zombie Archives - Bony Fiddle Entertainment

Zombie Head Casting Day – and Freddy Krueger attack?

by JD Stanley on March 29, 2015

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Zombie head casting was everything we could wish for – long, messy, productive, and fun!
2015 March 29 - Zombie plaster cast party8
Our SFX masters Sean George and Eden Kontrimas accompanied four of our “horde” zombies with Blair and Samantha for a day of mold making and casting. At the Toronto School for Professional Make-up where Sean is a teacher by day, we had the luxury of the entire FX department for the whole 7 hours it took to create these beauties.
Volunteering their faces to the zombie cause were Mandi Sunshine, Richard Chuang, Lex Darian and Justine Cargo. And Blair couldn’t let the day go by without getting a cast of himself done – for future posterity.

These casts are destined for the highest tier of ZomBFX full face prosthetics for our Ripe ‘n Rotten zombies. We’re even considering selling them online if we can swing that. Everyone wants to look as good as these guys after Sean gets done with their zombie FX, so why not share the love?
In the course of mixing and pouring and generally making a mess, someone thought to read the instructions on the Alja-Safe (alginate or Alginic acid used to make temporary molds needed on body parts when making life casts). The instructions say “must wear gloves”. And we were smearing this all over everyone’s faces. Concerning? Well, it’s called “Alja-Safe” not “Alja-Cancer“, after all, so pretty sure no one will suffer any adverse effects.

Blair and his idol Freddy at zombie head casting day

Blair and Freddy – a dream come true!

When any part of the Bony Fiddle crew get together, it never fails that some hilarity will ensue. At one point, when Samantha was working to film a little blurb with Mandi, she was “attacked” by Freddy Krueger and couldn’t get loose.
Not to worry, she’s safe and her sweater just got caught on one of the claws of a life size (and very realistic) statue of Freddy. Blair’s Freddy obsession was in overdrive as you can imagine.

Almost done – waiting on finishing touches

Each mold made separately, Sean and Eden went through a cycle of hair covering, applying Vaseline, smearing Alja-Safe all over each victim, er, volunteer’s heads and wrapping with plaster bandages. Once set and removed, they moved on to the second step of the life casts which involved coating the insides of each temporary cast with cement and burlap for strength. A short time later, the temporary molds were torn off, leaving the finished zombie head casts.
7 hours and lots of clean-up later, we had 5 perfect head casts. They’ve now joined the ranks of recently created Bony Fiddle skulls in Blair’s workshop. Destined for zombie fame, we plan to get lots of use out of them and you’ll see them in action the next time you order some Ripe ‘n Rotten zombies for your event or shoot.

At the Toronto Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade

by JD Stanley on October 25, 2014

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It was the day of the undead at the Toronto Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade.

Bony Fiddle krewe as the Addams Family just prior to the start of the Toronto Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade

This year, Bony Fiddle had the privilege of being a featured krewe in the Toronto Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade and it was a dream come true. Everyone dressed in costume and surrounded by hundreds of zombies…? What?

We live for this stuff!

Eden Kontrimas makes up Blair

The day began early with a make-up and costume pre-parade scramble. Big thanks to one of our Bony Fiddle FX make-up artists, Eden Kontrimas. Took stamina to power through the assembly line of krewe who needed making-up.
By the time we were ready to go, Blair’s apartment was trashed, but we looked awesome, so it was all good!

2014 Zombie walk - pre-parade Sam practicing her costume face

Sam practising her costume face

This was the biggest Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade in Toronto to date with more than ten thousand undead and supporters in attendance. Truly a testament to the organisational powers of The Toronto Zombie Walk Board of Directors – we love you Thea and your undead gang! We had the pleasure of creating a loose relationship with the Toronto Zombie Walk group this year and very much look forward to continued development of that relationship.
We’d drag our corpses anywhere for them.

Justine Cargo and Monte Shen as Morticia and Gomez Addams

The day’s events began around 11am with the opening of the Zombie Market and Nerf Zombie Strike Midway at Nathan Phillips Square. The parade launched at 3pm from the float holding area just behind City Hall. Funniest moment while we were waiting to go out? That would be Morticia (Justine Cargo) breaking into spontaneous twerking on the street. Oh, it happened – we have photographic evidence.
The krewes along with our own were released one-by-one with a pack of zombies between us. We rounded the first corner of the route to cheers and cameras while the zombie wrangles ran around us with brains on sticks to keep the undead under control. We made our way out to University Ave, around the corner onto College and then straight on down Yonge Street.
Hitting Yonge Street was surreal. We thought we’d seen a lot of people until we got around the corner. Spectators were elbow-to-elbow and about ten or fifteen people deep or more in some spots. Camera flashes were going off in every direction. What a rush!
Highlight of the day? What seemed like thousands of people packed onto both sides of Yonge Street spontaneously breaking in the theme song from the Addams Family as our Bony Fiddle crew walked by. Nothing finer than a Saturday afternoon when thousands of people all snap their fingers and sing in unison in response to something we did. No complaints there.
Thank you Toronto and thank you Toronto Zombie Walk and Halloween Parade. We’ll see you next year!

Oct 25, 2014 - Bony Fiddle Addams Family, full crew, pre-parade

Bony Fiddle – The “Family” business since 2006

Theatre – Man of Two Minds/Lost Refuge Wraps

by Blair Mueller on September 21, 2014

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I couldn’t be more pleased and proud of what we’ve accomplished thus far on our journey into the Toronto theatre scene. We’ve come a long way in just a few short months and I think I’m comfortable saying we not only reached our goal, but did it well.

