MT. HEALTHY HAUNTED HALL: Unholy Rollers!
The Mt. Healthy Haunted Hall is known primarily for its creative and bizarre concept rooms along with its mind-bending black maze (housed inside a tent at the end of the tour). Legend has it that the walls of the maze are changed around weekly just to confound repeat customers, and this year, it's DOUBLED in size, now taking up two full tents. The HOD!!! didn't have many problems getting through the first half, but the second half proved to be a whole other story. Between bumping into other hauntgoers in the dark going the other way, following crazily angled walls that led to nowhere, and encountering chain link fences that offered a glimpse of freedom but no access, we had been wandering around for quite some time. Every time we thought we had found the exit, there was a barrel placed firmly in it, making us think that section was just a dead end. And all the while, we could hear the Reverend Emmett Rotts delivering his Sunday night sermon, telling bad jokes and exhorting his demonic cohorts on to greater efforts inside the house. This was interspaced with the sound of Rotts throwing steel folding chairs onto the concrete in front of his pulpit (the one with the inverted cross) in an effort to get hauntgoers to sit and listen. Rotts could also be heard ragging on people who, too timid to stick it out in the maze, backtracked and left through the entrance. At some point during all this, it dawned on the HOD!!! that there was some hellish being inside the maze rolling the barrel from one spot to another in an effort to keep its victims inside. Doubtlessly, this was some nefarious plan by Rotts to get people to listen to his sermon! Between Rotts and his barrel-rolling cohort, you could say the Hall had an 'unholy roller' revival going on!
Betty Hancock, longtime volunteer at the Hall and our guide for the evening, had earlier pointed out the undead Reverend from the front of the Hall. Rotts holds court from a deck in the rear of the attraction, and can be glimpsed from the front yard over the top of some Port-O-Lets located on the side. "We call him the Pastor of the Porta-Potty," laughed Betty. Rotts is the newest signature character of the Hall, starring in a well done video giving the backstory of the event that can be seen on their website. Betty explained that "…a lot of what is in there is true-at least the part about Mt. Healthy getting its name from the fact that it was pretty much untouched by a cholera epidemic that swept Cincinnati in the 1800's." In the Hall's version of the story, Rotts was a holy man who sold his soul to the Devil to guarantee the safety of the area residents from the disease. Satan's also been a mainstay in the Haunted Hall for years, and you'll run across him early during the tour-guess he wants to stick close to Rotts to watch over his investment! And what about the Hall's longtime icon, Bug Boy? Well, Cincinnati's most infamous derelict corpse has had the Hall's 20th anniversary dedicated to him and the season declared "The Year Of Bug Boy"! His handsome mug (complete with stylish fedora) is plastered over the front of the Hall's 'Two Decades Of Decay" T-Shirt as well. The Bugster's room this year is located in the second tent out back. The room decor features his trademark insect covered wall panels along with shelves full of books, many of which have been thrown onto the floor. It seems Bug Boy isn't a big believer in 'Reading is Fun-damental' and wants his TV set back! Maybe if the Hall makes enough money, he can catch up on his payments. Of course, since TV has gone digital he'll have to get a converter box for it, so that static comes in crystal clear! "Bug Boy was a natural for our 20th Anniversary-he's been here almost every year, and we've used those 'insect walls' forever. They were a real pain to put together-each bug has to be hand sewn onto the wall. They won't stick with hot glue," said Betty.
And to further celebrate, the Haunted Hall has added more outside displays and tents to make the attraction even longer. There are now eight tents outside (if you count the maze as two), a shed containing a scene, and four or so outside displays. This is besides the rooms inside the Hall itself, giving you a bit of a Haunted House and Trail all in one event. The Hall has many rooms in its standard repertoire, and rotates them from year to year. The rooms are also located in a different place every time they're used to give each a fresh new look. We've already mentioned Satan and Bug Boy, but there's also the Hellavator (with the craziest operator in town), Norman Bates and his/her bloody bathroom, the Executioner (chopping a young lady in half with an ax), Dracula (whose scene actually IS in the same place every year-he's a tradition!), the Mummy, the Creature Crate, the Kreature Kages (with K. G. Beast), the spinning floor, the vortex (homemade and the best in Cincinnati), and the standout Wolf Man Woods where a young boy running through a thick forest heavy with fog is chased down, tackled, and mauled by a werewolf. The Hall might skip over some of these from year to year, but it's a good bet you'll see a new version of them at some point in time.
Every year, some all new scenes are added as well. Reverend Rotts has already been covered, but there are rotts...err...lots more. There's a guy spiked to the ceiling in the tunnel leading to the Executioner's room (foreshadowing an effect you'll run across later in the tour). The lair of the Unknown (and Undead) Soldier is to be found draped under camo netting inside a fog-choked tent. The Toy-turer is a Circus Klown whose hobby is building toys out of his victims-and he'll be more than happy to demonstrate them all for you! There's a Crypt out back that hasn't been kept up very well by its caretaker-it looks like the roof might collapse on hauntgoers at any moment. And what walk through the great outdoors would be complete without a hike through Camp Crystal Lake? The Camp has several tents along its path, and they might be hiding anything-or maybe nothing. You'll have to watch for signs along the way to be certain!
