INTERIORS: Exploring The Magic Mansion from ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK

On September 19, 1992, the Are You Afraid of the Dark? episode titled "The Tale of the Super Specs" premiered on Nickelodeon's Saturday Night block of programs known as SNICK. It was only the sixth episode in the series thus far and I'd yet to miss a single one. I was 9 years old. 

The story deals with a cheap pair of novelty glasses that, when worn, allows one to peer into another dimension inhabited by malevolent shadow people. On its own it's certainly a favorite of mine and one of the more famous episodes for being genuinely creepy with an ambiguously downbeat ending. But I didn't go to sleep that night overwhelmed with existential dread - contrarily, I was left feeling full of wonderment and desire -- not from the actual main premise of the show, but from the set design of one of its locations. More specifically, the props. 

This is one of the extremely few episodes that doesn't open around the campfire, but instead we begin during the daytime inside The Magic Mansion, a store owned by Gary's father. Gary is one of the storytellers in each episode's wraparound segments and is kinda the lead in a way, and in this setup Kristen (one of the other series regulars) is here to inform Gary that the gang feels his stories have waned in quality. (Heavy stuff.) That night Gary predictably uses The Magic Mansion as a central location in his new tale that manages to wow his audience. 

This lead in, the whole story that follows, everything else was just window-dressing to me - the real star, the real point of this one is The Magic Mansion; not since Mario's Magic Shop in Pee-wee's Big Adventure had I witnessed such hardcore pornography so casually cast upon my hungry eyes. 

For as fortunate and secure as my childhood may've been, the most glaring depravation within my little safety bubble was a lack of a legit Magic Shop (or Joke Store, depending if I was in more of a Legend of Zelda mood or a Batman mood). Looking at The Magic Mansion it appears to be a bit of both: foam ice cream cones, plastic fried eggs, fake puke, mixed in with various gothic idols and potion bottles, all anchored by a selection of monster masks to solidify it as an emporium of one-stop shopping. 

Ideally I just wanted my home to resemble this setting (or at least my bedroom) and as God as my witness I did my absolute best and took every step in trying to achieve that, and through flea market finds and repurposing store-bought toys I managed to amass enough decor to pass for the overall mood. 

It helps that the art direction (from fashionably named Art Director Réal Proulx) consists mostly of plastic dime store junk and rubber Halloween party favors. I'd no interest in that phoniness, but the onscreen stuff that was obtainable was sand art in curvy glass bottles and skull shaped coffee cups and decks of playing cards and leather-bound books, as well as my own contributions like multicolored candles and ornate incense burners that really tied the room together. Though my most screen accurate acquisition was a small velvet bag with a drawstring that I filled with baby powder to recreate the magic dust that transforms the ordinary specs into the titular super specs. 

I don't have much of that stuff anymore and my tastes in home decorating have shifted and broadened over the decades, but every time I revisit this episode the attraction is still there and just as strong. There actually are hole in the wall "Mystic Stores" that do exist on this planet if you look hard enough (if you've ever been to Salem, Massachusetts you'd think you'd hit the main nerve) but you'd be hard pressed to find an establishment that stocks crystal balls and rubber dog shit on the same shelf. Only in the world of SNICK do these dreams become reality. 

I don't know. Maybe it was Canada. 

- Paul