- Here's the story.

[music box music playing] - [Voice Over] Each year as the air goes cold and sweet and the days grow shorter, we turn inward and then turn our attention to a holiday that exercises our imaginations and calls us to pretend.

Halloween is a curious thing when you think about it.

This yearly holiday of make believe.

This tradition of disguise.

This opportunity to be more or different than you are.

A custom we're taught from the start.

Dressed up, in some cases, before we're even able to walk.

It's a holiday we love, arguably more than any other.

It is in fact the one time and day of the year that you are actually encouraged to be different.

[guitar music playing] It's a holiday made for kids.

For the curious.

For the make believer.

For the cautiously courageous explorers of dark things.

Because just as whimsical as the holiday is, it is also mixed with a certain measure of the macabre.

Legends and myths that are told around this darkening time of year are of the undead.

Of witches, curses, and headless horsemen.

Howling winds and satanic carnivals that roll into town.

Trick or treating, by its very nature, is about venturing out into the darkness.

Disguised for protection.

Journeying through spooky landscapes, lit only by glowing heads and accompanied by fellow explorers.

It's the rare exception as a child that allows us to go out after the street lights go on.

It's scary, but in a safe way.

Despite the darkness, the streets are ruled, for this one night, by your fellow seekers of like size, stature, and objective.

A bag of candy awaits you on the other side of your brave act.

Halloween offers us a chance to dare and to reach out into the darkness and safely touch what scares us.

[slow guitar music] - [Interviewer] Why do you think we as a culture celebrate a day that celebrates scary things, fear, et cetera?

- I think it's important to question fear, and I think Halloween kind of pokes a little fun at it.

- Well, I thought that Halloween was supposed to be a happy day for everybody.

They go out trick or treating.

I don't know that it was a scary day.

I don't think most people see it that way.

I think most, most people see it as a day of celebration.

- I think humans are, humans are messed up.

You know, we're funny creatures, right?

And I think there's a dark part of all of us and maybe that's our weird way of letting it come out each year.

- Well I think tradition plays a lot into the Halloween.

We're big Salem people, so we do go to Salem.

We've been there a couple times.

So yeah, the whole witchcraft.

Yeah, I don't know.

- It's like it's a tradition that kids look forward to also.

- Yeah - We decorate the houses all up and the kids come.

I love that.

I grew up that way too.

That's all you thought of Halloween when you were a kid, and the treats.

- [Interviewer] So it's almost like what we do today is just based on what we've been doing all these years, But at some point somebody decided to celebrate a day about fear and scary things.

- Well that's all about marketing, isn't it?

[all laughing] - Well, Halloween was originally a Catholic holiday.

Was the day before All Saints' Day, and the secular society has given it a different meaning, basically, for the occult.

So, it's not a good thing.

- Well, I guess, doesn't it go back to Pagan times, or something?

Like we just keep carrying it along through the years, and decades, and here we are.

We got one left.

We got Halloween night and that's about all I know about it.

- [Interviewer] Did you like celebrating Halloween as a kid?

- Sure, sure it was fun to go around, get candy and everything else, you know?

Sometimes you got cash.

Sometimes you got, "Get outta here".

- Well, personally I think it was mostly because of harvest season.

That's my belief of that.

Because usually it was a celebration and after all the harvest was done and all the hard work was done.

And people just like to have a good time, you know?

A little bit, kind of.

I don't know, have fun, basically.

- I mean, I would assume it's to help us come to terms with the things that scare us, right?

You know, 'cause it's an opportunity to face some of those things.

- I think we celebrate it 'cause we can dress up and lose our self identity and become something else.

Maybe our, I don't know, our alter egos.

- I don't know.

I think it's just another way to be all together.

Right?

Just another celebration day.

There's not really a meaningful thing behind it.

That's what I feel.

- I think part of us, you know, part of that is we enjoy pushing ourselves to the limit and you know, Halloween, scary movies, everything like that, like pushes our ability, to like, think outside of these four walls a little more like creatively, so.

- [Interviewer] So what was your favorite costume you ever wore?

