How Emmy-Nominated Composer Sara Barone Found Fear in the Feminine for Halloween Horror Nights

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Frankenstein. Dracula. The Mummy. Wolf Man. The Invisible Man. The things that go bump in the night and have haunted our screens for decades…has it always been men? Well no, Elsa Lanchester’s haunting portrayal of the Bride of Frankenstein is right there, but it’s undeniable that there’s a distinct lack of the feminine when it comes to horror (unless we’re talking about being the “Final Girl,” or the bodily terror that comes along with imposed standards of womanhood — everyone go see The Substance). Where are all my terrifying, morally-corrupt monster anti-heroines at?

Even events like Universal Orlando Studio’s Halloween Horror Nights, arguably one of the best (and scariest!) Halloween events in the country, their most revered yearly event Icons (a kind of monster-of-scaremonies, if you will), tend to be men: Jack the Clown, The Caretaker, The Director, The Usher, Doctor Rich Oddfellow. But this year, it was time for the women the bare their fangs and swipe their claws. While Guns N’ Roses’ Slash has previously collaborated for a whopping six seasons with Halloween Horror Nights in Hollywood on composing original scores for some of the haunted houses, this year, the team in Orlando tapped Emmy-nominated composer Sara Barone (Planet Earth III, Silver and the Book of Dreams, Grimcutty) to score “Universal Monsters: Eternal Bloodlines”.

It was a match made in heaven — er, the pits of hell? — as the house is headlined by a gathering of classic Universal Monsters femme fatales, like The Bride of Frankenstein, Dracula’s daughter, She-Wolf of London and mummified Egyptian princess Anck-Su-Namun. “Now was the time for us to investigate an all female cast,” Kelly Malik, Show Director at Universal Orlando Resort told Rolling Stone. “These female monsters have kind of been sitting in the shadows, if you will, and not having as much popularity in previous times. We thought about really bringing them to the forefront in the spotlight and giving them their due time.”

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The “Universal Monsters: Eternal Bloodlines” storyline finds fearless Saskia Van Helsing (an original character made for this year’s house) forced to forge an uneasy alliance with the Bride of Frankenstein to face off against Countess Marya in a battle for life and death, where only one bloodline will survive. We recently braved this house ourselves, and it’s one of the most compelling, goosebump-inducing original houses of the year, highlighted by Barone’s tense yet deeply poignant score. But we all know that behind every pulse-racing scare is a skilled HHN entertainment staff — and this year it was an all-female team behind the curtain, too.

“Kelly is the first female show director on haunted houses at Universal Orlando in over 10 years,” Lora Sauls, Universal Orlando’s Assistant Director of Creative Development and Show Direction, told us. “The last female show director was me. It really put it into perspective for me, and it’s huge for us that we could have a female cast with a female show director, lighting designer, character designer, and show lead — and of course, a female composer.”

We recently sat down with Barone, along with Sauls and Malik from the Entertainment team at Universal Orlando Resort to talk the inspirations behind this year’s Universal Monsters house, why music can influence and heighten our sense of terror, and why the monsters will always win in the end.

How does the planning process usually go for the Halloween Horror Nights? Did you intentionally set out to create an all-female house this year?

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Kelly Malik: Well, every year we plan for 10 walk-through haunted houses throughout the park, along with five scare zones in the midways. We start with a week of brainstorming and consider the themes of previous years, if there are any characters we want to bring back. We can pick the top five or six ideas, depending on how many IPs we have to fill out, [note: IP houses, or Intellectual Property houses are based on existing shows or films, such as this year’s Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire house] and we end up with a very diverse slate. Then we bring on partners such as technical designers, and partners like Sara, to do our score composition.

We know there are people that absolutely love slashers, and would love to have a whole slate of slashers, but that’s not for everyone. We really try to diversify the slate with creatures, slashers, fantasy horror and comedy horror houses, etc. Last year was such a success with our Universal Monsters house, but it was time for us to investigate an all female cast.

So what inspired “Universal Monsters: Eternal Bloodlines” specifically?

Malik: We really just dove into the storyline of how could these monsters come together? Then we created a heroine within Saskia Van Helsing, just to really drive the story. We partnered up with John Murdy [Creative Director of Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Hollywood] on the West Coast and he really fell in love with the idea as well. One great thing about this year too, is we do a lot of houses that have horror and fright in them. But this house has a unique sadness to it, though it really lends itself to the terrifying side of it as well.

Sara, how did you get involved in the in the project, and what was that process like for you?

