Ryan Hatt is not what he appears.
With his small frame and (seemingly) innocent smile, you might not know that his two passions are baking (and consuming) pastries and scaring people half to death. The manager of the new 4D attraction at the Terror Behind the Walls haunted house at Eastern State Penitentiary, Hatt has worked with the site in different capacities for almost a decade.
If you haven’t been, do not pass go and go straight to jail for one of the top-rated Halloween sites in the nation.
PGN: So what makes you so drawn to the macabre?
RH: I’m not sure. When I was 18, I went to Terror Behind the Walls and one of my friends said, “You should work here, it would be perfect for you!” I’m not quite sure what he was saying about me, but it stayed in my mind and the next year I auditioned and got hired to play this intimidating inmate and a prison guard in an attraction called Intake. It’s really funny; when I look back at my childhood, I never dressed up as anything scary. One year, I was Arthur the aardvark, another year a Tootsie roll, another year an M&M, so I’m not sure where the scary and macabre influence came from. But it’s something I’ve definitely adopted and fallen in love with. I like the relationship of scaring people. It’s such a symbiotic relationship; I’m putting all my energy into the scare and you’re giving me your energy back and we’re both getting a charge out of it. It’s a real adrenaline rush.
PGN: Ha, your childhood costumes combined the two factions that became your professions: food and Halloween.
RH: Yes! I’ve always loved sweets and desserts and now I’m a pastry chef and a ghoul. I love my work, I love to talk about it. I have the best careers ever. I’m really fortunate. Some people have a hard-enough time finding one job they like and I have two that I’m equally passionate about.
PGN: Where do you hail from?
RH: A small town in South Jersey called Westmont. It’s in between Haddonfield and Collingswood. It’s a typical quiet, suburban town. I lived there for the first 14 years of my life and then we moved to Waterford, N.J., out in the Pine Barrens, which is Jersey Devil country. I think that’s what first sparked my interest in mythological creatures, like Mothman, the crazy moth creature from West Virginia who supposedly terrorized a whole town. I was into all the conspiracy type of things and of course the Jersey Devil.
PGN: So did you ever see it out in the Pines?
RH: No, I wish! I wish …
PGN: Did the family go all out for Halloween?
RH: Not really. We put up decorations, but we weren’t that house — you know, the one covered in lights with giant figures on the lawn.
PGN: My mother used to dress up and paint her face stark white and stand on the lawn as if she was a statue. She would stay perfectly still as people commented on how life-like our decorations looked and then she’d suddenly move, scaring the heck out of kids and parents. It saved on candy because people were afraid to come up to the door!
RH: I loved those houses where people really put out an effort to make it fun!
PGN: What did your folks do?
RH: My mother worked for a company that made Corian; it’s a material used for countertops. She worked there for as long as I could remember. Both my grandmother and my aunt worked there too, and my dad is a cabinet-maker. He built a lot of cabinets at the Jersey Shore and used a lot Corian in his work and I think that’s how they met. Then he moved down South, Florida and Georgia, to build cabinets for airplanes and now he’s in Ohio.
PGN: Is that where you get your wanderlust genes from?
RH: Oh definitely. He used to be a long-distance trucker before that, so he’s been all over.
PGN: [Laughs] So how old were you when you realized that dressing up as a Tootsie roll probably meant you were gay?
RH: Honestly, I always knew. There was never a question for me. As soon as I knew what the word meant, I was like, “Oh, that’s me.” I remember telling my best friend when I was 7 years old. I’ve always existed as a queer person and all my friends always knew for as far back as I can remember. It was never anything weird or foreign and I’m so lucky for that. I told my parents when I was in my teens and they were both super-accepting. My dad was like, “Uh, I know already,” and my mom was like, “I’m your mother. You think I don’t know?”
PGN: What were you like as a youngster?
RH: I was loud. I was always a loud kid. I was always wandering off and going on adventures. I had that desire to explore.
PGN: What was the farthest you explored?
RH: I was all over the place. As soon as I could walk, I was out of the stroller. I remember one time we were in Macy’s and I was hiding in a pots and pans display. My mom panicked because she couldn’t find me. After that, I had to hold her hand whenever we went out. I didn’t mean to scare anyone. I was just always like, Oooh, what’s over there?