- I once dressed up as a in drag and everybody told me I looked like Cher.

- That's tough.

Maybe Jessica Rabbit.

Yeah, that was fun.

[laughing] - Well, as a child growing up, the favorite was a skeleton that I always wore.

- I was like a gypsy of sorts with my best friend when I was younger.

- I went as a subway train when I was a kid.

- [Interviewer] Which line?

- T train.

- I think it was like two years ago with my roommates.

We were old Roman emperors.

That was kind of cool.

Yeah.

- [Interviewer] Which emperor were you?

- I was Julius Caesar.

- My favorite costume was...

I don't even know if I can say this.

Ah, it's fine.

I was in a fraternity in college that will go unnamed, and I had some pledges, and it was just fun.

But we made the pledges dress up along with myself as the seven deadly sins, and so, that was a fun one.

They, yeah, that was my favorite.

- [Interviewer] What sin were you?

- Lust?

- [Interviewer] If you're gonna have one, that's a good one.

- That's the one to have, right.

- When I was a kid, like, the Terminator was my favorite.

That was like the big one that's like the fake arm and everything.

So.

- [Interviewer] Did you feel invincible?

- No.

No, no, No I did not.

No.

- Oh the Beatles.

And I wish I had it, you know, again, I think there's nothing better than those plastic faces.

And again, I don't remember it being hot on Halloween but like nowadays it's, it's kind of warm out with those plastic faces, you know, we'd be sweating.

But yeah, they were just great costumes.

You got them in Woolworths and you know, just, we used to be hobos.

- Usually we just ripped a couple holes in the pillowcase and went out.

You know.

Once you hit 11 or 12, Halloween becomes was a little passe.

Yeah.

But I think you should be celebrated.

It's a release kind of even while you know the trick or treat and have fun.

Let's see what happens.

- [Interviewer] When was the last time you don't remember the last time?

I guess you went out trick or treat.

- Yeah, I guess when I was about 12 or 13.

Got an got a, an egg yolk in my face.

You know, could have been acid but it wasn't egg yolk.

That was, I think that was right after that.

I stopped doing Halloween.

Yeah.

- Oh my gosh.

So wild in like I went to Catholic school and we always had a parade every year like in the parking lot.

And I was Tammy Faye Baker like, like this Saturday Night Live character.

- [Interviewer] How did it go over with the nuns?

- I don't remember, I don't think I understood like the severity of it, but I had older siblings so I'm sure they were like, oh this is a great idea.

So Tammy Faye Baker.

I was probably eight, nine.

- [Interviewer] That's classic.

- [Interviewer] What's something that haunts you in life?

- That.

Wow.

That's the way that I thought this was going to go.

Past failures I guess.

- Ooh.

I would just say like unknown noises haunt me.

Like when I'm somewhere, like even in a place that's familiar, if I hear a noise that I guess I'm not expecting to hear, that freaks me out.

Because usually the noise is before the action.

- Something that haunts me.

Life.

[laughing] As you get older, that stuff will haunt you.

You know?

- [Interviewer] Is there anything that haunts you?

- So many things.

[laughing] It's, that's the answer for everyone.

- I think this is terrible, but taxes, you know, like you're just graduate college and now, like that's something that's always looming.

You know, like you gotta do your taxes.

It's always something at the back of my mind.

- [Interviewer] Which is scarier: death or taxes?

- Taxes.

Taxes.

Cause you actually have to like, like it's not just like a one time thing.

Like you have to do it every year all the time.

Yeah.

- [Interviewer] You'll only have to die.

- Once.

Exactly.

- [Interviewer] Dying is easy.

- Yeah, that's easy.

- Something that haunts me in life.

- Ooh.

- Wow.

That's a good one.

Not you, honey.

- I know.

No, no, no.

Not much haunts me.

I mean if you were telling me I was going skydiving, that would haunt me.

But.

- Yeah.

- In everyday life, nothing - [Interviewer] Nothing hat wakes you up at night?

- No, I don't have anxiety.

