(intense music) - [Matt] Face your fears at Double M Haunted Hayrides, explore the creepy sculptures of William Fillmore, hear from spooky makeup effects artist Jared Balog and more.

It's all ahead, on this special edition of Aha, A House for Arts.

(scary laughing) - [Announcer] Funding for Aha has been provided by your contribution and by contributions to the WMHT Venture Fund.

Contributors include the Leo Cox Beach Philanthropic Foundation, Chet and Karen Opalka, Robert and Doris Fischer Malesardi and the Robison Family Foundation.

- At M&T Bank we understand that the vitality of our communities is crucial to our continued success.

That's why we take an active role in our community.

M&T Bank is pleased to support WMHT programming that highlights the arts and we invite you to do the same.

(intense music) (people screaming) (scary music) - Hi, I'm Matt Rogowicz.

Welcome to A Haunted House for Arts, a place for all things creepy.

We begin outside, in the dark, (scary music) on a cold October night.

(scary music) Good evening.

Tonight is all about the art of fear and what better place to do that than here at Double M Haunted Hayrides in Ballston Spa, New York.

Now, if you're ready, follow me.

(voice echoing) (scary music) - For us, in the Capital District, I think we are a tradition here.

We've been doing it so long and people know that we know what we're doing.

We know how to scare you.

(scary music) (intense music) I grew up here.

I'm second generation on the place.

My folks started the place here over 60 years ago.

Haunted Hayrides originally was a, a franchise out of Syracuse, and they approached us and asked if we wanted to be part of it and we jumped on board.

(scary music) I always loved Halloween when I was a kid, so I was attracted to it.

And my folks were like, you know, if we want to do this, we want you to run it.

So, I'm the owner here at Double M's Haunted Hayride for the past 31 years.

(scary music) - So we have a pretty massive operation here at Double M, about a hundred plus employees.

We have a management team that kind of guides the process to make sure all of our actors are in their spots and everything's going smooth.

- If you have your makeup done you know where to go, please go to the wagon!

Thank you!

(scary music) - So we gather our creative brainstorm team in March.

It's a handful of us that get together.

We talk about the past season, what worked well, what's time to stay goodbye and introduce some new themes.

We'll talk about ideas that each of us has for the next season and then we'll kind of sketch out a rough draft of what our haunts are gonna be so that we can start planning the process.

So our tractor-drawn hayride takes you through our woods where we have various scenes with different themes.

So each scene is a different theme.

It's not like the hayride's one theme.

So you're gonna get a little taste of a lot of different things when you go out there.

Different types of characters, different experiences.

Some high energy, where it's loud and intense, (chainsaw buzzing) some might be a little more low energy where it's more creepy and suspicious.

So everything's a little different.

We try and switch up as you go through.

So you go through kind of a range of emotions as you're going through the hayride.

- Our actors, when they're cast at the beginning of the season, everybody gets assigned a specific haunt is what we called, which is a scene throughout either the hayride on the trail or throughout one of our various houses here.

And they're typically at that spot for the entirety of the season.

What's really fun is seeing people come out of their shells by like the second weekend.

It usually takes a couple weekends, but once they get into the groove, they're awesome.

So, it'll sort of be, you know, looking at their character or their scene that they're a part of and determining, you know, what, if they're struggling, what might motivate their character or what, you know, is the objective of their character.

What obstacles do they have to them getting what they ultimately want?

- You have beautiful teeth.

I'm going to add them to my collection.

So wait, right here.

(circus-themed music) - I am the makeup artist here, at Double M Haunted Hayrides and I've been here 16 years and on a normal night I can do anywhere from 60 to 70 people in an hour and a half, in order to get them out on the trail to do their job.

(cirus-themed music) They line up according to haunt and they all come in at once and I do them all like assembly line style and then send them on their way.

Integrated the sponge technique and then, kicked up the airbrush.

And now, the airbrush is what enables me to get through so many people and you can do so much more with it.

(cirus-themed music) And to be honest, makeup can only do so far.

It has one job and that's to make you look a certain way.

If you don't act a certain way, doesn't matter what you have on your face.

So, it all depends on our actors.

They are the ones who make things happen.

- It's dinner time.

(woman laughing) - Come on!

- I think people like to experience something that is almost unimaginable in a normal day life.

So you get to come here and put yourself in a world that you would never experience on an everyday basis.

And there's so many different fears that we might touch upon.

Some people it might be, go through one scene and think it was nothing and then, the next one they might be crying because it's just, we hit on that fear that that deep down they're terrified of.

