For one night only, blood curdling screams and a shovel scraping concrete replaced the familiar sounds of music and dancing. This was the West High Dance Department’s annual haunted house, an event in which dance students and their teacher, Ms. V, completely transform the dance room and adjacent spaces into a terrifying labyrinth of horror.
The terror began before guests even entered. While waiting in line, Melody Kerch (12) stalked attendees by dragging a shovel along the ground, creating a shower of sparks and a deafening sound that sent people running.
Once visitors entered, the scares were imminent. A clown played by Lavender Libertor (10) greeted victims outside a room where other actors popped balloons, setting a daunting atmosphere from the start. Attendee Sara Sahdev (11), coming from the California Academy of Mathematics and Science , confessed that this was one of the most frightening parts: “the Pennywise one was really scary. I’m scared of clowns…the popping balloons.”
From there, the maze snaked through a series of distinct nightmares: a gruesome doctor’s room with a disemboweled patient, a grim prison cell with tally marks scrawled on the walls and a hallway of silent, robed figures that attendee Mashfiq Rehan Khaja (12) finds “actually creative.” The path continued as actors performed cult-like rituals with bone-masked actors, through a bayou filled with fog and corn stalks, and until one reached a freaky contortionist that Sahdev noted “made [her] jump.”
This level of performance requires more than only a costume. The scare actors, many of whom are dancers, use physical training to create better scares. In a New Orleans-themed room, Camilla Guzman (10) highlights the importance of “timing to know when the people are coming in and when they’re the most vulnerable.” Fellow actor Milena Kerch (12) adds that “you need your center of balance so that you don’t fall over and you can reach out as far as possible.” Nikki Wheeler (10), who used a loud fan for scares, hoped the “random pop” of sound would terrify guests.
For other performers, their role in creating a spooky experience for visitors was all about acting. Libertor, a theater student, explained that the “dramaticized nature of theater” helped him embrace a clown’s “over-the-top feelings.” The secret, according to scare actor Melody Kerch, is patience. “You have to watch. You have to wait,” she explains, “and you have to figure out when their guard is down.”
Orchestrating these individual scares into a cohesive nightmare is Ms. V’s creation, and she has been running the event for eleven years. She believes the haunted house is another avenue for her students’ artistry, stating, “I feel like dancers are performers too, and dancers can be very creative… It gives them another outlet to show that.” However, the event did not come without its own real unexpected scares. Ms. V shared one of the more bizarre, unexpected moments from this year’s event: “somebody stole our banner off the fence this year. Who steals a banner? Isn’t that weird?”
Regardless of bizarre setbacks like the stolen banner, the show had to go on, especially considering the sheer amount of time invested. Planning is a year-long process, but the students were still able to truly bring it to life. Amanda Bloomfield (10) describes setting up the rooms as “really fun” and a way to “bond with the people I was setting up with.” Christie Nguyen (10) agrees it was “fun to see the room come together.” Sofia Palfi (10), another scare actor, emphasizes that the event “really brings the [dance] team together, because all levels have to cooperate together.” Riley Flaskerud (10) echoes this sentiment, adding, “it’s very nice, especially in the dressing room when we were all getting dressed and ready, I think it was such a nice sanctuary to be a part of.”
This strong sense of camaraderie behind the scenes translated directly into the terror felt out front, where the effort was clear to attendees. “I expected a much smaller house,” admits Khaja, “but this one had a lot of different rooms, so it was a great change of pace.” Ms. V notes that guests are “amazed that we’re able to pull it together and tear it down in a 24 hour period.”
Given the exhaustion of such a quick event and the massive scope of the project, one might wonder why she continues. When asked what keeps her motivated to tackle such a massive project year after year, Ms. V admits she almost did not do it this year. The reason she did? “It’s the students, for sure,” she asserted. “They…said, ‘We got you.’ And they stepped up a lot.”
With the screams fading and the fake blood washed away, the West High Dance Department proved once again that they can command a stage in any genre. Whether through graceful pirouettes or terrifying jump scares, these students and their dedicated teacher know how to put on a show, leaving guests already trembling in anticipation for next year’s nightmare.