I don't get worried about things.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

Nothing really haunts.

- Yeah.

- We're not haunting people.

- Music every single time.

[chuckling] - Something that haunts me is how fast life goes by.

That freaks me out sometimes, but sure.

It freaks everyone out.

- [Interviewer] Was there ever something that you were afraid of as a child that when you grew older you realized, well that was silly?

- Water.

- [Interviewer] Water?

- Yeah.

Cause I can't, I was never, I never learned how to swim.

And up to this day I'm still a bit, you know, I won't go in deep water.

Yeah.

Like we went, we went tubing down in Delaware and it was, cause my daughter wanted to go for the very first time and I built up enough steam to do with her.

But boy, let me tell you, hung onto that tube.

- As a child, I was probably afraid of going into deep water, you know, while going to the beach.

That was like a fear of mine going into deep water.

But I still don't go into deep water.

But I mean, I know I can swim, but I still have a fear of deep water.

- It's kind of interesting.

In the back of one of the old buses, the Mac buses was this metal protrusion that came out of the bus and for some reason I was afraid of it.

And so my mother made me touch it and then I says, okay, it's just a piece of metal.

- Darkness or just the afraid of the unknown.

And then I realized we just gotta face it.

And I used to be really scared of my backyard at night, so nope, not anymore.

[laughing] - Of course we all had like the boogieman or something like, it's so far back, it's fuzzy.

I can't even remember.

But there was something.

Yeah.

You know, But my mom and dad laid my fears, you know, they knew how, Right?

[hesitating] - I guess I was afraid of tomatoes.

That might sound dumb.

[laughing] - [Interviewer] To eat them?

- Yeah.

- [Interviewer] Still don't like them.

- No, me neither.

- I'm still afraid of bananas.

- [Interviewer] Bananas?

- Yeah, I hate them.

I despise them.

When you, I can literally, I just, I don't want have anything to do with them.

- [Interviewer] I won't ask.

Do you have any irrational fears or phobias?

- Bananas.

[chuckles] - [Interviewer] All right.

Do you believe in ghosts?

- The mere fact that we don't know everything leaves open the possibility of everything.

And if we think we know everything, we know nothing.

So the answer is, it's a possibility.

- [Interviewer] Have you ever felt the presence or seen them?

- Oh, for sure.

- [Interviewer] Can you describe that?

- No, I don't want to get into that.

That's too personal.

But I have.

Yeah.

- I do believe in ghosts.

I don't, I've never seen one.

I do believe I've felt a ghost presence, I think.

Just walking into certain buildings or situations, I'm pretty sensitive.

So it just, it's like, it's just, it's almost like we, when you feel someone's behind you and you don't even need to turn around, you just know they're there.

Like, we do have this energy of that emits about six feet away from us that helps us kind of, it's, it's like a survival thing, right?

Like we know automatically when they're behind us that they come into our territory.

So I think that, I would say, yeah, that that's how I, that's been my experience with ghosts.

Like, I've maybe not seen one, but like have felt a presence in that way.

- [Interviewer] Do you believe in ghosts?

- Yes, I do.

- [Interviewer] Have you ever had an experience where you felt saw or experienced one?

- Yes.

- [Interviewer] Can you describe what it was like?

- I mean, it wasn't a malicious energy.

I think energy still, I mean, energy exists, right?

Can't be destroyed or created.

So it's usually just transferred.

But I, I do believe that they're, they're around.

Things are still around.

I've been in spaces that you just feel like something's there.

- Basically.

I don't believe in ghosts.

Is that a difference between ghost and spirits?

I don't know Maybe a spiritual being.

It might be in existence, but I don't know about a ghost.

But I think sometimes you might feel a spiritual being like maybe you know, you are dead mother or dead father.

You have a feeling that might be with you at times.

You know.

- I think I come across little signs of like, you know, I stopped for a second, I'm feeling something and I'm like, that doesn't, that doesn't seem like it's here.

And so that has come up a few times.

Even last night.

Swear to God.

