Moving Walls

 If there is one thing we know about walls, it's this: they are immobile.  Right?

People expect walls to be sturdy.  They hold up the ceiling.  Walls do not move.  Naturally, making walls move adds uncertainty to a patron's experience.

One way to to this is to have an actor open or move a wall so that it splits up a group of people.  It has the added bonus of unexpectedly making them go through the haunt without whoever was in front.

Simply push a hinged wall into the group while entering the scene.  The old hall is inaccessible and a new one is the only way through.

Another way is to move walls when they cannot see them move.  Maybe it's dark.  They come down the hall and come to a dead end.  They turn around, unsure how they missed the corner.  Maybe there is a new corridor that was not there before.  Maybe they are trapped in a box where a moment ago there was a hall.  Maybe they were alone, and now they are not.  Has the texture of the wall changed?

It does not have to be dark, of course.  They could simply go around a corner where they cannot see the wall behind them silently wing 90 degrees.  When they turn back, it's clearly into a different hall.

When I did this, I used both blackness - no light - and a corner.  When they turned the corner, there was a tableau for them to experience.  An actor changed the wall and got into a new position.  When they came back, in the dark, they ran into a wall of fur.  They were SURE they had not been there before.  There were some other tactile surprises for them too.  Many had no idea how this had been done, even after going through a second time.  A simple trick, but it plays against what we "know" about walls.  Walls don't move.  Right?

Happy Halloween!