Poltergeist
The 1982 haunted horror hit Poltergeist is the original film in the trilogy. Written by Steven Spielberg and directed by Tobe Hooper the movie follows a family being terrorized in their own home by ghosts and an evil demon known only as Beast. The only thing creepier than the film is the curse that followed it and its cast.
Many believe the infamous Poltergeist curse started with the swimming pool scene in the first film. Instead of prop skeletons you see bobbing about in the muddy pool, it is reported that real human skeletons were used instead. Craig Reardon, a special effects artist who worked on the original film commented at the time it was easier to buy real skeletons than plastic ones, as the plastic ones involved labour in making them.
With the film’s prop budget in-tact so began the curse and the string of deaths that would eventually become as famous as the film itself.
On 4th November 1982, 6 months after the filming of Poltergeist , Dominique Dunn who played the oldest sister Dana, was strangled to death by her boyfriend John Sweeney at her Hollywood apartment. Dana was just 22 at the time; her boyfriend only served three years in prison.
In the second film Poltergiest II: The Other Side, the shaman played by Will Sampson a medicine man in real life, attempted an on set exorcism in hopes of ending the curse. He died less than a year later after complication from a kidney transplant.
Among the same cast 60 year old Julian Beck who played Kane died of stomach cancer. He was diagnosed with the disease before he took the role.
In 1988, during production of the third and final film, 12 year old Heather O’Rourke the young girl who played Carol Anne in all three films, died whilst filming the ending of Poltergeist III. After developing stomach cramps she soon took a turn for the worse and went into cardiac arrest where she was immediately rushed into surgery. She suffered from septic shock and died on the operating table. The films ending had to be shot with a body double.
This is where it gets more weird. Remember the football poster over the little boy's bed? Here's a closer look:
It says "1988 Super Bowl XXII." The poster is accurate in that Super Bowl XXII was in 1988, but it's weird that a little boy would choose to have that on his wall in a movie that was released in 1982. There's no indication throughout Poltergeist that any of it is supposed to take place in the future.So what? They probably didn't want to deal with licensing from the NFL or something, right? It's not like something insanely coincidental and horrible happened six years later on the day of the Super Bowl in 1988.No! That was a trick! Of course something happened. Remember that little girl Heather O'Rourke?
Well on January 31, 1988, the day of the Super Bowl in San Diego, California, O'Rourke happened to be living in San Diego where she passed away. And just like that, the movie proved its prescience with one of the weirdest set decoration choices in horror movie history.
Other strange events that add to the curse include, Oliver Robins who played Robbie in the original film and his near fatal accident set. While filming the scene where he gets attacked by the clown there was a malfunction with the mechanical toy and it nearly chocked Robins to death. Everyone on set just thought he was doing a great performance, it wasn’t until he began to turn blue that they realised something was seriously wrong. Robins suffered no damage after being freed from the clown.
Perhaps the most tenuous link to the curse, JoBeth Williams, who played the mother in the original movie, claims she returned home from the set each day to find pictures on her wall askew. She would then straighten them out, only to find them crooked again the next day!
Few years ago Lou Perryman, the man who played Pugsley in part one, got murdered in his home, by a man who, for no apparent reason, wandered drunkenly to the home of Perryman and killed him with an axe.