PGN: What’s a story that your mother tells about you?
RH: I was the biggest momma’s boy. If anyone else tried to hold me, I’d cry and cry. I think it really made her feel validated. [Laughs] “Yeah, my son hates everyone else, but he loves his momma!”
PGN: What was your favorite class in school?
RH: I think it was English. I had a teacher, Mrs. Zanella, who instilled the love of language in me. Because of her, I learned the art of communicating effectively with people, whether it be through writing or speech. I’ve used the skills that she taught me when spreading messages on queer politics and animal rights and my veganism. It’s also helped with my work here at Terror. As an attraction manager, I have to be able to effectively train my team on things like how to scare or the correct evacuation procedures. I’ll always be grateful to her.
PGN: What was your first foray into activism?
RH: When I was 12, I went vegetarian; that was my first stand, and then I went vegan a few years later. Animal rights have always been important to me and they’ve always intersected with queer rights and other protected classes. I just think we shouldn’t commodify somebody else’s body for our own gain, whether it’s human or non-human animals. To me, it’s all linked together. Whether we’re talking about trans rights or trans inclusion or people of color in the queer community, it’s about making sure there are safe spaces for everyone. Same thing for animal rights: We need to make sure that every living being capable of suffering does not suffer. It’s one of the reasons why I love working here at Eastern State. We’re very inclusive as a workplace. It’s a really supportive and loving community. We’re like one big family that looks out for each other.
PGN: Name an organization that you’re working with right now.
RH: There’s a group called Food Not Bombs, and we prepare and distribute vegan meals for the homeless around Philadelphia. They’re a great organization. I also work in the hardcore-punk music scene trying to make it more inclusive. We intervene if we find that a venue has done something problematic, like discriminating against a particular class of people.
PGN: What was a moment where you had to step in?
RH: When I was in Morocco, I was on a tour and we had a stop where we were supposed to ride camels to our next destination point. I stepped to the front of the bus and said, “Look, I don’t feel comfortable riding this animal when I’m not able to get consent from it. If anyone wants to join me we can walk to the other side. I’m just speaking here as a person to create a space so no one feels pressured if they don’t agree with this form of abuse and want an alternative.”
PGN: You’ve traveled to 38 countries. What was your first trip overseas?
RH: When I was really little, I went on a resort trip with the family to Jamaica but I don’t know if I’d really count that. Two winters ago, I went to New Zealand with my friend, Leah, who also works [at Terror Behind the Walls]. We used all the money that we saved from haunting to do an incredible tour of the country. We stayed in hostels and backpacked around and saw the islands. We did everything from skydiving to zorbing, which is rolling down a hill in a giant plastic bubble, and sledging, which is like white-water rafting on a boogie board. That was my first real trip overseas and it was incredible. It made me want to see more places and so last year, after the haunt ended, I took off and started a 38-country tour across five continents.
PGN: Wow, you made up for lost time!
RH: Yes, I took a pair of 3D glasses from one of our exhibits and took a picture of me wearing them in each country that I visited. On our website, there’s a section called Tour Guide Chronicles and you can see pictures of me standing in front of places like The Sphinx in 3D glasses!
PGN: What a great idea.
RH: Yes, and I got to go to some cool haunted houses in other countries, which is rare; they don’t really celebrate Halloween much outside the U.S. But there was one in New Zealand that was pitch-black and you’d just follow red LED dots to find the path. Some of the dots were held by actors so, at any time, the path could shift. I also went to one in Malaysia that had a 3D attraction similar to ours, which was interesting.
PGN: What was the most harrowing moment?
RH: When I got to Calcutta, India, it was about one in the morning and I had no Internet or phone service. All I knew was the name of a street where there was a youth hostel, so I got in a cab and tried to find it. After about an hour and a half of riding around, we still didn’t find it. Thankfully, it’s so cheap there the ride was only about $4. I finally checked into a cheap, little hotel that was kind of sketchy. That was a little scary, not knowing where I was or where I was going in the middle of the night with no phone to contact anyone to even tell anyone where I was.
