It’s no stretch of the imagination to claim Mike Meyer has the “Fright Stuff” to succeed in the increasingly popular – and tough – Halloween horror industry.
In fact, last November the 45-year-old Aurora native received not one but two Chicago/Midwest Emmys for a documentary he co-produced and edited about Statesville Haunted Prison.
“Feeding the Beast” focuses on the 25-year history of this legendary haunted attraction – located 10 minutes down the road from Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill – that had been frightening folks young and old from all over the Chicago area until it closed in November of 2021.
Meyer knew this nationally-recognized Halloween attraction well, having researched and filmed it for a dozen years. Much of that work went into “Days of the Living Dead,” a web series he co-produces with Yokai Films owner Chris Sato about the ins and outs of the haunted house industry.
And with a set of prestigious Emmys now decorating his office, Meyer is still creating stories to fright and delight. On Oct. 15 his new feature-length film, “The Fright Stuff: The Life and Times of the Haunted Attraction Industry,” will premiere at Facets Cinemateque in Chicago.
“Then it’s off to festivals,” Meyer told me, where “hopefully we get it in front of people who want to license the film” for a streaming service.
When I met up with Meyer recently he was grabbing lunch in a downtown Aurora restaurant after filming a segment on wig-making for the Paramount Theatre’s upcoming “Frozen” musical. Since the beginning of its Broadway Series, Meyer has been creating B-roll for the popular venue’s promotional videos.
It’s gigs like that – for corporations and nonprofits – that “pay the bills,” says the 1997 graduate of West Aurora High School who earned his film degree from Southern Illinois University and owns MeyerFilm in Chicago. But horror is his true passion, he told me, not unlike many other filmmakers who are drawn to the creativity and imagination this genre allows.
Meyer’s immersion into the haunted house industry began around 2012 when he was shooting a feature film “with a horror bent” that called for scenes in caves, which at the time was banned by Illinois because of a health issue related to bats.
He and Sato eventually were directed to the fake cavern at Statesville Haunted Prison, where they met John LaFlamboy, whose Zombie Army Productions – which started as a group of passionate film graduates a quarter-century ago – turned a building on a farm in rural Crest Hill into one of the Midwest’s leading haunted attractions.
The Emmy-winning “Feeding the Beast” documentary used plenty of archived footage to narrate the story of the regional impact Statesville Haunted Prison had, as well as the buildup to its 2021 final show, the result of COVID and the land owner’s decision to go in a different direction with the property.
But it was the interviews with the young workers, many of whom were drawn to the industry because they “lacked direction” in their lives, that “took this film to a different level,” insisted Meyer.
“It’s easy to get lost in the trappings … kids dressed up like monsters. But it’s what this place meant to these kids that made this film so emotional … it became their family,” he continued. “There were moments in that movie that are so overwhelming to me. Piecing it together, there were times I had to take a break … I knew we had something special when it was finished.”
His pair of Emmys – he won in the category of Best Long Form/Arts and Entertainment for co-producing with LaFlamboy and Sato, and individually for editing – is “a nice conversation starter,” especially because “by nature, I’m not a super-salesman for myself,” Meyer admitted.
But more than anything, he added, the awards were “validating,” and “put the wind back in my sails to do other stuff.” That included finishing “The Fright Stuff,” which features haunted attractions across the country but focuses on the formation of HellsGate, the even bigger haunted attraction LaFlamboy created across the bridge from Statesville Haunted Prison after it closed down.
There’s no question this industry has “grown exponentially in the last 20 years,” but the bar has gone up just as quickly, said Meyer.
“As John (LaFlamboy) likes to point out, 15 years ago you had a zombie with its guts falling out of the stomach and kids would run. Now, 12-year-olds are poking the guts and asking, ‘Did you make this out of silicone?’”
“What worked in the past no longer works … so the question is, what do we do now?” said Meyer, again referring to LaFlamboy’s quote of note. “You can’t scare everyone. But you can entertain everyone.”
Which is just what he hopes his latest film will do.
“These films definitely won’t scare you, but hopefully you’ll find these stories about the people who do the scaring as entertaining, inspiring, enriching and – believe or not – wholesome as I do.”
