WEBVTT - Poltergeist Curse: Paranormal Activity, a Plane Crash, and Murder 0:00:00.720 --> 0:00:19.680 Disgraceland as a production of Double Elvis. This is a 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:23.599 story about a horror movie franchise, but it's also a 0:00:23.640 --> 0:00:28.240 story about a curse and freakish events that haunted the 0:00:28.280 --> 0:00:33.480 sets of three horror films. I'm talking about strangulation, I'm 0:00:33.479 --> 0:00:37.640 talking about an exorcism. I'm talking about a story where 0:00:37.720 --> 0:00:41.600 one actress from the film franchise was brutally murdered, and 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:46.120 a story where two more actors died unexpectedly. It's a 0:00:46.159 --> 0:00:50.960 story about a horrible plane crash, a story about the 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:56.120 poltergeist curse, a movie that scared the hell out of moviegoers, 0:00:56.160 --> 0:01:00.760 and a movie with an iconic theme. Great music, unlike 0:01:00.840 --> 0:01:02.720 that music I played for you at the top of 0:01:02.760 --> 0:01:07.200 the show. That wasn't great music. That was a preset 0:01:07.240 --> 0:01:13.480 loop from my melotron called c Static MK two. I 0:01:13.560 --> 0:01:16.479 played you that loop because I can't afford the rights 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:20.880 to Ebony and Ivory by Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder. 0:01:21.800 --> 0:01:24.720 And why would I play you that specific slice of 0:01:24.920 --> 0:01:29.319 black and white cheese? Could I afford it? Because that 0:01:30.040 --> 0:01:33.200 was the number one song in America on June fourth, 0:01:33.360 --> 0:01:36.319 nineteen eighty two, and that was the day of the 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:41.080 film franchise Poultergeist launched into theaters, scaring the hell out 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:43.640 of teenagers and little kids like me at the time, 0:01:44.319 --> 0:01:47.760 and starting rumors of a cursed film franchise that would 0:01:47.800 --> 0:01:56.520 claim the lives of many. On this episode strangulation, exorcism, murder, death, 0:01:56.560 --> 0:02:02.720 and destruction in the Poultergeist Curse. I'm Jake Brennan, and 0:02:02.880 --> 0:02:32.880 this this disgraceland Richard laws And thought it was his 0:02:33.000 --> 0:02:35.960 lucky day. First, he had been able to beat the 0:02:35.960 --> 0:02:39.639 incoming snowstorm by switching his flight from Monday to Sunday, 0:02:40.200 --> 0:02:42.560 which meant that he'd be able to escape New York 0:02:42.639 --> 0:02:44.640 and make it to Cleveland, where he could honor his 0:02:44.680 --> 0:02:48.960 commitment to the Cleveland Cavaliers. As a drug counselor for 0:02:49.000 --> 0:02:53.440 the NBA, Richard often extolled the virtues of simply showing 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:56.000 up and if he needed a little luck so that 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:59.720 he could show up well, he'd gladly take it and 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:03.360 then and more luck. The ticket agent at LaGuardia recognized 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:06.840 him not from his work with the NBA, which, despite 0:03:06.919 --> 0:03:11.880 being real honest work, was actually his side hustle, because 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:16.120 Richard Lawson's day job was as an actor with appearances 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:20.200 and recurring roles on everything from Remington Steel to Dynasty, 0:03:20.800 --> 0:03:23.880 and most recently, as a regular cast member on the 0:03:23.960 --> 0:03:28.960 daytime soap All My Children. The ticket agent noticed that 0:03:29.080 --> 0:03:32.760 Richard was sitting in coach seat six A, and as 0:03:32.800 --> 0:03:36.720 a diehard All My Children devotee, quickly upgraded the actor 0:03:36.760 --> 0:03:41.080 to seat one F in first class. But now from 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:45.040 the leathery comfort of his spacious first class seat, Richard 0:03:45.120 --> 0:03:48.720 had a sudden, inexplicable feeling that his luck was about 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:53.760 to change. The snow was already coming down. Flights had 0:03:53.800 --> 0:03:57.440 been delayed all day long as Creuz worked to thaw 0:03:57.520 --> 0:04:00.200 out the side of the plane. Richard thought he could 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:04.120 actually feel the warm chemical blast of de icing fluid. 0:04:04.920 --> 0:04:09.800 And then he felt something else, a chill. His stomach 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:14.600 went upside down. The plane wasn't even moving, but something 0:04:15.320 --> 0:04:20.440 was off. Something was wrong. Richard felt it deep in 0:04:20.480 --> 0:04:23.920 his gut. He had to get off the plane. Now, 0:04:24.800 --> 0:04:28.039 hold up. He took a deep breath, calm down. The 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:31.720 basketball team was waiting in Cleveland. He had to show up. 