Dance parties, zombies, and slashers

Halloween may be over, but for Scott Richey, the dead rise all year round. The 26-year old King’s College student is behind a very unique event that has taken to the streets of Halifax: zombie walks.

Richey grew up in Cole Harbour and Dartmouth, and graduated from Prince Andrew High School. It was there, through the support of some great teachers, his interests were cultivated. He studied Applied Arts and Visual Communications at NSCC before moving onto King’s College.

An interest in flash mobs and a desire to overthrow mundanity led Richey to organize outdoor dance parties. Flash mobs, as defined by Wikipedia, are “a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, do something unusual for a brief period of time, and then quickly disperse.”

“People seem to so easily get into routine, so I began to think about how I could shake that up,” said Richey. “Over the summer I got some people together and we held two “random dance parties”, one by the library on Spring Garden Road and one in Parade Square by City Hall.”

All passer-bys were invited to join in on the dances, held at lunch hour. Workers on a break had the chance to lose their inhibitions and spend their free time partaking in a free, fun gathering instead of mulling over coffee.

Following the success of these dance parties, Richey and friends Brian Larter and Kathy King began to plan other events. The one that garnered the most interest was the zombie walk.

According to Wikipedia, a zombie walk is “an organized public gathering of two or more people who dress up in zombie costumes. Usually taking place in an urban centre, the participants make their way around the city streets and through shopping malls in a somewhat orderly fashion and often limping and gnawing their way towards a local cemetery.”

This is exactly what you would have seen if you happened to be outside in Downtown Halifax on August 26. A hoard of zombies wandered out of Camp Hill cemetery into the nearby Public Gardens, spreading in a wave of undead delight.

“The zombie-walk turned out to be a great success and had something near one hundred ‘walking dead.’ It was so successful because of the interest people stirred up. I remember offering a handbill to someone by the ferry terminal who wouldn’t leave with less than four more to pass out to friends. None of it could have happened without so much help from so many wonderful people.”

Richey has also been involved in local theatre productions since high school. He was involved in this year’s Fringe Festival, in “The Slasher Play”.

“’The Slasher Play’ which was written by two friends, Terry Drisdel and Isaac Thompson. “Slasher” was one of this year’s “fringe hits” having the highest attendance in its venue. It was something of a B-movie horror on stage and a lot of fun to be involved in.”

When he isn’t making the dead rise, or causing random folks to get together for a shindig on the streets, Richey works at the Dal campus and volunteers at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia.