A few years after legendary magician Harry Houdini crusaded against spiritualists and mediums, spook shows started popping up throughout North America and beyond. Also known as ghost shows, these late-night performances began by providing escapist entertainment for folks during the Great Depression. Principal attractions of these colorfully advertised events included the promises that guests would experience spirits communicating through a medium from beyond the grave and that they would see ghosts in the theater. Naturally, most people understood that there was nothing mystical about these shows — they existed to provide a sense of tongue-in-cheek wonderment, thrills and laughter.
Magic acts served as the centerpieces of these mystically-themed shows that began at or near midnight and typically featured both macabre and bawdy showmanship; had fantastical advertisements that promised incredible sights to the extent that P.T. Barnum would have approved; and which were typically followed by the screening of a horror movie.
According to Mark Walker, author of “Ghostmasters,” the preeminent text on spook shows, these performances gradually lost their audiences due to a number of factors, including the rise of a new invention called television, the downsizing of movie houses, and rising operational costs. And though midnight movie screenings are still enjoyed by niche audiences, spook shows have been all but completely relegated to history.
On Thursday, Peekaboo Gallery will present an homage/resurrection of the ghostly tradition at the historic Mayan Theater. The Exotikon Super Shock Show will include a performance by world-class magician Rob Zabrecky, spooky-themed live music by Ghouly Gal and Jimmy Psycho and the Infernal Order of the Black Flame, and burlesque performances featuring Emma Vauxdevil and Vita Devoid. There will also be horror-themed cocktails, a presentation on spook shows, and a gallery exhibition of vintage spook show posters and memorabilia. The show’s promotional language (including font and punctuation) pays tribute to the spook show advertisements of old. Peekaboo Gallery’s website proclaims that the 21-plus event will be “HORRIFYING! GHOSTS will FLY THRU THE THEATER! SKELETONS will come to life and parade on stage! MONSTERS will run among you in the AUDIENCE! Do you have the GUTS to attend? WE DARE YOU TO JOIN US!!!”
At the heart of this production is Jordan Reichek. An award-winning animation producer-director whose credentials include “The Simpsons,” “The Ren & Stimpy Show” and other popular titles, Reichek is the owner-operator of Peekaboo Gallery, which he has dubbed “The Pop Culture Time Machine™.” He is an avid collector of vintage records, furniture, automobiles, posters, illustrations, comics, clothing and more; among his principal focuses are tiki decor and Disney ephemera.
Through Peekaboo Gallery, he has produced gallery exhibitions that he likens to “museum-esque, theatrical experiences.” Last year, Reichek launched his Exotikon events brand. The brand’s first event, simply titled Exotikon, took place over three days at the now-shuttered Wisdome LA. And, despite a few hiccups, the event was quite glorious. The brand’s subsequent events, Exotikon Satellite Christmas Show and Exotikon 2, have taken place at the Mayan — as will the Exotikon Super Shock Show.
This reporter attended the inaugural 2023 Exotikon event on behalf of tiki lifestyle magazine Exotica Moderne and bore witness to possibly the biggest celebration of tiki culture that Los Angeles has experienced. Exotikon featured multiple galleries of vintage artifacts, including tikis and elaborate costumes worn by the late Yma Sumac. Among its extensive attractions, the event featured a presentation on tiki-inspired architecture by premier tiki historian Sven Kirsten; live music by a number of tiki-themed musicians — including the Tikiyaki Orchestra, one of the few first-rate exotica bands in the world — burlesque performances by a number of SoCal’s most well-known dancers; and an extraordinary tribute to Danny Balsz’s historic, Monterey Park amusement park, the Tikis, which thrived in the ‘60s and ‘70s. This tribute included a panel discussion, a performance by Polynesian dance troupe the Dancing Fire, and the culminating, staged virgin sacrifice into a smoke-bellowing volcano.
In short, Exotikon events provide first-rate, deep-dive celebrations that inform and entertain attendees on their respective subjects. For the Exotikon Super Shock Show, featured performer Rob Zabrecky — frequently billed simply as Zabrecky — possesses the credentials to perform an honorable tribute to the all-but-vanished showcase style. For the past 15 years he has been performing reenactments of Victorian seances at the Magic Castle, and, following the retirement of Leo Kostka, Zabrecky as been the iconic venue’s resident medium. Regarding spook shows, in particular, he will be contributing an introduction to Mark Walker’s upcoming follow-up to “Ghostmasters.”
“Spook shows have been a part of my life for 25 years, all because of this place right here, the Magic Castle,” Zabrecky said. “I like to think of spook shows as an early form of immersive theater because what you had were these magicians performing these seance-y kind of effects. And then, gorillas might be unleashed, and ghosts might come out in the audience. It was this ephemeral experience where people might have been in your face — not dissimilar to an escape room.”
He pointed out that as spook shows started fading from the cultural landscape, some theater owners recognized that there was still a market for midnight entertainment, which included other types of interactive events such as “The Rocky Horror Picture Show,” and, more recently, “The Room.”
“People are going to see that, and they’re throwing footballs around; they’re talking back to the screen, and that is not much different than what these spook show performers were doing,” Zabrecky said. “They were on stage, and they were working with the audience, and these things were happening in real time.”
In regards to the modern appeal for something like Exotikon’s show and what audiences might expect, Zabrecky pointed out that there’s always room for nostalgia. “I think it’s safe to say we’re gonna be going with a very vintage approach to this,” he said. “My character is sort of this B-movie hypnotist outsider person who’s a little bit off, in general. And yeah, there’s going to be conjuring of spirits; there’ll be some magic, some comedy, and maybe some hell’s gonna break loose during all of this. I’m not gonna say how, in advance; you have to come and see it for yourself.”
As for Reichek and his decision to produce a spook-show showcase for modern audiences, he said his plan “was always to do a Halloween show, which most people will tell you is insane, because the haunt season here in L.A. is so saturated. But I’ve looked at the haunt season stuff and the offerings, and I’m like, ‘Yeah, but it’s all modern horror.’” He added, “What are the people who are into vintage culture going to do during Halloween? Sure, there’s Disneyland, but it’s for kids. And since one of my multiple collections concern spook shows, which are vintage-themed horror, that’s the route I decided to take.”
