Las Vegas Weekly

October 30, 2008 · 10:08 AM

A sneak preview of Amazing Johnathan’s frightful Halloween party – expect some ‘missing persons’

By Robin Leach

This publicity shot indicates the sensibility of Amazing Johnathan's act.

Photo: Planet Hollywood

More than 1,500 morbid fans of the macabre will show up tonight (Thursday) at Amazing Johnathan’s annual Halloween horror-fest. This year he’s dubbed the devil’s decadent display with a “Missing Persons” theme because, as he says: “Some people will simply get lost in it -- and never get out. I’ve got the body bags lined up already!” Expect to see his fellow magicians David Copperfield, Criss Angel, and Penn & Teller, along with such other Strip famous faces as Carrot Top among the crowds.

In an exclusive sneak preview for Luxe Life, AJ explained that he’s turned his eastside Vegas warehouse into a closed mortuary with a hidden basement where his party guests will start out after taking a shaky scary elevator ride. “This just isn’t for the faint of heart,” AJ told me. “This fourth year will be the most horrific party I’ve ever produced. I’ve spent almost three months creating and building everything for the one-night. If last year’s guests thought it a 5 on a fright scale of 10, then this year’s goes right off the charts!

“When the elevator crashes and opens it’s a long, long underground mine shaft with pieces of crisscross wood. They will walk down a really, narrow corridor through waterfalls, dripping water and cobwebs. Bu the ceiling keeps getting lower so they wind up crawling through it and there’s a lot of unexpected surprises I’m not even going to let you in on.

“This year for the first time we’re also doing it in 3D. Everything is 3D down that first corridor so they will have to wear special glasses which means triple the danger because its right in your face. The hallway leads to a big, gigantic maze, that’s completely black. You can’t see anything in it. The maze is almost three times the size of last year and there are no lights. The only way you can escape is by feeling the walls. I’m going to confiscate all cell-phones or have a tour-ghost down there to prevent anybody cheating by lighting up an escape path.

“Its likely that some of these people will never get out of the maze -- and thus ‘Missing Persons.’ I have a lot of ripped and bloody clothing already from the test-runs of people that couldn’t get out. There will be a long hallway of mortuary body bags that they have to push their way through -- some of them contain live people and some of them mannequins. We also have a very good shocker when they go to grab onto the railing -- it collapses as they try to hold on and as it falls they will also be electrified. That’s my favorite part. I don’t have to worry about insurance or anything like that because it’s not open to the public so it’s anything goes. Just when they think they’re getting close to a way out they enter the long, last corridor and are chased by dogs it gets so narrow the only way is to move sideways very quickly as the snarling menacing dogs approach closer and closer.”

If tonight’s guests make it that far, with some assistance from his Krave Theater sidekick, Psychic Tanya, they wind up in AJ’s party room which will feature “the most bizarre and unique” showbiz acts all night long.

“People expect us to outdo each other as far as how decorative the acts get,” said AJ. “Last year you couldn’t miss it, we had people in the air hanging from bungee cords performing a sex machine demonstration. This year, if it all comes together like I hope, we have ‘a choir of nuns and priests,’ who will stop singing and breakout into an all out orgy onstage.

The first year it started, when you came, I think there were about 300-400 people, and then it grew to 800 and then 1,500 last year, so who knows? Who knows if we might reach 2,000 -– and then the police come to break it all up!

“In terms of fright and fear, it will be a lot scarier than last year because we have the death theme throughout this whole thing. I worked almost three months on this -– and it will take the guests who do get out about 10 minutes down there amongst the horrors! I promise you that Copperfield will go through it -- and wind up screaming. Criss will come down after his media shows for Believe -– and I’ll go see his show tomorrow night (Friday) at the premiere. Last year, Pamela Anderson came, the band Godsmack was here. Every year the word leaks out and we get more celebs. I know Pantera will definitely be here tonight.

“I promise plenty of blood curdling chills and there’s real danger with most of the stuff, so it’s not really fake things. The ultimate fright night and no rules. Some people could go missing for the rest of their lives and other people could just have a heart attack and vanish. A lot of people will get mad when they come out to the other side. Not very happy, because they’ve had to crawl and then the room where the ceiling goes down way too far, I mean it goes down real low- and then you can hear people complaining, ‘OK, this is not funny anymore.’ That’s the stuff I think is funny.”

Luxe Life will have the full photo and celebrity report of AJ’s insanity on our all new VegasDeluxe.com website at the weekend, so don’t miss Halloween’s wildest and moist bizarre party.

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