A typical month of October for most teens usually consists of visits to the pumpkin patch, the purchase of seasonal fall drinks, pumpkin carving with friends, trick-or-treating and attending costume parties. However, this is not the case for London Gross.
For Gross, the month of October marks the start of her annual job: working at a haunted house. Gross has been a scare-actor for a total of eight years. When she was 8 years old, her father had introduced her to working at Enigma Haunt, a popular haunted house in South Florida located in Boca Raton, before it closed around 2021. Nightmare Village at Xtreme Action Park in Fort Lauderdale opened the next year after Enigma Haunt’s closing, around October 2022. Since then, Gross has been working there every October.
Working at a haunted house is not as easy as it may seem. “A lot of freaking work goes into haunted houses,” junior London Gross said. “Building, painting, setting up, working the animatronics, making props, teaching people how to scare, making sure there are no loose screws for people to hurt themselves on, zone leaders, makeup, cosplay, costumes — it’s a lot.” There is training that goes into haunted houses as well. For returning actors, they have to attend at least one acting training and one safety training, but for new actors, they have to attend two of each. The training is important because “it’s to teach you how to properly scare people and to basically show you where emergency exits are and what to do in case of an emergency,” Gross said.
All of these factors involved in creating a haunted house require a significant amount of time. “The building process of the entire house usually starts in April and takes all the way up till September to get everything ready,” Gross said. This year, their opening day was Sept. 28, and their last day will be Nov. 1. Depending on the day that you attend and how close it is to Halloween, the price ranges from $30 to $40.
Nightmare Village is open from 7 p.m. to midnight on Fridays and Saturdays and from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. on Thursdays and Sundays. Gross has to arrive earlier than that. “So when we go in, there is a costume and acting manager who tells us which position we’ll be working for the night, and we go to the board and sign in, where we get paid. And we go put our costume on, which is given to us by the costume manager, and then we get whatever makeup is designated for our area.” This process takes up to two hours due to the makeup and costumes.
The haunted house is one big house, but it contains three zones. The overall theme is a movie theater, and the people going through the house are the protagonists. They go through the “screen,” which leads to each zone of the house. The three zones are called the dollhouse, vampire house and hillbilly house, or “the cellar.” For Gross, her position as to which zone she is located in can vary.
Outside of working at a haunted house, Gross finds joy and relaxation in different hobbies. From the age of 4, she has been fixated on Jurassic Park and dinosaurs. They have been the inspiration for most of her artwork. She also takes walks after school and listens to music. “I really suggest it as it helps me a lot and gives me the energy I need after a long day,” Gross said.
As for the future of her job, Gross plans to continue scare acting. Despite the tiring nature, she enjoys participating and taking part in it. She hopes to be able to do it as much as possible.
