Fright Nights is a an annual special event hosted by Movie World on the Gold Coast The Event features several haunted mazes that I was fortunate to be involved with, working along an extremely talented crew, where we tasked with theming out 3 of the 5 mazes on site.
I came on board as a Set Builder and Decorator, focusing on building and dressing the rooms to suit the brief. Having a talented Scenic crew to work with assisted the process, knowing the finishing of each room would really bring the space to life. We worked long hours, over 2 months of work, with the feedback very positive, our attention to detail and world building was like nothing they had seen before at the park.
Hellship
‘Hellship’ was a sunken ship overrun by a sea witch, who had opened up a portal to hell.
The first maze I worked on, fitting out several rooms with additional structures in order for the scenic team to come through and overlay the entire maze with a concrete render and paint job to reinforce the sunken ship aesthetic.
Circurse
A prohibition dust bowl era travelling Circus is ransacked and burnt to the ground by a rival sideshow. However, many of the looters are still hanging around waiting to pick off anyone else daring to walk through the debris.
The ‘Circurse’ maze allowed for a of creative expression, telling the story of the ransacking and what evidence would be left behind. Burning piles of debris, broken cages, and heads on spikes were just some of the crazy ideas we were able to play around with.
DCeased
A virus has spread amongst the cities of the DC Universe, rapidly infecting everyone. The Superheroes try to stop the spread, but many of them fall victim to the virus. A spaceship set to leave Earth in a last ditch attempt to save humanity, is commandeered by an infected Superman.
This Maze was based on a popular comic book run, which helped us visualise and build a consistent theme and style throughout the maze. A lot more time and effort was put into this flagship maze of the fright nights event, with approval granted from the theme park as well as the DC company.