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.800 He needed to chill the fuck out. Everything was going 0:04:34.800 --> 0:04:37.800 to be fine. Richard convinced himself that there was nothing 0:04:37.880 --> 0:04:41.960 to worry about. The plane took its place behind several 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:46.680 others on the runway. Minutes passed, ten minutes, twenty minutes, 0:04:47.160 --> 0:04:50.760 the snow began to come down harder. Thirty minutes the 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:54.599 plane slowly ambled down the tarmac and the wind blew, 0:04:54.760 --> 0:04:59.200 stinging wet against the cabin windows. As the plane was 0:04:59.240 --> 0:05:03.440 cleared for ta off, Richards started to worry again. All 0:05:03.480 --> 0:05:06.640 that de icing had happened thirty minutes ago. What if 0:05:06.680 --> 0:05:10.640 the plane was covered in ice again. Richard's anxiety began 0:05:10.720 --> 0:05:14.320 to increase in direct proportion to the plane's increase in 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:19.520 speed as it taxied down the runway, and then they 0:05:19.520 --> 0:05:24.960 were airborne. The plane was barely fifty feet in the 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:27.600 air when it began to roll to the right. It 0:05:27.720 --> 0:05:31.440 rolled some more hard, and then the nose pointed down 0:05:32.000 --> 0:05:34.120 like it was a magnet being pulled down to a 0:05:34.160 --> 0:05:38.800 steel turmac. Passengers screened and the plane was nearly sideways 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:42.200 when it hit the ground, and the crunch was deafening. 0:05:42.600 --> 0:05:45.040 They caught air again briefly, and then once more came 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:49.159 down hard, and the nauseating screech of metal on asphalt 0:05:49.320 --> 0:05:52.760 rang out. Flames licked the windows from outside. It was 0:05:52.800 --> 0:05:55.120 impossible for anyone to tell where the plane was at 0:05:55.279 --> 0:05:57.680 or what direction it was headed in. It was rolling 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:01.880 over on itself, tumbling towards oblivion, literally splitting apart at 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:09.200 the seams, and suddenly everything went black. The noises stopped, 0:06:09.480 --> 0:06:11.960 and the passagers could barely see a thing, but they 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:15.200 knew they were upside down, held in place only by 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:18.760 their safety belts, and the sound of bubbles began to 0:06:18.760 --> 0:06:23.120 percolate from all sides. Goddamn thing was underwater. The plane 0:06:23.120 --> 0:06:26.640 had landed in Flushing Bay and it was slowly sinking 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:30.200 to the bottom. But Richard Lawson knew he was going 0:06:30.240 --> 0:06:34.000 to die. He was trapped, His body was pinned between 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:38.080 two unseen objects. He began to panic for real, and 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.440 this was luck, all right, bad luck. Maybe he shouldn't 0:06:41.480 --> 0:06:44.159 have taken that upgrade to first class, Maybe he shouldn't 0:06:44.160 --> 0:06:46.960 have switched flights. Maybe one of his minor decisions that 0:06:47.040 --> 0:06:50.520 day had jinxed it. And maybe his bad luck was 0:06:50.560 --> 0:06:54.680 bigger than his choices that day. As the plane cabin 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:58.400 began to fill with ice cold salt water, Richard's mind 0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:01.640 flashed back to that one movie he had made ten 0:07:01.760 --> 0:07:06.240 years earlier, in nineteen eighty two, The legacy of Poltergeist 0:07:06.520 --> 0:07:11.000 and its Seagulls was infamous, four actors dead in their wake. 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:13.960 Some said the productions were ill fated and that the 0:07:14.000 --> 0:07:17.360 actors were the ones paying the ultimate price. One by one. 0:07:18.440 --> 0:07:21.920 Richard Lawson struggled to free himself from the overturned airplane 0:07:21.960 --> 0:07:25.120 as it was swallowed by flushing bay. He knew it 0:07:25.200 --> 0:07:28.760 was futile. His fate was clear. He was about to 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:38.800 become the latest tragedy in the Poltergeist Curse. The skeletons 0:07:38.880 --> 0:07:42.520 weren't supposed to be real, or that's what actress Joebeth 0:07:42.560 --> 0:07:47.120 Williams assumed. Real skeletons would be too creepy, too gross, 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:50.920 But