(scary music) - Back late nineties, we had a haunt with a wizard, okay?

I purchased a staff with a globe on it, okay?

And it, you press the button and it makes a a thunder and lightning sound and it flashes up.

Just so you guys know, I still have that staff from the late nineties.

I've never ever put batteries in it.

We no longer, I haven't done the haunt in 20 some years and it still works.

(Leo laughing) - William Fillmore is a professor at Russell Sage College who creates the sculptures of your nightmares.

Discover why as soon as William was born his very own mother said, just put him back.

(intense music) - I'm Billy Fillmore.

I make intentionally creepy stuff.

(intense music) I really like to take the things that I don't like about society or the things that I've experienced and I try to replicate that in 3D materials.

In the end, it's all about trying to make work that makes people stop and wonder why the hell would anyone make that?

(intense music) When I was a kid, I was terrified of my closet and I didn't know why.

In fact, my parents have these really funny pictures of me sleeping in the hallway or I would go to Mike's room, my brother's room, and I'd sleep with him.

And then eventually, my brother was so tired of me coming and waking him up and sleeping with him that they put a lock on his door.

And then they have a picture of me sleeping in front of his door, 'cause I was so terrified of sleeping in my room.

It took awhile of remembering this that I remember looking into the closet and seeing the void and I was so afraid of the possibilities of what could be inside of there.

(intense music) (child singing) (scary music) And so, I was so afraid of that closet.

And I think my aesthetic and my taste kind of built around that terror, that now I feel like I am no longer afraid of the closet but now I've become the thing in the closet.

(calm music) Just Put Him Back is a, (Billy laughing) it relates to my birth story.

So, I was an in vitro baby, and this is in 1980, and an in vitro baby cost $10,000.

And so, my dad never let me forget how much I cost.

And during my, the time of my birth it was just a very traumatic event.

I guess there was at some points, they told, they asked my mom you have to choose between yourself and the baby.

(lullaby music) So I was finally birthed and the way I was, the way it's told to me is the umbilical cord wrapped around my belly.

And so I was covered in green (beeping) and none of my hair follicles had been, like sloughed off, which isn't normal.

All of your hair follicles grow when you're born.

But some babies are born with all their hair follicles still attached.

So from head to toe, I was covered in orange hair and green (beeping).

I was so gross that my mom's first words to me was like, that's the ugliest thing I've ever seen, just put him back.

(baby crying) So I think that that is one of those perfect kind of stories where my artwork comes from, where it's beautiful on one hand and how much trauma and suffering had to occur, but then, it's really funny on the other hand that you went through all this trouble and you just get a red-haired, green (beeping) covered baby.

There's nothing, I get along, I love my parents, Mom, Dad, I love you and we get along great, but they were kind of the first institutional rule setters for me, and I never understood why.

I got a bachelor's degree in business administration and there's nothing worse than graduating with a degree that you didn't actually want.

So, the day after I graduated I went to my first visiting artist lecture, and the artist whose name was Justin Sweet.

He was a concept artist.

And I'd never seen anybody make the stuff that I was consuming.

So he made a lot of concept art for like the Chronicles in Narnia, Lord of the Rings, some video games that I had played, comic books and it just kind of blew my mind.

And after that, the next semester I just started going back to art school.

(intense music) There's two parts of me that I always am questioning.

One is my 13-year-old self, who was in the middle of puberty and being punished for being different or not understanding the rules, and the other part of me that I like to listen to is my deathbed self.

So, I'm imagining myself in my nineties or hopefully like later than that, in a hospital bed trying to look back on my life and hoping that what I did was worthwhile.

So between those two parts of my personality I find myself trying to make work that appeals to both of them.

(intense music) So, I've worked here at Russell Sage College on New Scotland and right now I live like a mile and a half away and I always walk, and when I'm walking I'm not looking for stuff, but stuff seems to find me.

So I walked by a church that's down on New Scotland and in the grass was this doll that definitely looks like it survived a fire or something like that, but it's porcelain head is still intact.

And I saw it's mangled body and I was just like that is the ugliest thing I've ever seen.

Like I was to my mom.

I pick it up and its eyes are closed.

When I pick it up, its eyes are open, (lullaby music) and its eyes are just terrible looking 'cause they survived the fire.

But it's just the weirdest creepiest thing ever.

So when I brought it back I didn't want it to just sit it on a shelf, so I ended up making a box for it.

And in my mind I was imagining what would my grand, the grandmother who said I was the cutest thing she'd ever seen, what kind of box would she like to see it in?

