I exit my mother’s car and walk on the mushy grass and mud toward Asylum Run, located in Harrisburg. I have a huge smile anticipating a fun night with my Asylum Run family.
I take out my purple makeup bag, which holds everything I need to turn everyone at Asylum Run into nightmares. This year, our theme, “Freak Show,” required a lot of clown makeup. Some actors just blacked out their eyes because they wore masks. Knowing that I get to do what I love for the next few hours puts me in an extremely joyous mood. I walk over to the shed where we keep our extra makeup and pull out the clear, stacked cabinets. Tonight Raelee, the manager, sits inside, her gorgeous grey eyes lighting up when she sees me.
“Yay, you’re here tonight! Are you starting now?”
“Yep, where do you want me?” I say, champing at the bit to get started.
“Behind the shed should be fine,” she said.
I pick up the makeup cabinet and walk out, ready to set everything up.
For some people, makeup is a job, a hobby. In my case, it’s a lifesaver. I first discovered SFX makeup at a theater camp in 2014. The camp was held at Harrisburg Area Community College, HACC. The camp offered improv classes, making costumes and memorizing scripts. During this time, my depression haunted me—I was self-harming and had been hospitalized earlier that year. Doing makeup helped me to become someone else and something different. Knowing that I could do whatever I want to do without actually hurting myself makes me feel free. Whenever I felt sad, I would use glue and create burns. I didn’t have most of the supplies I needed, so I used eye shadows for colors and glue in place of liquid latex. Whenever I attempted a makeup with blood, I would use bright red lipstick, but this inhibited me from creating the looks I wanted. Trying to figure out how to make my passion a reality was difficult, but, eventually, I made it work. When I volunteered at Asylum Run, I learned techniques I later added to my special makeup effects toolbox.
Though SFX makeup is my favorite type of makeup, I also like to do beauty makeup—kind of like glam and gore. According to www.instyle.com, 86 percent of women in the United States who wear makeup said it makes them feel more self-confident. On average, women spend around $144 a year on beauty. Beauty makeup allows me to transform myself into different people and different things: Kylie Jenner, Lorde, Katy Perry, a man. Doing my makeup SFX or beauty helps me to feel more confident and happy with myself. Knowing I can create something that is beautiful and scary at the same time is pretty amazing. Getting to work with and meet new people, for me, is the best part of doing makeup. Picking up techniques along the way is also a great part of makeup. Anthony Stewart, a professional special effects artist, who’s currently working on Fox Network’s supernatural series, “Sleepy Hollow,” stated, “You get to dabble in a lot of different things around the shop, constantly learning new techniques and figuring things out, floating around from shop to shop, and occasionally landing a semi-permanent position.”
Stewart said special effects work is a hard field to get into. It’s all about who you know. “It took me a little bit to come to terms with just how much work it is, but, once I got into the swing of things and working more jobs, I kind of got hooked. Looking for work when one job ends gets easier,” Stewart said.
Although I want to go into a different field of special makeup effects than his, speaking with Stewart really gave me a clear idea on how to better my career. Being able to be creative is a great part of the job and being able to work with my hands will most likely help me to push myself harder. Eventually, I hope to win a season of the Sy-Fy network’s show “Face-Off” and get my career shot from there. Being in this field of work can also help to set myself up for other occupations.
When asked about his future in SFX, Stewart said, “…there are a few different paths this occupation could send me or anyone down.” Knowing that there are so many paths to pursue gives me hope for my future in my career. For example, Stewart is a professional sculptor as well as a creature designer—and an amazing one at that. “To become an established sculptor, you just need to work hard, practice until you’re good and then keep practicing because you can only get better.” When working with special effects, Stewart said that it’s always a good idea to have personal projects to show employers both enthusiasm and passion.
Knowing for myself that I can be pretty much anything I want to be as long as I have the correct mindset helps me to plan better for myself. Going into makeup is something for which I’ve always had a passion. SFX makeup is still extraordinarily new to me, and there are many things for me to try and to learn. Working at Asylum Run has helped me in so many ways, from the amazing and beautiful people that I’ve met there to the makeup skills that I now have today because of volunteering there. Asylum Run isn’t just a haunted house for me—it’s my home. It isn’t just, as NBC News says, “a $300 million industry,” it’s a place for people like me, who don’t fit into society, to feel safe and secure in their own skin and to be surrounded by people they know and love.
Eileen Reinnagel is a junior at CASA.