fake skeletons cost too much and took too much 0:07:50.960 --> 0:07:55.200 time to manufacture. Real skeletons were cheap and easy to 0:07:55.240 --> 0:07:59.160 come by, so it was real skeletons that bobbed up 0:07:59.200 --> 0:08:02.120 in the muddy water and brushed elbows with joe Beth 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:05.960 Williams in the iconic pool scene from the original Poltergeist, 0:08:06.360 --> 0:08:11.240 Toby Hooper's nineteen eighty two horror classic. Joe Beth's authentic 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:15.120 reaction to her close encounter with actual human bones helped 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:18.320 make Poltergeist not only the highest grossing horror movie of 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:21.680 nineteen eighty two, but the eighth highest grossing movie of 0:08:21.720 --> 0:08:25.680 the entire year. And it wasn't the only authentic reaction 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:29.679 in the movie. Eleven year old Oliver Robbins, who played 0:08:29.760 --> 0:08:33.440 Joebeth's son, was reportedly nearly choked to death by his 0:08:33.600 --> 0:08:37.680 character's toy clown as the possessed toy wrapped a long 0:08:37.920 --> 0:08:41.560 arm around his neck and tried to strangle him. According 0:08:41.600 --> 0:08:45.120 to Oliver, while they were shooting the scene, the animatronic 0:08:45.160 --> 0:08:50.000 clown malfunctioned and the arm actually constricted his airway. He struggled, 0:08:50.240 --> 0:08:53.360 his eyes bumped out, he gasped for air, and the 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:56.480 crew of adults thought that Oliver was simply delivering a knockdown, 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.960 drag out performance, and it wasn't until his face began 0:09:00.200 --> 0:09:03.960 to turn blue that they realized something was terribly wrong. 0:09:06.679 --> 0:09:11.480 None of these terrifying onset mishaps faced child actress Heather O'Rourke, 0:09:11.880 --> 0:09:14.200 who was all of five years old when she was 0:09:14.280 --> 0:09:18.160 first cast as Carol Anne, the youngest member of the 0:09:18.200 --> 0:09:21.840 Freeling family and the character who makes contact with and 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:26.880 later is abducted by the malevolent spirits haunting her family's house. 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:30.720 Heather was told there was nothing to fear. In fact, 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:33.160 she had been taught how to pretend she was afraid. 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:36.360 She hadn't acted before, but she knew the business of 0:09:36.400 --> 0:09:41.199 making movies, the make believe business. Her older sister made movies. 0:09:41.800 --> 0:09:44.760 In fact, Heather was lunching in the MGM commissary with 0:09:44.800 --> 0:09:47.040 her mother one day, waiting for her sister to wrap 0:09:47.080 --> 0:09:52.320 a scene, when Stephen Spielberg spotted her. Spielberg was Poltergeist 0:09:52.360 --> 0:09:55.680 writer and producer, and Heather fit his vision for Carol 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:59.840 Anne Freeling to a tea. Spielberg was in the middle 0:09:59.840 --> 0:10:04.360 of making his latest masterpiece, E T the Extraterrestrial, and 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:08.000 was therefore contractually prohibited from directing another movie at the 0:10:08.040 --> 0:10:12.160 same time, which is why MGM hired Toby Hooper of 0:10:12.280 --> 0:10:17.520 Texas Chainsaw Massacre Fame to direct Spielberg's Poultergeist script. But 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:21.319 Spielberg couldn't divorce himself from the production. He was on 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:24.400 set just as much as Hooper, and according to which 0:10:24.480 --> 0:10:27.120 cast or crew members you ask, he was the one 0:10:27.160 --> 0:10:31.400 who was actually really calling the shots. What Spielberg and 0:10:31.440 --> 0:10:34.360 Hooper did and didn't do where one of them ended 0:10:34.360 --> 0:10:36.760 and the other began. Well, that was just a little 0:10:36.760 --> 0:10:39.199 bit of Hollywood magic. It was all part of the 0:10:39.280 --> 0:10:43.000 larger sleight of hand. As Heather O'Rourke would learn, it 0:10:43.120 --> 0:10:46.240 was how movies got made. It was all make believe, 0:10:47.120 --> 0:10:51.080 just like the scary bits were make believe. But that 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:55.360 wasn't entirely true. That was just something that adults said 0:10:55.440 --> 0:10:59.480 to make children less frightened. The truth was, there were 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:04.280 things there, unexplainable things, things that made the hair stand 0:11:04.400 --> 0:11:06.120 up on the back of your neck and the skin 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:09.840 