And so, I went to Joann's and found it like, the prettiest, nicest fabric.

So the tension between a traditional doll that's been mutilated, not by me, just found it and then putting it in a curio cabinet box as if it's some kind of precious object was just really fun.

(scary music) I like affecting other people, but, the main audience for me is me and those two characters I've talked about, like my 13-year-old self and my ancient deathbed persona.

(scary music) By paying attention to those two, what it's really doing is making sure that I'm not being depressed about what I made and I'm not anxious about what I could make.

And it's always kind of pushing me to make the best work that I can make now.

(scary music) - Now I don't know about you, but I often have this recurring nightmare of being covered in cold, slimy gloopy goo and suffocating to death.

Then I just realize that I'm thinking of the time special effects makeup artist Jared Balog made a lifecast of my face.

Take a look.

(intense organ music) - [Narrator] Those of you with queasy stomachs should turn away now.

(intense organ music) (scary music) - Look, these things are great.

I mean, they're awesome.

(scary music) The artistry that goes into special makeup effects is it runs the gamut from sculpting, from painting from mold making, from design.

I mean it's just, it's all over the place.

It really encompasses kind of everything.

And I think that's kind of what drew me to it at such a young age.

(intense music) Anything that I could get my hands on I would watch, and then, after a while of watching enough horror films I kind of realized that somebody was making this stuff.

You know, somebody was making like the monsters, the zombies and all that stuff.

And I mean, I remember watching the making of "Thriller".

I mean that was, that for me was a big turning point.

Seeing Rick Baker, you know, he was doing a lifecast in that.

They were doing, they were in the makeup trailer applying all the makeups.

I mean, that was a, that was a big one.

You know, I was probably like way too young to be watching horror films, but by the time I was around like seven or eight, I mean, that's when I started getting you know, I got a hold of latex and Dermawax or nose putty or whatever, blood, you know, just messing with that kind of stuff.

And then, slowly kind of working up towards making like a mold or doing like a lifecast of somebody.

So are you cool with doing the life, you think you wanna do the lifecast?

- [Matt] Yeah.

- Okay, let's do it, okay.

(intense music) - This is exciting.

- So the lifecast is the basis for all special makeup effects in terms of prosthetics.

If at any point too, you wanna take it off, just let me know.

We'll just take it, we just won't air this.

(men laughing) We'll do something else.

But trust me, it's really quick.

- I'm gonna say, this is gonna be a cool makeup.

- You'll get like a nice cool little- - I won't regret this.

- Yeah, yeah, no, you get a nice cool little throw, takeaway gift, you know.

- Give it to my mom.

- Exactly.

(men laughing) The materials have changed a little bit, so, I'm gonna use the more old school materials which is alginate, but now nowadays, we use silicone 'cause it's a little bit more durable.

We can, you know, it lasts forever.

(upbeat music) So this is alginate.

Basically, you want to get it to like a pretty creamy consistency.

You don't want it too thick.

This is, you don't want it too runny.

All right, close your eyes.

(intense organ music) Ooh, it's a little cool.

It'll bring up more details and stuff.

Right outta high school, I just started working on any independent film I can get my hands into.

I didn't start out doing straight special effects.

I started doing some sound and special effects, just anything else, NPA stuff, anything to kind of get me onto like, anything.

So I would start, you know, doing some short films.

I did a couple features starting out, and then, you know, as I was able to build up a little bit of a resume, I took pictures of stuff more and, you know, people could see more of what I was doing.

Then it was kind of strictly more just special effects and kind of was able to weed out doing all the other gigs that I didn't really, I didn't have an interest in.

It just kind of snowballs from there, 'cause once you get known for doing the special effects other filmmakers will recommend you for stuff.

Other actors that like really enjoyed working with you will recommend you for projects.

(upbeat music) You look great, man.

So then the plaster bands go on.

(upbeat music) How you doing?

You doing okay?

- Mm-hm.

- Good.

(upbeat music) And then, that all comes off.

So, what I'm gonna have you do, lemme see your hands here.

So you're not gonna pull, but you're just gonna, you're gonna hold, kind of just put your hands.

No, no, no.

Take your hands, put them right, there you go.

Okay, now I want you to lean forward just a little bit.

Okay, and then basically, all I'm gonna have you do is just kind of make scrunchie faces, frowny faces, you know, stuff like that.

And just kind of slowly, there you go.

There you go.

Good, all right, cool.

(upbeat music) And there's, the negative impression of his face.

