Client: Mountain Charley’s
Project: The Haunted Bar: A Spooktacular Pop-Up Theme Bar
Location: Los Gatos, California
Event Type: Pop-Up Restaurant and Bar
Attendees: 3000+
The Challenge:
Historical Los Gatos landmark Mountain Charley’s (built in 1972) welcomed ThemeDream to design, produce and market a 31 day Halloween themed pop-up bar & dinner show during the month of October.
The Results:
ThemeDream transformed this historical Los Gatos landmark bar into an almost unrecognizable creepy haunted mansion setting. Guests entered through an indoor haunted forest with eerie low-hanging fog that led to a dilapidated front-of-the-house facade with lurking ghosts peering out its LED screen windows at their approaching, trespassing guests. Once walking inside our haunted house, guests were greeted above by creepy portrait paintings that, one by one, came to life (via LED screen) to reveal their cursed subjects. Above the bar, rested three comedic bust sculptures with map projected faces heckling bar guests with comments like “Choose your poison carefully, as it maybe your last” or “You look about as stiff as that scotch!”. While a skeleton singer eerily performed, guests enjoyed plush couch seating with coffin-shaped lounge tables while sipping on “haunted cocktails” such as “The House Favorite” served in a poison bottle, “All Dolled Up” served in a creepy doll head mug and “Seance” served on fire in a skeleton hand glass with a tarot card coaster! Other spooky areas included a creepy doll wall haunted by two photo-friendly “Shining” twin sisters. The mansion owner’s study featured a library with a catacomb fireplace, LED screen flames, a ship painting that eerily transformed under black light, a backward hands-moving haunted grandfather clock, and an ode to Disneyland’s “Haunted Mansion” inverted busts that’s faces followed you as you walked by.
The Haunted Bar’s first ticketed attraction: “The Haunted Dinner: A Spooktacular Dinner Theatre Experience”. The Haunted Dinner featured a seated, 360° fully-immersive, state-of-the-art ghost show filled with paranormal performances by sword swallowers, aerialists, illusionists, singers, dancers, musicians, actors and more! Haunted Dinner guests embarked upon a frightfully delightful 6-course culinary journey of Halloween-themed plate presentations with wine and cocktail pairing options served by the living dead! Guests feasted their eyes on playful plate presentations with creepy course names such “I left my heart in San Francisco” where guests were served a gory heart made of red velvet cake, fondant and bloody berry sauce. Dinner show tickets for the entire five-week run show sold-out before doors opened to the activation and shows were selling out in less than a minute from being placed on sale!
The Haunted Bar’s 2nd attraction: "MUSIC TO BE MURDERED BY: A Killer Dance & Sing Along Show” was a first-of-its-kind, 360° fully-immersive, state-of-the-art "Theatrical Nightlife Show" featuring music choreographed performances by acrobats, ballet dancers, belly dancers, snake dancers, burlesque dancers, contemporary dancers, contortionists, aerialists, singers and musicians as our staff & guests cheered, danced and sang along to everyone's favorite classic Halloween-inspired songs ranging from Classic Rock, Top 40, Pop, 80's, Rock, Soul, R&B, Hip Hop, House Music & EDM such as Nina Simone’s “𝘐 𝘗𝘶𝘵 𝘈 𝘚𝘱𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘖𝘯 𝘠𝘰𝘶”, Frank Sinatra’s “𝘞𝘪𝘵𝘤𝘩𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘧𝘵”, AC/DC’s “𝘉𝘢𝘤𝘬 𝘪𝘯 𝘉𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘬”, Prince’s “𝘓𝘦𝘵’𝘴 𝘎𝘰 𝘊𝘳𝘢𝘻𝘺”, Missy Elliott’s “𝘎𝘦𝘵 𝘠𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘍𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘬 𝘖𝘯”, and Notorious B.I.G.’s ”𝘏𝘪𝘱𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘻𝘦”.
Services Provided:
Creative Direction ◇ Experiential ◇ Fabrication ◇ Immersive Environments ◇ Set Design ◇Audio/Visual ◇ Lighting ◇ Custom Sound Effects ◇ Custom Décor ◇ Pneumatics ◇ Culinary Design ◇ Craft Cocktail Design ◇ Costume Design ◇ Make-Up Design ◇ Storyline Development ◇ Script Writing ◇ Actor Casting ◇ Show Directing ◇ Talent Management ◇ Graphic Design ◇ Photography Services ◇ Digital Marketing
