Wednesday, November 16, 2011

THE POLTERGEIST CURSE they cameeeeeeeeee

It was plagued with freak accidents, untimely illness and violent ends. The 1982 hit movie that spawned sequels, a TV show and, after its stars began dying, an eerie urban legend about powers from beyond. Coincidence or perhaps something far more spooky? The following are some things you may not know about POLTERGEIST:

Dominique Dunne, who played eldest daughter Dana Freeling, was strangled by her possessive boyfriend five months after the release of Poltergeist and died five days later. Just 22 years old, she was the daughter of novelist, Dominick Dunne, and sister of actor Griffin Dunne. Dunne had been rehearsing lines with an actor friend when her boyfriend showed up, picked a fight and then killed her. To drown out the noise of the two yelling outside, the actor turned up the Poltergeist soundtrack.

During a break from the filming of POLTERGEIST III, Heather "They're Here" O'Rourke, 12, who played Carol Anne Freeling in all three movies, died from an intestinal blockage that ruptured. She had been ill for about two years, but her mother claimed doctors misdiagnosed her condition. The movie resumed filming, with stand-ins for O'Rourke's part.

O'Rourke was buried in Westwood Memorial Park in Los Angeles, a short distance from Dunne.

Actor Will Sampson, a Creek Indian and actual shaman, performed an exorcism on the set of POLTERGEIST II to rid it of "alien spirits." A year after POLTERGEIST II was released, Sampson died of complications from a heart-lung transplant.

A few months after filming wrapped on POLTERGEIST II, actor Julian Beck died after a long battle with stomach cancer.

JoBeth Williams, who played mother Diane Freeling, claims she returned home from the set each day to find pictures on her wall askew. She would straighten them, only to find them crooked again the next day.

During a scene when Robbie Freeling (Oliver Robins) was choked by a clown in his room, something went wrong with the prop and Robins was actually being choked. Spielberg praised him for his authenticity until he caught onto the trouble and saved Robins.

James Khan who wrote the novelisation of the movie claims that one night, as he typed the words "Thunder and lightning ripped the sky," a blast of lightning hit his building and blew the cover off an air conditioning unit with enough force to hit him in the back. (oh please!)

The house used for exterior shots in POLTERGEIST, located in the L.A. suburb of Simi Valley, was damaged during the 1994 Northridge earthquake.The skeletons used on the set of POLTERGEIST II: THE OTHER SIDE turned out to be actual human skeletons, which creeped out the cast members.


The curse of the film Poltergeist, said to exist because of the premature deaths of people connected with it, has struck again.

Zelda Rubinstein, who played the tiny psychic in the 1982 film directed by Tobe Hooper and produced by Steven Spielberg, is dead.

Curse? Actually, it is the entire Poltergeist series that's said to be damned. Four cast members died in the six years between the release of the first film and the release of the third, with one dying during production of the second film. Two of them died at young ages, 12 and 22.
Heather was born two days after Christmas, 1975. In 1988, she was living in Lakeside California, near San Diego. She was attending school, and was president of her fifth grade class. Here is The apartment building that they lived in, and another view.

She was cute, could speak, and could memorize a 60-page script in about an hour.

In June of 1987, she had completed filming Poltergeist 3. During that shoot, she had suffered from "flu like symptoms". She was diagnosed with a parasite she had picked up from drinking water in a campground. From what I can gather, she suffered from bowel obstructions all her life, but nobody knew about it. Heather was put on medication, and the problem had supposedly been resolved.

On the night of January 31st, 1988, many months later, Heather claimed she didn’t feel well, and crawled into bed with her parents. She woke up vomiting, so her mother gave her a Gatorade drink that was supposed to soothe her stomach.

The next morning she got up, and still complained of feeling bad. Her feet and fingers were swollen and blue. Her mother tried to give her some toast to eat, but Heather complained that she couldn’t even swallow. Her mother was going to call the doctor, but Heather passed out, so she called 911. By the time paramedics arrived, little Heather was in shock. One of them asked if she was feeling bad. "A little," was her reply. On their way to the hospital, her mother told Heather, "I love you." "I love you too," were the last words they spoke. Such beautiful last words.

They took Heather to the Alvarado Medical International Hospital, 8 miles away. She had heart failure en route, and was revived at 9:25am. She was then taken by helicopter to the Childrens Hospital and Health Centre in San Diego, where they arrived at 10:45am. Here is the emergency entrance. Her parents were informed that Heather might have suffered brain damage, because her pupils were fixed and delighted.
The doctors suspected it might be a bowel obstruction, and rushed her into surgery. They were too late. Heather died on the operating table at 2:43pm. Her intestines had burst, and she died from the infection. She was only 12.

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