on your arms tinkle. Who were what those things were? 0:11:09.960 --> 0:11:13.840 It was sometimes impossible to know, but one thing was 0:11:13.880 --> 0:11:20.520 for sure. There he and they had always been here. 0:11:44.360 --> 0:11:47.520 James Hermann stood in the doorway to the bathroom, speaking 0:11:47.520 --> 0:11:50.480 to his son, who was brushing his teeth. It was 0:11:50.520 --> 0:11:55.040 a perfectly normal moment, downright prosaic, actually, one that happened 0:11:55.080 --> 0:11:58.040 nearly every day. But it was about to be disrupted 0:11:58.080 --> 0:12:02.079 by a very abnormal occurrence, the kind that was beginning 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:05.360 to happen with alarming frequency at the family's three bedroom, 0:12:05.440 --> 0:12:10.240 single story house. It was around eleven in the morning Sunday, 0:12:10.679 --> 0:12:15.319 February ninth, nineteen fifty eight. Strange things have been happening 0:12:15.320 --> 0:12:18.720 in the Hermann's home at sixteen forty eight Redwood Path 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:23.080 in Seaford, Long Island for nearly a week. Bottles all 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:25.360 throughout the house were popping open on their own and 0:12:25.440 --> 0:12:29.600 falling to the floor. Shampoo, medicine, liquid starch in the kitchen, 0:12:29.880 --> 0:12:32.599 bleach in the basement, a bottle of holy water in 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.439 the mast at bedroom, and none of the bottles were 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:39.160 sealed with corks or pop tops. They all had screw caps, 0:12:39.440 --> 0:12:45.360 which required several rotations to remove. James and Lucille, along 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:48.280 with their children, twelve year old James Junior and a 0:12:48.360 --> 0:12:52.480 thirteen year old daughter, also named Lucille, listened in varying 0:12:52.559 --> 0:12:55.920 degrees of confusion and fear as the bottles popped and 0:12:56.000 --> 0:12:59.920 fell from nearby rooms all week long, but they hadn't 0:13:00.080 --> 0:13:05.959 witnessed it firsthand until now. As James Junior worked the 0:13:06.000 --> 0:13:09.679 toothbrush back and forth on his molars, James Senior stood 0:13:09.720 --> 0:13:12.400 in the doorway of the bathroom and watched in horror 0:13:12.720 --> 0:13:16.720 as a glass medicine bottle moved shakily across the top 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:20.400 of the sink eighteen inches give her take entirely on 0:13:20.480 --> 0:13:23.880 its own, and then it crashed and shattered into the 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:28.040 sink basin. James Junior jumped, his toothbrush hit the floor, 0:13:28.320 --> 0:13:32.400 and James Herman couldn't explain it. The sink top was level. 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:35.520 The medicine bottle shattered with such force that it must 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:39.720 have been shoved, but by whom or what. When Nassau 0:13:39.800 --> 0:13:43.959 County Detective Joseph Tauzy arrived at the Herman's house to investigate, 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:46.240 he made it clear that he didn't believe in the 0:13:46.320 --> 0:13:51.720 supernatural ghost spirit specters all horseshit. Surely there was a 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:55.360 reasonable logical explanation for what was going on, perhaps a 0:13:55.480 --> 0:13:59.760 high frequency radio transmission, a down draft in the home's chimney, 0:14:01.320 --> 0:14:05.520 but unexplainable things continued to happen. The bottle of holy 0:14:05.600 --> 0:14:09.120 water once again fell from the master bedroom bureau. When 0:14:09.200 --> 0:14:12.280 James ran to retrieve it seconds after hearing it fall, 0:14:12.600 --> 0:14:15.520 he found it hot to the touch. And later that 0:14:15.559 --> 0:14:18.760 same day, James Junior and Lucille were watching TV when 0:14:18.760 --> 0:14:22.280 a porcelain figure rose from a table, moved three feet 0:14:22.280 --> 0:14:27.760 through the air, and fell to the floor. Detective Tozy 0:14:27.920 --> 0:14:33.120 himself bore witness to some truly weird shit. It challenged 0:14:33.160 --> 0:14:36.360 his logical just the fact's mind. He went home each 0:14:36.440 --> 0:14:38.280 night and thought about all the ways he could try 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:40.960 to explain what he had seen. And the Hermans, on 0:14:41.000 --> 0:14:44.080 the other hand, had seen too much, and they were 0:14:44.160 --> 0:14:47.640 freaked the fuck out, so they got the fuck out. 0:14:48.480 --> 0:14:51.760 On February twenty first, a little over two weeks since 0:14:51.800 --> 0:14:55.360 they had begun to experience the inexplicable, they packed their 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:58.280 bags and went to stay with a relative, and