PGN: What was the most harrowing moment at the penitentiary of the non-paranormal type?
RH: Well, by nature, this is a crazy place to work. There’s loud music playing and everyone, actors and customers, are high-energy and having a good time. Customers are always jumping backwards or running away. There’s nothing scarier to me than a customer running. I’m always like, Nooo! What’s going to happen? Who are they going to crash into? But our actors really know their scareas (scare areas), and they generally know how customers are going to react and act accordingly, but some people are just totally unpredictable. But we do our best and take a lot of pride in our safety record.
PGN: What’s new for this year?
RH: We have two new attractions. It’s our 25th season so we decided to really amp it up. We have Quarantine 4D, which I manage. The concept is that the visitors have been infected with some kind of virus. You get 4D glasses as you go through and will see all sorts of crazy illusions as you walk through the room. Then you go through Breakout, where you have to get out of the prison. Some guards try to keep you in while inmates are shouting, “Come this way!” as you try to get out, sometimes having to crawl through tunnels.
PGN: One thing I like about Terror is that it’s scary but not too gory. A lot of other sites have attractions that I don’t find scary, just disgusting.
RH: Yeah, I think a lot of places focus on “How gross can we be?” Here, we do have some gore, but we concentrate on developing our actors’ skills and how they deliver a performance and work with this beautiful building. You could not ask for a better setting than this historic penitentiary. I think it puts our show on a whole other level.
PGN: I understand that TBTW is a fundraiser.
RH: Yes, we fund the historic site, which is open year-round. There are all sorts of programs, from movie screenings to lectures. Even though it’s not an active prison, we do a lot of work with prison reform and what’s happening now. In the middle of the yard, there’s a big monument that shows incarceration rates throughout the years and compares the United States to other countries so you can see that the U.S. has the highest rate per capita of people in prison. We ask the question, Do prisons work? Last year, we did a whole series on the transgender experience in prison and combined it with art installations. I’m so proud of the work that’s done here year-round. Come here for the haunted house, but come back for the day tour or one of our many programs.
PGN: I learned who Alan Turing was long before the Hollywood movie came out from a documentary screening you had here. So what’s your favorite scary movie?
RH: I recently saw “Goodnight Mommy.” It’s an Austrian film, a psychological thriller that’s not gory but will creep you out … to the bone.
PGN: If you had $20 left, what would you spend it on?
RH: A bus ticket to anywhere. To get the most out of it, I’d want to find some kind of experience some place new.
PGN: Where would you send someone visiting Philly (other than here)?
RH: The Mütter Museum. It’s so bizarre and so cool. I could spend hours in there. My favorite thing there is a set of drawers that contains things that this doctor removed from someone’s throat, weird things people choked on like safety pins or children’s toys.
PGN: People tell me I need to stop …
RH: Scaring them. I leave fake roaches all around the place, like in my refrigerator, or I’ll tell someone to meet me somewhere and I’ll hide and jump out at them.
PGN: What scares you?
RH: I’m scared of fish. I’m not afraid of sharks or whales or something in the water, but a goldfish in a tank I can’t handle, or even walking down the fish aisle in the grocery store. Eek!
PGN: I’m the same way. I’ll hold a boa constrictor, but I could never do that thing where the little fish nibble your feet to get rid of calluses. Eek, indeed. A favorite Halloween moment?
RH: One year, a neighbor gave out full-sized candy bars. That was cool. And another woman used to save her change all year, and you were allowed to take a handful of change. As a kid it was, “Ooh! A bunch of nickels! Sweet!”
PGN: Speaking of sweet, let’s talk about your other career. How did you get started?
RH: I was in school for film and baking on the side just for fun, but I really liked it and decided to turn it into a career. I got an internship and then job and, before you know it, I was the head baker at a small bakery, churning out hundreds of cupcakes a day. Sometimes turning a hobby into a career can ruin the fun for you, but I’ve loved every minute of it. Two jobs that I love … I’m a lucky guy.
Terror Behind the Walls runs through Nov. 7. For more information or tickets, visit www.easternstate.org/halloween.
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