (1912 North Pepper [...]

Ghoulish piano player aboard Ghost Ship
I thought I had said everything I had to say about Ghost Ship, the new Halloween attraction in Newport Beach that completed its final voyage of the season last night, but I stumbled upon something in an apparently irrelevant article that seemed worth noting. In a Salon.com review of “Lulu,” [...]

The Captain of the Ghost Ship, seeking volunteers to join his crew
A final update for those considering a trip out to Newport Beach to enjoy the much maligned Ghost Ship:
As last we noted, the opening weekend reactions prompted Ten Thirty One Productions to promise a new and improved attraction during its second week of operation. Although [...]

Dates: October 21 through November 5
Location: Mountain View Mausoleum and Cemetery, 2300 N. Marengo Avenue, Altadena, California
Wicked Lit’s innovative productions – based on the works of Poe, Lovecraft, Dickens, etc – fully immerse the audience in different times and locations, creating a unique brand of shuddery entertainment, quite distinct from other Halloween events in Los Angeles.

Dates: October 14-16, 21-23, 28-30
The Ghost Tour at Stathearn Park brings to life the history of Simi Valley, told by dead souls from the past. The experience is not intended to be frightening, but it does hit the right mood for Halloween. People interested in history and/or in enjoying Halloween without being assaulted by costumed maniacs, will find this event to be a pleasant and educational diversion.

Date: October 30
Hours:

6:30pm to 8:00pm: Red Carpet Arrivals
7:30pm to 1:00am Halloween Launch Benefit

Location: The Conga Room L.A. Live, 800 West Olympic Boulevard # 235, Los Angeles, CA 90015-1366
Link out: Click here
Description: The sCare Foundation – a newly founded non-profit organization whose goal is to alleviate the hardships of poverty and homelessness facing North American youth [...]

Dates: October 14-31
Hours: 8-11pm weeknights & Sundays; 8pm-midnight on Fridays & Saturdays
Theatre 68 doesn’t have the expanse of other Halloween haunts in Los Angeles, but it offers something distinctive that you would be hard pressed to find elsewhere: a more personal, intimate variety of horror, with audience and characters engaged up close and personal.

Dates: October 21-31
Hours: 6-9pm Sunday-Thursday; 6-10pm Friday-Saturday
Location: 4602 Morse Avenue Sherman Oaks, CA 91432
After a three-year hiatus, Boney Island is back, and it’s even better than before! The Halloween yard haunt’s skeleton crew has morphed from a carnival into a magic show, but the familiar, whimsical aura still pervades the grounds, making this one of the best Los Angeles Halloween haunts for children.

The caretaker at Fallen Angel Cemetery sent us this video, showcasing the souls of the damned who have been cast down to the nether regions. We don’t usually post videos from outside sources, but this one does a good job of conveying the atmosphere and look of this nifty little yard haunt. The only aspect [...]

Creatures of the Corn at FrightFair
I always knew this gig would make me famous. A few seconds of my video of  the FrightFair Screampark show up in a segment that the local NBC news station recently ran a segment on the Pierce College Halloween Harvest Festival, which is where FrightFair takes place.
Hey, anything that throws a [...]

Dates: October 15-31, 7pm to 1am
Location: 2821 S. Western Ave, Los Angeles, CA 90018

Description: This amateur Halloween yard haunt – which has been in operation several years now – features scary decorations with a few animatronics, music and sound effects.
On Halloween Night, there are treats for the kids and a few costumed characters delivering a [...]

Date: October 29 at 8pm
Location: The Silent Movie Theatre, 611 N. Fairfax Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90036
Link out: Click here
Description: Head on over to the Silent Movie Theatre for Halloween fun.
From the website:
If you’ve been a part of the Cinefamily for a while, then you know how monumental our Halloween parties are. It’s our birthday [...]

Date: October 31, 4-7pm
Location: Downtown Burbank, California
Link out: Click here
Description: Downtown Burbank comes alive to the sounds of thousands of costumed kids and oodles of poodles decked to the K-9’s for Halloween. Parents are invited to bring their goblins and ghouls for an early evening of trick-or-treating. Downtown Burbank merchants provide free treats from store-to-store [...]

Dates: October 7-9, 14-16, 21-23, and 28-31
Six October seasons have passed since last we visited the Six Flags Magic Mountain Fright Fest, in the eldritch year of 2005 (review here). That is vast eons of time in the competitive netherworld of Halloween haunted houses and hayrides, and Six Flags has expanded its Fright Fest with more mazes, scare zones, and shows than ever before; we found this year’s event to be much the same as before in terms of its overall impact, but it is bigger and better than before.

Jamie Lee Curtis at last year's Dream Halloween Evening.
Title: October 29, 5-8pm
Location: Barker Hangar 3021 Airport Avenue, Santa Monica, CA 90405-6101
Link out: Click here
Description: Come on down for this magical evening, benefitting the Chidlren Affected by AIDS Foundation. Guests include founder Jake Koberdanz and actors James Lee Curtis, DOris Roberts, and Josh Duhamel.
From the website:
Los [...]

Date: October 29, from 9am to noon
Location: 1095 E. Willow Avenue, Long Beach, CA 90806
Link out: Click here
Description: On Saturday, October 29, Long Beach’s two oldest cemeteries transform into a Living History tour that allows living tourists to stroll about listening to tales of the dead.
From the website:
Amidst old tombstones, tour participants gather [...]