So I don't know if it was a ghost, I don't know if it was God, don't know if it was an alien or my stupid mind, but.

- What, what people find as ghosts today, usually souls in Purgatory that are asking for prayers or asking for help, but what the, what the society usually thinks as ghost is, is not true.

- Yeah.

I believe in demons.

Yeah.

I, yeah.

They're there.

I can't deny their existence.

Yeah.

- I don't really believe in ghosts.

- I don't think I really do either.

But I say that I do just in case like one's listening and is gonna come and get me.

- Do I believe in ghosts?

My mom did.

And I think that rubbed off a little bit.

There's gotta be a little bit of truth to that.

- I, I want to.

- Semi.

Yeah.

- [Interviewer] Have you ever had the experience where you felt something and thought that it could have been?

- No.

- Oh yeah.

- You deaf?

Okay, got it.

- No, a lot of times I'm just laying in bed and I feel like somebody's like rubbing my leg.

It's like I think she's in the room and I look, there's nothing there and it's just in this one room, when I lay this bed, I feel like somebody touched my body.

Yeah.

In this one room.

I never told you that, but yeah, no, it freaks me out sometimes.

- Secrets.

- That did not, that wasn't a breeze.

There's no fan or anything.

It felt like somebody touching me.

- [Interviewer] You can't explain it.

- Can't explain it.

Yeah.

- Ghosts?

I'm paranormal bent to my.

- [Interviewer] Have you ever seen or experienced something that kind of made you question?

- Yes.

- [Interviewer] Do you want to go into that or would you rather not explain that one?

- Well, I was, I was more along.

I could chalk it up to like my imagination.

But yeah, I've seen things out, you know, out the corner of your eye.

A hand on the shoulder when nobody's around.

Well it's kind of like, you know, back in the seventies, you don't know if it was real or not.

- [Interviewer] What's the scariest movie you ever saw?

- When I was a kid?

Well, Daddy's Gone A-Hunting.

- Probably Frankenstein.

You probably had never even heard of it.

- the Friday the 13th is, is one of them.

And Halloween, the movie Halloween is pretty scary also, you know.

- [Interviewer] What's the scariest movie you've ever seen?

- Heathers.

- Probably the Crawling Eye.

When I was a kid with Forrest Tucker, - It was probably this French movie called Martyrs.

And I saw like, like 10 years ago, was a teenager.

- Rodan, do you know the movie Rodan?

- Oh my god.

I don't know if it's the scariest movie, but the one that comes to my head is Sleepaway Camp.

- [Interviewer] What's the scariest part of the movie to you?

- Anytime something like pops out is what gets me, you know, those creepy girls, they always get you with them.

- And they skinned off from a human being - The eye going up the mountain in the, in the Swiss Alps.

- And all you heard was the chittering of these insects.

- And then when Lupin turns into the werewolf.

- The little formula was poison, but it wasn't.

- The need for conformity.

- It is just so absurd what happens in it.

- And it was that near the end of the movie, when well, I don't want to give it away.

- Because you don't expect the outcome.

- Anyway.

It was so scary that I actually did jump up out of my seat and I still remember that it was just, it was an unexpected, unexpected moment.

- That was very scary.

Yeah.

- I was like probably 12 years old, 13 maybe.

You know, he gave me a thrill.

After that, it was like, nah, I go watch anything.

- [Interviewer] What role did fear play in your life as a child?

Did it?

- Not really.

No.

- [Interviewer] Is it playing any role in your life today?

- Sure.

I guess yeah.

Fear of failure.

- As a child, you know, not fitting in, Not not, Yeah, I think that was like the main fear growing up and I think now it's like not maximizing my self potential.

- There are a lot of things that I used to be afraid of just because my mom told me that they were dangerous.

But, you know, I'm really good now and cautious to to a degree.

So I think it has helped me.

- Fear of my dad.

But you know, that, that, you know, I think I'm the person I am today because of my father and he ruled by fear sometimes.

So.

- Yeah.

My, my father ruled heavy handed.

- Yeah.

[chuckling] - We didn't mess with him.