Desserts by Chi’s Cakes

What started out as just an idea to do a small, local theatre production, quickly escalated into a double bill show with a debut party. Not quite sure how it became so complex, but we have no small ideas, so I apologise for none of it.

Jeremy Panda

Featuring Jeremy Panda, who performed live acoustic guitar music for us, and delicious catered (and Bony Fiddle themed!) desserts by Chi’s Cakes, it was a fantastic kick-off to the first night of the show at the Tranzac Theatre. Thanks Chi and Jeremy!

Make-up/SFX: Sean George, Eleanor MacVeigh, Eden Kontrimas

A big, Bony Fiddle skull nod to our amazing FX make-up team of Sean George, Eleanor MacVeigh, and Eden Kontrimas (right). The energy and attention they threw into creating the zombies for Lost Refuge added a whole other layer of awesome.
Zombies walking through the crowd and up onto the stage went over really well with the audience during each show and were a big hit. Not to mention, the team pulled off some undead miracles and created us some of the nicest looking zombies I’ve ever seen. And I can’t believe they did it for us. You guys rock!

Samantha Willison, Marina Pratt, and Jasmine Nichols

Samantha Willison, Marina Pratt, and Jasmine Nichols not only helped keep us on track, but more importantly kept us co-ordinated with their adept handling of all our back stage operations and our stage crew. Couldn’t have done it without you!
Original music and sound effects were created by Ryan Bower who kept the sound board along with Samantha during all performances. Ryan was with us from the start and working on the music months ahead of auditions when planning was still preliminary. Props for hanging in there, Ryan, even through the computer problems. Oh, and in case you forgot? No one cares about your golf, Ryan!
Although we didn’t fill the house every night, which would have been too good to be true for our first show, I consider this a huge success for Bony Fiddle and our live performance crew. Feedback from theatre goers was quite positive all around and everyone who worked on the show should feel very proud of themselves.
We even had the pleasure of being reviewed by Daniel Rostas at Mooney on Theatre and the review he gave us couldn’t have been better, especially on our first time out. It tells me we’re on the right path and doing the right thing. The cast and crew know how I feel – they’ve already requested a cast party 3.0!
It’s been a very enjoyable summer, one of the best, and we’ve learned a lot along the way. We’ve also met some amazing people that we’ll be working with again and feel like some true friendships were made not only between myself and everyone involved, but within the cast and crew, as well. It’s no easy feat to put on a show in just six months, and with everyone’s help, we did a wonderful thing here.
We brought people together and we made art.
Until next time.
Blair

Dundas Square ZOMBIE promo a HIT!

by Blair Mueller on August 31, 2014

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On Saturday, August 30th, we hit up Dundas Square with two of our zombies from our upcoming show Lost Refuge, the second of our double bill feature, to generate some hype about our production, and from the moment we left my apartment we knew it was going to be a great night!

Our zombies for the evening, played by Mandi Sosnowski and Justine Cargo, also featured in our show, were very excited to be a part of the promo and we couldn’t have been more happy with their performance. We learned one valuable lesson during our night out, if you want attention, make friends with a zombie or two!

We rode the subway there and back and even before we got into the train, we had already given away our first promo card to interested bystanders. People were taking pictures and videos from across the subway platform, over their shoulder, and around poles. Some couldn’t stop staring, some could only look for a second before being grossed out, and others just wanted to get up close and personal.

People couldn’t get enough, and we have our talented special effects make up artist Sean George to thank for that! The work he did on these zombies was so great and even made some full grown men run away screaming. No really, we’re not joking.
A little later in the evening, we even had a few people ask if we were a part of the TV show “The Walking Dead” doing a season five promo as part of the Fan Expo that was happening all weekend. Thank you, we’ll take that as a compliment, and we love The Walking Dead.
When we got off the subway at Dundas Station, and our zombies learned how to open doors on their own, we were greeted by a group of guys that wouldn’t get close enough for a picture, along with a whole bunch of people stepping up on their own to take a selfie with a zombie, and that’s just the beginning. As we crossed the street and weaved our way into Dundas Square, we quickly generated a crowd. I’ve never seen so many selfies being taken. We had people running up to snap a picture and then taking off, people asking what it was all about, others just stood by and watched. There must be hundreds of pictures floating around the internet now. Some were foolish enough to try to talk to the zombies and ask for a picture, but we all know zombies don’t talk. We even made a little friend, a young boy who was fascinated with the make up and how we did it.
Over all, the evening was a lot of fun and we got to scare a whole bunch of people. It was an evening well spent. Would we do it again…? Hell yes! And we might too, with all our zombies!
Our show opens on September 11th at the Tranzac Club, located at 292 Brunswick Ave, in Toronto. Come join us for our opening night party. The doors open at 6:30 PM and includes live music by Jeremy Panda, desserts by Chi’s Cakes, drinks from the bar (sold separately) and a chance to win some great prizes, all before we get on with the show at 8 PM. Our other three performances are on September 12 @ 8PM, and September 13 @ 2:30 PM and 8 PM. Tickets range from $25 for the Saturday Matinee to $40 for the opening night party and show, and can be purchased online at bonyfiddlelive.com.
We look forward to seeing everyone there!
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