Sara Barone: I got involved through the Universal Composers Initiative — I’m a part of this cohort which started earlier this year, and it’s an incredible opportunity. There’s eight of us in the program, and when the team at Universal shared the chance to pitch, I was immediately so excited about it. I’m such a horror fan in every way, and especially a fan of the Universal Monster Universe. Being primarily a film and television composer, working on something that’s an immersive experience like this was just so exciting and just a very, very different kind of creative process.

How was making that switch like? What do you focus on more when you’re working on something that’s a physical experience versus TV or film?

Barone: It’s very different in that I’m not working to picture — but in terms of storytelling, it’s pretty similar. Laura and Kelly and the team were very kind to give me this wonderful brief that included the whole story, and so I felt like I could see it in my mind. It was a chance to do something that was incredibly thematic, because it’s a very character driven story.

Universal Studios, too, has this rich history of scoring in their films that I’m a big fan of. One of the Egyptian sections of the house has the ox and a moon, and The Mummy (1999) is one of my favorite movie scores of all time. It was fun to think about that history, but also bring my own voice to it, and in a modern context. I was also excited about the fact that it was female-driven, so I ended up using a lot of female vocals at the heart of the score in various ways. It’s such an emotional journey, so there’s a sadness to the score like we talked about, but there’s also a bit of a sense of adventure, and, of course, primarily horror.

Lora Sauls: The tonality, instrumentations and vocalizations that Sara put into this composition just really drives that storyline. It was the step before we got the scareactors that made it all come together and feel complete.

What do you think about the power of music to inspire horror within us?

Sauls: I think for me, the music can elevate the emotion you’re trying to convey in that particular scene, or for that particular character, or the type of scare that they’re trying to deliver to the guests. The music can really drive whatever that feeling is and the intensity of the scare, if you will. I’m also just going to add that I think what Sara did beautifully with this story is that she took us to different places. In this story we go to Egypt, we go to Romania, we go to London — and the different tones and instrumentations that Sara put within this score really took us to those locations as well.

Barone: I also felt like the direction that you guys gave was great, especially because we were very focused on the idea of having a leitmotif for Saskia. That theme gets repurposed in every section of the house, and at every moment in various ways. Hopefully that helps with the storytelling and the character development, having a kind of singable motif that you hear in different forms throughout that connects the entire story together.

What do you think having an all-female team brought to the house, or it’s storyline?

Sauls: We really just wanted to give opportunities, not just to have all female cast monsters, but a female show director, composer, show, lighting designer, and of course, a female composer. We have a female house lead, and I hadn’t thought about this truly until now. Kelly is the first female show director on haunted houses at Universal Orlando in over 10 years. The last female show director was me. This one especially put that into perspective for me. I’ve been at Universal Orlando now over 28 years, and I started my career as a singing and dancing Bride of Frankenstein — I never thought that I would be here.

I think it empowered all of us. We have a great character designer in Stephanie Masco — she creates all of our masks and makeup and wow, the She-Wolf she created for this house was just it. It wasn’t just, ‘let’s put eyelashes on a wearwolf’, you know? [Laughs]. There are so many times when we’ve been told to just put lipstick or eyelashes on the monsters, and that’s what we didn’t want to do with this haunted house. We wanted to make sure, especially with the She-Wolf character, that she was powerful, but still had a feminine quality. The bone structure, the hair line, and that feminine touch on the features without going overboard was more than what we’ve seen in the past.

Are there any parts of the score that you’re all particularly proud of?

Barone: Yes, I love the Egypt section — that’s very fun. But I don’t know. I think for me, it was really just the journey throughout that’s the best part. It starts really emotional, and transforms very quickly as well. Which in a way, compared to my experience scoring film and TV, was pretty technically challenging. You have a lot to say in very short spurts, and it needs to feel consistent. It needs to feel like it’s not stopping and starting, that it’s a full journey. Transforming Saskia’s theme with different arrangements was also a fun part, so I can’t choose.

Sauls: I really enjoy the last portion of the house with the epic battle, because at the end of the day, we have a fantastic score that is so thriving, and it just brings together this culmination of fear and anxiety with the music. It highlights the overpowering nature of all these monsters, because we are doing horror, and monsters are going to win.

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Malik: We gotta let them win. What was funny was that when we were walking Mike Aiello [Senior Director of Entertainment Creative Development] through the house for the first time, and he was like, ‘you what?‘. [Laughs] And I’m like, ‘it’s the monsters! We’re gonna bring them back! We have to let them win.’ I stand at the end of the house several times, and I just like to hear the guest comments. I can’t tell you how many times I hear, ‘I can’t believe they killed [Van Helsing]’. You’re either Team Saskia or you’re Team Drac, what are you gonna do?