And then once that comes off, I will fill it with probably, plaster, but you can fill it with a couple different materials.

(intense music) (men laughing) We're gonna clean those up, but- - [Matt] That's freaky.

(scary organ music) - [PJ] Yeah, and that's where everything kind of starts from there.

(scary organ music) I just wanna keep making like cool, creature stuff.

I'd love to work on more.

I'd love to work on something like "The Thing", that to me is like the ultimate, you know, project, dream project.

That'd be so cool.

(scary laughing) - I thought we'd end the evening stabbing everyone's favorite fall squash, the pumpkin.

Get your carving tools ready and follow along.

(scary music) (person panting) (scary music) (person panting) (scary music) (tool scraping the pumpkin) - I am Brian Bateman.

I am a professional pumpkin carver, this time of year.

(scary music) I think I originally got into it just carving cool pumpkins for my kids and just pushing myself to see how far I could go and I discovered that I could go pretty far.

(dog barking) I thought it would be fun to do him with the helmet.

You don't usually see Thanos with a helmet on but I thought it'd be fun to do it with a helmet because I could use the pumpkin itself as the helmet.

So the first thing I did was draw the helmet.

(upbeat music) You scrape away a thin line of the pumpkin with it because it's V-shaped there.

(upbeat music) My next step is gonna be to carve away everything here in the face.

(upbeat music) And at this level, you don't want to carve deep 'cause you want to leave yourself a lot of thickness.

(tool scraping the pumpkin) It's weird narrating my carving.

I feel like, I feel like Bob Ross.

Just gonna paint some nice little trees and a little deer over here.

(scary music) The truth is, I'm good at what I practice and so are you.

Everybody gets better at whatever it is they practice.

So, so definitely the pumpkins I carve today are better than what I was carving 15 years ago.

(scary music) So an internally lit pumpkin really has to be carved in the dark in order to get the right effects.

So, when I'm carving an internally lit pumpkin I have to start with the light bulb on inside the pumpkin.

I use an LED bulb 'cause it doesn't get real hot.

And, and so I'm sitting in the dark and the thinner the skin, the brighter the spot.

So it's, it's sort of the opposite of what's intuitive, you know?

And that's why it's important to do it in the dark.

When you turn the light on it really doesn't look like much.

So those kinds of pumpkins only look good, you know, on your front stoop at night, or in a dark room or a dim restaurant, things like that.

And then, there are 3D pumpkins, which is like more, if you've ever seen Ray Villafane those are the types of pumpkins that he does where you don't even have to empty out the pumpkin.

You don't have to carve out the insides.

You just carve your image right into it.

(intense music) You really kind of have to just eyeball it.

You can't, you know, because you're scraping off the skin at the beginning and just going for it.

There we go.

It didn't even occur to me until I was watching videos that it's important to keep spraying your pumpkin to keep it moist.

Man, that made such a big difference.

(upbeat organ music) (water bubbling) I have these, these glass marbles that are kind of flat and we'll see how that works.

(upbeat organ music) Oh my gosh, I'm scared.

(upbeat organ music) It helps to have a background in drawing and art and things like that.

But however your pumpkin looks the first time you try to do a complex design, you just keep trying.

You just keep trying and practicing and you get better at it.

(upbeat music) (intense music) (upbeat music) - Thanks for joining us.

For more arts, visit WMHT.ORG/AHA and be sure to connect with us on social media.

I'm Matt Rogowicz.

Thanks for watching.

♪ It was a night just like this ♪ ♪ Many years ago ♪ ♪ When we invented the spooky twist ♪ (country music) ♪ Many boys and girls ♪ ♪ Came from all around ♪ ♪ And did the spooky twist ♪ ♪ Now, make sure you tell your parents ♪ ♪ That you're going to go out this evening ♪ ♪ And spooky twist ♪ (wolf howling) ♪ Make sure to leave a breadcrumb trail ♪ ♪ So you'll be able to find your way home ♪ ♪ Spooky ♪ (scary laughing) (country music) (man screaming) - [Announcer] Funding for Aha has been provided by your contribution and by contributions to the WMHT Venture Fund.

Contributors include the Leo Cox Beach Philanthropic Foundation, Chet and Karen Opalka, Robert and Doris Fischer Malesardi and the Robison Family Foundation.

- At M&T Bank, we understand that the vitality of our communities is crucial to our continued success.

That's why we take an active role in our community.

M&T Bank is pleased to support WMHT programming that highlights the arts and we invite you to do the same.