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‘Hellhouse!’ pokes fun at fundamentalists’ horror shows
HOLLYWOOD, Calif. – “I’ve got your homosexual lifestyle!” the demon cackles. “In hell! AHAHAHA!!!”
He laughs as the AIDS patient in the hospital bed is dragged from view by devilish hands.
High comedy? Some California entertainers think so. That’s a scene from their new live show Hollywood Hellhouse! – a self-styled spoof of Christian fundamentalism.
But is the damnation line simple satire, or does it really reflect God’s will? The answer depends on your theology.
The demon’s line is taken directly from a “hell house,” a Christian haunted house where ghosts and goblins are replaced by abortions and drug overdoses. The deliberately – and seriously – scary message the houses convey to children: Screw up in this life and you’ll burn in the next. But Hollywood Hellhouse! plays the same theme for adult laughs.
Real Halloween hell houses, staged across the country, include a famous example at a Cedar Hill church. The Hollywood parody, featuring Bill Maher as Satan and Andy Richter as Jesus, premiered in Los Angeles last weekend.
Gruesome scenes in real hell houses are intended to shock adolescents into believing that Jesus is their only escape from the fiery wages of sin. The folks in Hollywood say they’re using the drama to scoff at a literal hell and at ministers who try to scare the hell out of children.
“The material parodies itself so well,” said Maggie Rowe, the 30-year-old Los Angeles writer and actress who is the driving force behind Hollywood Hellhouse!
Similar scripts
It says something about a chasm in American culture that two groups that deride each other’s core beliefs use the same text to promote their own views.
Even so, some of the Hollywood cast members admit to a smidgen of doubt.
“Ninety-nine percent of me is sure we’re doing OK here,” said Michael Friedman, 35, an aspiring screenwriter. “One percent of me is worried we’re all going to hell.”
The Rev. Keenan Roberts is a conservative Colorado pastor whose Hell House Outreach kit was used for part of the Hollywood script. Despite a theological divide, he was a warmly welcomed and friendly opening-night VIP. God’s message, he said, would survive satire.
“I’ve told them this is really an honor,” he said before the show. “Whatever they’re doing with it … is something of a tribute.”
Ms. Rowe’s show is staged by a small army of LA entertainment pros. Many are almost-famous faces from commercials, movies and TV guest spots. Some have written for shows such as Six Feet Under, The Simpsons and South Park.
A day before the premiere, the crew finished recasting a two-story office building on Hollywood Boulevard as a chamber of horrors.
“There’s one small change in the human sacrifice scene,” Ms. Rowe said. Nearby, the tech crew was adding the grinding roar of a garbage disposal to an abortion scene.
Ms. Rowe, a close friend of just about everyone in the cast and many in the first-night audience, said that she was raised in a conservative Christian household – and that it warped her.
“The biggest fear of my entire life was going to hell,” she said.
Now she attends a Zen Buddhist center, where eternal damnation isn’t in the big picture.
Christian-themed haunted houses have been around since the 1970s as an alternative to Halloween. Some conservative Christians believe the season’s witches and ghouls are an unholy window into the occult.
Mr. Roberts, 39, was an assistant pastor at an Assemblies of God church near Denver when he created his Hell House Outreach in 1995. He said his kit – including a detailed script, staging directions and other material – has been sold to 555 churches in 46 states and 13 countries. (It sells on his Destiny Church Web site for $299, plus shipping and handling.)
‘Awful, dark’ humor
Last year, Ms. Rowe saw a documentary about the hell house that is produced each year by Trinity Church, a Pentecostal church in Cedar Hill.
“It just struck me as funny in an awful, dark, way,” she said.
She decided that the same script could be used to laugh at the beliefs behind the real productions.
“Religion needs to be rescued from fundamentalism,” she said.
From that perspective, the broadly played hell house scenes approach the gross-out humor of movies like Scream. If you believe that conservative theology is ridiculous, so is the show.
Ms. Rowe called some friends who called some friends. They rented an appropriate venue: the building owned by the Center for Inquiry-West, an organization that investigates reports of the paranormal and supernatural. Offices and hallways were draped with curtains and festooned with lights.
The show’s setup is like many Christian versions: People enter in small groups and are led from room to room by a “demon tour guide.” The Hollywood script uses scenes from Mr. Robert’s kit and the Trinity Church version:
• A girl’s throat is sliced in a satanic ritual after she was led to the occult by Goosebumps and Harry Potter books.