Also every year, the Hall likes to have at least one oddball 'theme' room with an outrageous sense of humor. In years past we've had the Monster Maternity, the Fun-eral, and the Birthday Cake. It's easy to pick out which one it is this year-the Bride of Frankenstein's Wedding. You're greeted out front by a Creepy Caterer offering up food that looks like Dr. Frankenstein's leftovers. Inside, you're invited to leave your gift at the reception desk and come meet the Bride. The Bride jerkily spasms to and fro (emulating Elsa Lancaster's birdlike performance in the classic black and white film)-and it seems her groom, the Frankenstein Monster (remember, kids, Frankenstein is the Doctor-the guy with the bolts in his neck is the Monster) has really flipped his lid over the Bride-his headless body is strapped to an operating table nearby. So-where'd the head go? The answer isn't long in coming, supplying one of the two surprises in store here. What's the other? Well, we're not telling, except that it involves the return of our 'effect of the year' from two years ago-or as the Phantom of the Opera would say, "Look! She sings to bring the house down!"
The Hall's been around long enough to spawn its own new generation of haunters. Betty points to Reverend Rotts and says, "That's Eric-he's been working here since he was 12 or so. Not only did he do the video for the website, but the last couple of years he's also been the one who drew up the floorplans for the Haunted Hall. It's the same with Matt, who did our website and is also in the video-he's acting inside the house as the Mummy right now." While taking the HOD!!! through the Hall, Betty also points out another actor-Alex, her son. He's a 'yard monster' tonight, which acts as the Hall's entry level position. He's patrolling the grounds between the vortex tunnel and Wolf Man Woods. "Alex has been up here pretty much since the day he was born," said Betty. He really seems to enjoy it, as he's also running over to the Junkyard between groups to work up a few scares. It's a good thing all the new blood is coming around-Betty still acts inside the Hall, usually in the lobby outside the Hellavator or inside the coffin found in Dracula's room. But she says her days in the more strenuous roles are over-"Being the Executioner's victim is just too rough on my back over the course of a night (the role involves contorting your upper body through a hole in a table), so it's good we have all these young actors!"
Of course, the veteran haunters still have a few tricks left as well. The gent who designed the black maze staked out a spot inside, tucked himself into a corner and gave directions to anyone who would listen. After we exited the maze, we struck up a conversation with him and began to talk about some of our favorite effects within the haunt. The Birthday Cake was immediately brought up, and some of the Hall's crew laughed and said it would probably be the final year for it. Of course, this immediately brought protests from some of the other members, citing how long it took to build in the first place and what a pain it had been to construct. The consensus ended up being that the cake would return for one more season-after all, next year the haunt will be 21! Hmmmmmm...wonder if I'll have to start calling Bug Boy-Bug MAN?
At any rate, the Hall looks as if its future will be as entertaining as its past. It has a quirky sense of personality that many newer haunts lack. The Haunted Hall does things the old fashioned way-and does them well. They always seem to find the best spot and role for each individual monster. Their actors are among the best at interacting with hauntgoers and improvising dialogue-and even making scripted dialogue seem fresh. Old rooms get new twists, like the black maze. So, revisiting our opening paragraph, just how long did it take for us to find our way out of the Twin Tents Of Doom? About ten minutes-not so bad. Some people were stuck in there for 45 minutes, including the group of girls that mistook our legs for tent supports for a couple of minutes (I knew all that weightlifting would pay off someday!). After that, we pulled up one of the chairs that Reverend Rotts was tossing into the lot to hear what he had to say. Delighted to finally have something other than a captive audience, he immediately started telling his favorite humorous anecdotes-all of which ended with their participants dying. Amid a cry of 'Hallelujah' from the assembled crowd, the HOD!!! got up to leave (we had actually been hoping for some hymns-say, "How Great Thou Aren't" or something else devoted to the guy in red with the horns and tail). With all the verbal abuse the good Reverend is dishing out, it seems that a "Haunted Dunking Booth" with Mr. Rotts as the target would be a sure-fire moneymaker for the Hall! We paused to talk to Betty again before leaving-at which point one of Rott's towering skull faced hooded acolytes skulked over with my chair and motioned for us to go back. He silently stood vigil the whole time I talked to Betty and shuffled after us as we left. For all we know, he's still following the HOD!!!, making his slow but sure way down I-75-or maybe he went back inside the maze to roll barrels in front of exits. The flock of Reverend Rotts surely is faithful-you won't find a more devoted group of 'unholy rollers' anywhere in the Tri-State!
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