- We're older than we look.

- I think fear as I was a child, I think it held me back in some areas now that fear is just not being, doing something good enough and the fear of people not liking me.

And I think think that's it.

- I was a really scared kid.

Like I wouldn't let my mom's hand go.

I wouldn't answer the phone, I wouldn't talk to strangers.

I kind of got over that by just traveling by myself and like exposing myself to the fear as much as possible.

I think it worked.

- Oh my god, growing up Catholic and Italian, I think fear was a big part of like why you didn't do things and it went on further into my adulthood.

What was the second part of that?

- [Interviewer] So what role does fear play in your life now?

- I actually think the fear helps now for me to think through things and plan a little bit ahead.

Because once you learn that there's no reason to be fearful of certain things, you can figure out how to maybe like move past the obstacles and it's not really fear, it's more like challenges.

- It's something that molds your life in some ways.

Like it's challenging sometimes to be scared of like right now I'm starting a new job and I'm [bleep] myself, right?

But fear, it's someone, like, it's something that we need in our lives just to remember that we can do more.

- [Interviewer] Last question for you.

If you could eliminate fear from your life, what would you do or do differently?

- I would follow my dreams.

I would not have so much fear in my art.

I'm, I'm an artist, so yeah.

That's it.

[laughing] Yeah.

Oh, live life is art.

Thank you.

- [Interviewer] If you could eliminate fear from your life, what would you do?

- If I could eliminate fear for my life, what would I do?

Do what I'm doing now.

I'm trying to live as fearless as possible.

So.

- [Interviewer] Great answers, man.

- Thanks.

- I wouldn't, because it's such an important part of life and I think without it, life would be more boring and just wouldn't have the same meaning that it does.

- Yeah.

I, I agree.

I think it's kind of the healthy thing to have, you know, in your life.

It keeps you, keeps you on your toes.

- I would not do that.

I would not do that.

We, we need to be scared of stuff sometimes.

That's what I think.

Yeah.

- I guess what I'm doing now I'm on holiday at the moment.

So just enjoying the moment.

- Oh.

Wow.

These are this, those are the Halloween questions.

I don't know.

I don't know.

That would take a lot more thought than I, than I think you have film in the camera.

So cheers.

- [Interviewer] Thank you.

- You got it.

- I am going to say that if you could eliminate people's fear of dying, then I think people would be more inclined to do things that are outside of their comfort zone.

- [Interviewer] And last question, if you could eliminate fear from your life, what would you do?

- Jump for joy.

[chuckling] Okay.

- Everything.

I think, I mean, you just have to face the fear anyway.

So even if it's not there, you know, still do the things that scare you.

- [Interviewer] If you could eliminate fear, all fear from your life, what would you do or do differently in life?

- Run for president.

I don't think I'd do anything differently.

I served my country, you know, I got an education, I had a good job.

Ups, downs, the whole, whole routine in life.

I can't at this point say that there's anything that I would change.

- [Voice Over] Whether we realize it or not, Fear plays an interesting role in all of our lives.

To experience fear of one kind or another, doesn't mean you're weak, thin-skinned, or irrational.

It means you're human.

From the cradle to the grave, it lurks.

And while those things that lurked in our childhood in the dark recesses of our closet or under the bed, were ultimately easily explained away as monsters or boogeymen men.

It's our adult fears that aren't so easily exercised.

Fear of being alone, of not fitting in, of not measuring up or accomplishing all that you once hoped for.

Fear of the unknown of strangers from strange lands or even the future.

These are the things that haunt us beyond the days of tricks and treats.

These aren't the things that go bump in the night, but instead the things that go bump in our life.

The challenge perhaps isn't to completely eliminate fear.

But to do just like you did in childhood.

To confront it.

To clean out from under your bed or in your closet To learn.

To understand, to decide not to make decisions based on it.

And maybe even to wear it as a costume.

Wearing out your regret might not win you best dressed in the Halloween parade of your life, but it might put things in perspective.

Good luck trick or treating and Happy Halloween.

[mellow music playing]