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| 10/29/2008 12:17:00 PM | Email this article • Print this article | Pratt family lending a severed hand to Scare for the Cure project
LAURI ZACHRY
Education Reporter
One Round Rock ISD teacher and her family are spending the Halloween season scaring people for a good cause through their involvement with Scare for a Cure.
The Scare for the Cure haunted house will be open tonight and Friday, Oct. 31 at Elks Lodge No. 201, 700 Dawson Road, Austin, from 7:30 to 11 p.m., with a special midnight show Friday from 11:30 to midnight.
The assistant director of the production is Cedar Valley Middle School science teacher Susan Pratt.
"There is climbing, crawling, dodging and creepy people jumping at you at any given moment. We think everyone is out by the end of the night but sometimes we're not quite sure," Pratt joked.
The 40-minute interactive haunted house is modeled after two iconic Austin haunted houses: Richard Garriott's Britannia Manor and Wild Basin Preserve's Haunted Trails. Participants in the interactive haunted house serve as video game testers for Dunstan Interactive Entertainment (or DIE for short). The goal of the haunted house is to escape the mishaps of the game testing and kill the entity of Alice, the main evil character, played by Page Roberts. Roberts is a 20-year veteran with the Britannia Manor and Wild Basin Preserve's Haunted Trails.
"There are lots of special effects throughout the house," Pratt said. "Volunteers built hundreds of feet of rock wall to look like you are actually in a castle. All of the costumes are works of art. We have nothing store-bought here."
Because of the authenticity of things used in the haunted house, Pratt wants to take some of her science classes to the haunted house to learn the science behind what they have created.
She said there are over 80 actors and volunteer technicians who help each night to make Scare for a Cure a gouling success.
One of those actors is Chandler Roberts, a student at C.D. Fulkes Middle School. He plays an anti-virus software and serves as one of the youngest volunteers in the interactive haunted house.
He began volunteering with the interactive haunted houses at age 9.
"I like being a part of this, but I don't like going through the actual house because I know what to expect and it can be scary," Chandler said.
Robert's family members - Joe, Page and Jackie Roberts - are all involved or have been involved at one time with the production. Jackie Roberts is a junior at Round Rock High School.
The interactive haunted house also includes spoofs of popular video games such as "World of Horrorcraft," "Zombie Kombat" and "Tomb Robber."
Scare for a Cure is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to raise money for local cancer related charities. This year the proceeds of the interactive haunted house will go toward scholarships for students suffering from cancer or those students affected by immediate family members who have or who have had cancer. Last year the interactive haunted house raised $10,000 for the Breast Cancer Resource Center of Austin.
On a personal note, Pratt got involved with Scare for a Cure because she lost her father five years ago to cancer and she has lost several close friends to the disease.
Scare for a Cure's Austin haunted house started in the backyard of Jarrett Crippen's south Austin house. Crippen asked participants for donations of canned food for local food banks and even raised $5,000 for leukemia research. It grew year by year, with help from the drama troupes of local high schools.
In 2007, Crippen moved the production to the Elks Lodge. At that time volunteers who helped create Britannia Manor and Haunted Trails in years past also joined this new production.
Admission is $20 for adults, $15 for students (age 13 and over) and $25 for participants who want to go through the red level, or more challenging level.
For more information about the interactive haunted house visit scareforacure.org.
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