• A fetus ripped from a pregnant young mother – part by recognizable part – by a verbally abusive “abortion doctor.”
• A girl shoots herself after being gang-raped when her drink is spiked at a rave.
• A teen shoots his classmates, his teacher and himself in a “Columbine-style” attack.
• A hugely pregnant woman bleeds to death after taking the abortion drug RU486. (She goes to heaven after calling on Jesus for help.) And a gay man dies of AIDS.
• Hell and Satan are depicted. (A horned, cloven-footed Mr. Maher delivered profanity-laced ad-libs on opening night.)
• A portrayal of Heaven includes a silent Jesus (Mr. Richter).
• In a “fellowship room,” “youth group” members encourage people to “pin their sins” on a painting of Jesus.
Funny? You had to be there. But many were laughing on opening night, even though some had to wait more than two hours for their 30-minute tour.
The abortion scene, among others, drew audible gasps and laughter – both nervous and heartfelt.
For that scene, Mr. Roberts’ kit – the one intended for straight-faced presentation – suggests raw meat to represent the fetus. Ms. Rowe opted for realistic latex body parts that a demon dangles in the faces of the audience.
“I didn’t know whether to laugh or to cry,” said Jen Mayer, 26, a development executive for Comedy Central in the first-night audience. “But I’m glad somebody did it.”
The stocky, baby-faced, blond Mr. Richter – the original sidekick on Late Night with Conan O’Brian – made for an incongruous savior in a cheesy fake beard, toga and white T-shirt.
“Rarely do I do comedy that’s pointed,” said Mr. Richter, a member of the United Church of Christ. “But this was a chance to make fun of a creepy, weird show that somebody puts on to scare kids into accepting the God of love.”
Producers of real hell houses say they’re only using what works in secular culture. Says Mr. Roberts’ church Web site:
“Shake your city with the most ‘in-your-face, high-flyin’, no denyin’, death-defyin’, Satan-be-cryin’, keep-ya-from-fryin’, theatrical stylin’, no holds barred, cutting-edge’ evangelism tool of the new millennium!”
Hell house supporters say their reading of the Bible is clear: Homosexuality is a sin, the occult is dangerous, and Jesus is the way out of eternal torment. The multifaith cast and crew of Hollywood Hellhouse! have no such unity of belief.
But in many ways, creators of the real and Hollywood hell houses occupy mirror universes: Both aspire to entertain. Both say it’s important to get their message out – even as they acknowledge that they won’t change many minds.
Both sides also say they know – and don’t much care – that they offend some people. Even many conservative Christians don’t approve of shock-style evangelism. And some on the other end of the religious spectrum aren’t comfortable with guerilla-theater satire as the best response.
Viewers’ opinions
Elisabeth Nixon is a graduate student in anthropology at Ohio State University who figures she’s been to hundreds of hell houses, hallelujah houses and tribulation trails in her study of American culture and folklore.
After watching Hollywood’s opening night, she said the actors delivered the same lines but missed the intensity of true believers.
“It may be real, but it’s not authentic,” she said. “It just comes across as lacking something.”
The Hollywood version was real enough for Padraic Duffy, 29, a playwright. He said he knew little about conservative Christianity and welcomed the chance to hear what evangelicals preach – in a nonthreatening setting.
“It was like a zoo of conservative thinking,” he said. “And they were safely behind bars.”
Mr. Roberts held his temper after his trip through Hollywood Hellhouse! He clearly wasn’t impressed.
“My expectations are met entirely,” the pastor said. “Our hell house is not like turning on Comedy Central.”
Hollywood Hellhouse! is scheduled to run every Saturday through Halloween. Other actors will cycle through the parts.
There’s no plan to take it on the road. But some of Ms. Rowe’s filmmaker buddies are shooting a documentary. Backers and opponents say they think Hollywood Hellhouse! will prompt discussions about American religious culture far from LA.
“I can’t think of a better way to start a conversation,” Ms. Rowe said.
Mr. Roberts figures he wins, no matter who sees the Hollywood spoof. His own annual Hell House opens in Denver on Oct. 14. And he says the publicity generated in LA will pay off for him.
“I will be answering my phones and my e-mails for the next five years,” he said, “equipping churches because of Hollywood Hellhouse!”
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