Greene County residents relish ghoulish work in horror movie
Fright is big business and some local writers, actors and makeup artists are happily cashing in.
Author Michele Bowser of Spraggs and special effects artist Carly Riggi of Rices Landing have the creative juices that go into making zombie movies and writing ghoulishly funny books.
Bowser got her literary start as part of a Barnes and Noble writing group and was discovered by Burning Bulb Publishing after self-publishing her first book.
C.R. Nelson/For the Observer-Reporter
C.R. Nelson/For the Observer-Reporter
Author Michele Bowser of Spraggs poses with Alex Shields, who has a part in “Uncle John is a Zombie,” which will premiere Nov. 16 at the Oaks Theater in Oakmont.
She described the inspirations behind her three books: “Nuke Punk,” a look at the future from a 1980s movie thriller perspective, with a clown in a clown car being menaces by a tractor trailer, “The Hags of Black County,” based loosely on what she read on a Waynesburg internet chat page and “Don’t Yell at the Damn Desk Clerk!” that is largely a true tale of working the midnight shift at a Waynesburg motel.
“After enough time had passed – about five years – it became funny enough to write about,” she said.
The persona Riggi brought to life was that of Nancy Lee, one of her undead characters in the Doll Factory fright room at Haunted Hills Estate in Uniontown. This is her third season of acting and doing special effects there.
Riggi discovered her passion for the ghoulishly theatrical when she presented Romeo and Juliet as zombies as a ninth-grade project at Jefferson-Morgan in 2013 in which she got an A.
Her attention to every gory detail won her Best in Show at the 2017 Steele City Comic-Con for special effects makeup and she will be starting Douglas Educational School’s Tom Savini Special Effects Program in Monessen next year.
Bowser and Riggi recently worked on the set of John Russo’s film “Uncle John is a Zombie” in 2016. Russo wrote and acted in the original cult classic “Night of the Living Dead” in 1968 and brought the action home to the Pittsburgh area to keep the original zombie spirit alive.
“Uncle John” goes 45 years into the future from the 1998 film to cover the lives of the zombies who didn’t die but have been hidden in basements by their relatives. They are now trying to re-enter society and some of the challenges they face are fear, prejudice and zombie hunters.
Bowser, who is the niece of Leigh Shields of Shields Demesne Winery in Spraggs, got her family involved as extras and a special edition melomel wine, “Uncle John’s Brain Juice” that will be available during the movie’s Nov. 16 premiere at the Oaks Theater, located at 310 Allegheny River Blvd. in Oakmont. The movie begins at 7:30 p.m. and there will be a reception afterward.