Everybody sing together now “It’s the most wonderful time of the year”—especially if you’re an addict for zombies and spider webs over Rudolph and wreaths. In Hollywood, you’ll find puh-lenty of company, too. Just take a look at “Dancing With The Stars” cast David Arquette, Chaz Bono, and Ricki Lake (picture at Halloween Horros Nights at Universal Studios, Hollywood).
The city may be nicknamed “Tinsel Town”, but why save the tinsel for the Christmas tree when there’s a much better reason to slice the stuff up now and put it to good use?
When you pull a psychological focus on the deep-seated motivations behind our Fascination with the Freaky, it’s easy to understand why a lot of Hollywood yearns to book Transylvanian escapes this time of year.
In a piece on the Psychology Today website, Dr. David Pincus of Chapman Universityasserts: “on a biological level, each person has his or her own distinct level of baseline arousal. This is the level of stimulation in our nervous system when we are at rest. Some people are more ‘amped up.’ Others are ‘under-aroused.’ Paradoxially, the underaroused people are the ones most likely to enjoy scary movies, as well as motorcycle rides, tattoos and piercings, roller-coasters, gambling, recreational drugs, playing contact sports, and so on.”
Someone could likely add “movie and TV stardom” to that list—right, Doc?
Pincus goes on to clarify: “…these folks…love both Halloween and also horror films; the nastier the better. Ironically, folks like (this) find the effects calming. Again, it is paradoxical. Thrilling information from the environment ramps us up to a more comfortable level.”
Further, on a “let’s invoke the deep dead guys” level, Pincus explains: “Jung suggested that everyone has a persona – the face they put on for the world, and also a shadow-side – the darker, more hidden aspects of personality that run counter to the persona. The two sides run in balance to one another, such that the bigger one’s persona becomes, the larger is the shadow that is cast.”
Even the Justin Bieber crowd could figure this one out. Hey; an opportunity to let out one’s “shadow side”? AND get away with it? Better yet: get some wicked-cool publicity out of it? Who’s in?
Looks like the Biebs himself is at the head of that line. During a recent shoot for a commercial promoting his “Someday” perfume, the pop star pranked his unsuspecting co-star by donning a hockey mask, a la “Friday the 13th”’s Jason . A more notorious member (oh, let’s just call him President) of the Halloween Prankster Club is Rainn Wilson, whose 2009 “Guide to Halloween Pranking” is one of the most famous—and, weirdly, harder to find than a working flashlight at Camp Crystal Lake—vids on the ‘Net .
Wilson himself recently appeared on the blood-red carpet at Universal Studios Hollywood’s Halloween Horror Nights Kick-Off Party, prior to accepting an Eyegore Award for his work in 2003’s “House of a 1,000 Corpses”, directed by this city’s patron saint of Halloween: Rob Zombie (Universal’s five-week Halloween party contains a terror maze designed by the singer/writer/director/bad-ass, as well as Eli Roth of “Hostel”, and honorary bad-ass Alice Cooper).
Shockingly, Saint Zombie doesn’t have a personal Halloween blow-out on tap…the man’s too busy working on the stuff that actually feeds Halloween fantasties. Fresh off a summer tour with Slayer, Zombie starts putting down footage this week on a new film he’s written and will direct: “The Lords of Salem”, shooting on location in Salem, MA. The film tells the tale of modern-day DJs who are contacted by 300 year-old witches, out for blood in revenge for the wrongs on their ancestors in the city’s famous witch trials.
In Hollywood news, for others, however, the occasion is a full-on command to throw the dry ice into the punch and kick up the zombie-rific party tunes. You’ve either been living under a rock or dressed up like one if you haven’t heard of Heidi Klum and Seal’s famous annual bash, in which They-Who-Never-Age dazzle us with costumes that somehow always one-up themselves.
This year being no exception:
For 2011, the power couple is waggling eyebrows even before hitting the party: by announcing they’re moving the celebration from New York to Las Vegas’s TAO Nightclub on October 29th , marking the first time you really will be able to get tickets to “O” if you want.
Other celebs “gettin’ Jungian with it” may surprise you. Harrison Ford, he of the wilderness helicopter rescues and famous whip-snapping skills, is gaining on Klum year-by-year for letting his “shadow side” romp free: a nun’s habit in 2010; a Lakers fanatic in 2009 and a pea pod for 2008’s All-Hallows Eve (way to eat your vegetables, Calista). All that effort—just for trick-or-treating runs with the kids, too! In years past, Mariah Carey and Nick Cannon have also gotten famously into the Halloween spirit , a tradition likely to continue with the two special additions to their family. 
If the idea of seeing the Cannons and the Fords out on the sidewalk doesn’t entice you, then take a look at what Kate Beckinsale will do for a handful of candy corn: Please tell us you DO eat a least one piece of candy corn each year, Kate. You’ve already wrapped “Underworld Awakening”, after all!
The Great Pumpkin flies in two weeks. String up the ghosts and get ready to watch the gory goodness, Hollywood Style.