At this permanent haunted house, Halloween terror reigns

There’s a permanent scary Halloween haunted house in Thousand Oaks.

Bruce Stanton and his friends show up every October to unlock its doors and lead people through “Blood Manor,” the “Mineshaft” and a creepy execution scene where a man appears to be hanged with a loud clank.

The 15-year-old Reign of Terror Haunted House is located in a former Best Products warehouse atop what is now a Gold’s Gym at the Janss Marketplace shopping center. It has operated there each October since 2010. It will be open Thursday through Saturday, its final day of this year.

Stanton, 43, is a dental implant equipment salesman who started operating a do-it-yourself haunted house in 2000 at his Thousand Oaks home.

“As a kid, I’d trick-or-treat in Culver City. The smallest things, a bloody hand or spider webs, were the coolest. When I owned my own home, I wanted to continue that Halloween tradition. I started out pretty small and eventually converted my whole house into a haunted house,” he said while leading a group of teenagers through the sprawling, maze-like series of frightening scenes.

“We’d pack up the furniture and build ‘rooms’ in the frontyard and sideyard. The real house was about 1,500 square feet. The haunted house was about 2,000 square feet.”

In 2008 Stanton’s haunted house outgrew his home and moved to the 2,500-square-foot Conejo Recreation and Parks District’s community center.

“We outgrew that space before we even started,” he said. “The district had a great relationship with the Janss Marketplace and the next year we moved to an 8,000-square-foot shoe store space there. That was great, but we still had to set up and tear down the haunted house.”

Mall marketing manager Heather Danko remembered the unused warehouse above the gym. The elevator in that building had been decommissioned and walled over, and the upper level was vacant. She offered that 30,000-square-foot space to Stanton. He decided that the offer of a free, permanent home for the haunted house was too good to pass up.

This year, there are about 70 different sets in the dark, maze-like space. There are six different themes — the claustrophobic Mineshaft, a traditional Victorian haunted house, Blood Manor (“which is grandma’s house gone wrong,” Stanton said), a “postwar experimental backwoods laboratory,” a backwoods area “where the hillbillies live” and an insane asylum area.

“My favorites are the Mineshaft because of its high level of detail and its claustrophobic feel, and the Victorian — it’s so traditional to a haunted house,” Stanton said.

About 50 volunteers help build the sets and serve as actors during this year’s 11-night run. They range in age from 18 to 76, which is the age ofSally Garcia of Thousand Oaks. Some have taken part in the annual event for nine years.

“We want to be a cross between Disneyland and Universal Studios. We want every corner touched, with entertainment from the first time you cross our door until you exit. We want that Universal quality of scare and horror and set decor. We feel like we’ve totally achieved it,” Stanton said.

Tickets to the haunted house are $17, and $25 for a front-of-the-line pass.

Stanton, who confesses that he has spent “hundreds of thousands of dollars” on equipment and building materials for the Halloween house, said proceeds from ticket sales are donated by Janss Marketplace to the recreation and parks district’s teen center and theater group. Over the last five years, that has totaled about $58,000.

“We bring hundreds of 2x4s and hundreds of sheets of plywood every year through the standard-size door and up the stairs,” Stanton said.

Volunteer Jason White, 39, an information technology manager from Camarillo, said he volunteers about 30 hours a month in September and October refining and operating the house’s lighting and sound effects. During the rest of the year, he works 10 hours to 15 hours a month on the haunted house.

“We’ll never be finished building this,” added another volunteer, Dawn Morda, 39, of Ventura.

Teenagers on the tour from Newbury Park and Thousand Oaks high schools were awed by the zombies and ghouls.

“A woman came out in the darkness and whispered in my ear while I was trying to get out of the room,” said a still-shaking Molly Pendergast, 16, a junior at Thousand Oaks High.

“I was extremely scared,” confided Raevyn Walker, 16, a junior at Newbury Park High. “I didn’t actually go through the whole thing.”

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Twitter: @BobsLAtimes