halloween horror nights singapore

Oh, finally. A scare actor at Universal Studios Singapore (USS) has taken to Facebook to rage against the relentless harassment she and her colleagues received from social media figures invited for a sneak preview of this year’s Halloween Horror Nights event.

On Monday, media outlets (including us) and social media “influencers” across the country attended the preview of USS’ eighth edition of their annual Halloween Horror Nights. It would be a test-run of sorts for the scare actors; a rehearsal performance for a small group of people before the actual event opens to the public for 18 nights (Sep 27 – Oct 31).

Unfortunately, some of the select folks invited to help hype up the event weren’t exactly in their best behavior. Sickened by the inappropriate treatment she and her colleagues received on Monday — and the years before — Belle Pereira Ho took issue with how these influential figures are showing their followers that the USS performers can be bullied openly.

Side note: We can vouch that some of the people being called out here were stepping over the line during the media preview night. We witnessed first-hand how some of the USS performers were subjected to highly-shrilled taunts, annoying heckling and unruly teasing by the comedians just to make their fellow “influencer” friends laugh. We also saw how they acted similarly during last year’s media preview.

Anger, hurt and disappointment

According to Ho, her sentiments about the issue is shared by her fellow USS performers. She pointed out that the actors put in a lot of effort, energy and time into creating an entertainingly scary atmosphere for attendees, which crumbles under the utter rowdiness of some “influencers”.

“You are not being professional,” Ho wrote in a Facebook post. “It’s NOT FUNNY! Jokes targeting actors, being indirectly offensive, noisy like monkeys, screaming back INTO the scare actor’s EARS, spoiling the atmosphere for other media guests, creating a scene and trying to outdo every single line of the actors.”

Videos uploaded on her post feature Instagram stories uploaded by local comedians Hirzi Zulkiflie and Fakkah Fuzz, showcasing them and their friends (including YouTuber Munah Bagharib) making fun of the scare actors, who aren’t allowed to break character throughout the event. To be fair to them, they are comedians after all, but their constant laughter at the expense of the USS performers seemed a little vitriolic. Ho mentions that there are other moments of harassment that weren’t recorded.

Related Facebook post Shared from Facebook

Related Facebook post Shared from Facebook

“Even if they don’t do well in their scare, you as a senior, shouldn’t have made fun of them,” highlighted Ho. “Not only did they not set a good example to encourage the actors on set, but they shamed them and post it on social media to the world.”

Commenters agreed that the comedians weren’t being funny at all.

< PREVIOUS SLIDE SLIDE 1 of 4 NEXT SLIDE > Facebook screengrab © Provided by Coconuts Media Limited

Apologies to the performers

While Munah and Hirzi remain mum about their heckling, Fakkah Fuzz took to Instagram to apologize for his inappropriate behavior. He explained that his defense mechanism to being scared was to make jokes, and he meant no disrespect to the USS performers.

< PREVIOUS SLIDE SLIDE 1 of 3 NEXT SLIDE > Photo: @fakkahfuzz © Provided by Coconuts Media Limited

Im out here joking but Im actually damn scared. Apologies to the performers if I stepped outta line I wasnt thinking cuz I was secretly shittin my pants. My bad. Thank you for a great time u guys were awesome! #hhn8 Im out here joking but Im actually damn scared. Apologies to the performers if I stepped outta line I wasnt thinking cuz I was secretly shittin my pants. My bad. Thank you for a great time u guys were awesome! #hhn8 A post shared by Fakkah Fuzz (@fakkahfuzz) on Sep 24, 2018 at 3:34pm PDT

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