they 0:14:58.280 --> 0:15:02.600 were gone for two days. No supernatural activity was detected 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:05.320 at their home while they were away, and now did 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:07.840 anything out of the ordinary happen at the relatives' house 0:15:07.880 --> 0:15:11.680 where they were staying. When they returned to sixteen forty 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:15.120 eight Redwood Path on the evening of February twenty third, 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:19.720 they were greeted by a flying sugar bowl. An eighteen 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:22.680 inch statue of the Virgin Mary rose from a bureau 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:25.800 and sword twelve feet through the air. A large bureau 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:29.240 tipped over in James Junior's room, a record player weighing 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:33.200 ten pounds rose from a table and traveled fifteen feet 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:39.080 across the room. The Herman's predicament became a local, even 0:15:39.200 --> 0:15:43.240 national sensation. People all over the country wrote letters, made 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:46.320 phone calls, even showed up the Herman's home to play 0:15:46.480 --> 0:15:51.560 armchair ghostbuster. A priest performed a blessing. Another so called 0:15:51.600 --> 0:15:54.880 holy man conducted a ritual to cleanse the house. Some 0:15:54.960 --> 0:15:59.680 people blamed aliens, others said it was communists. A marche 0:15:59.840 --> 0:16:03.080 F fifty eight profile of the Hermans in Life magazine 0:16:03.160 --> 0:16:08.160 raised another possible suspect, James Junior. The article reported the 0:16:08.240 --> 0:16:11.400 quote in the Annals of Poltergeist, it has been consistently 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:15.160 noted that the mysterious motion of objects has taken place 0:16:15.160 --> 0:16:20.080 in households containing adolescent children. It further reported that James 0:16:20.200 --> 0:16:24.040 Junior was often nearby when bottles popped in porcelain figures 0:16:24.080 --> 0:16:29.600 hovered midair. Doctor J. Pratt, a psychologist from Duke University's 0:16:29.640 --> 0:16:34.120 Parapsychology Laboratory, made the trip to New York from North Carolina, 0:16:34.160 --> 0:16:37.840 to investigate whether or not James Junior's mind was indeed 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:43.800 influencing matter. Like detective Tozy, Doctor Pratt didn't believe in ghosts, 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:46.240 but he did believe that some people were able to 0:16:46.480 --> 0:16:50.280 let's say, animate otherwise inanimate objects with their own minds 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:54.280 without even knowing it. It is within the realm of possibility. 0:16:54.320 --> 0:16:57.480 Doctor Pratt once said that if eight million New Yorkers 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:00.920 at one time concentrated on moving the Empire Higher State Building, 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:05.080 it might move a bit. Doctor Pratt was in Seaford 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:08.000 for three days, and nothing moved on its own, not 0:17:08.119 --> 0:17:11.359 the Empire State Building, not even a decorative porcelain figurine. 0:17:13.119 --> 0:17:15.720 But as soon as he left to return to North Carolina, 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:21.240 it all started up again. Unlike the movies, there was 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:24.960 no tidy ending to explain the paranormal activity occurring in 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:28.240 the Herman's Long Island home. There was no discovery of 0:17:28.280 --> 0:17:32.520 an ancient burial ground beneath the house's foundation, no four 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:36.119 foot three spiritual medium named Tangina who was able to 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:40.600 detect an unsettling dark presence called the Beast, no portal 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:44.240 to another sphere of consciousness that douses those who pass 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:48.679 through it with a sloppy layer of ectoplasm. Those, of course, 0:17:48.760 --> 0:17:52.680 were Hollywood embellishments to the true story of the hermans 0:17:52.800 --> 0:17:57.359 nineteen fifty eight haunting, and that true story was used 0:17:57.640 --> 0:18:01.040 nearly twenty five years later, as that's the basis for 0:18:01.119 --> 0:18:05.399 the Poltergeist screenplay written by Steven Spielberg. Michael Grayis and 0:18:05.480 --> 0:18:09.959 Mark Victor in the movie Carol Anne Freeling played by 0:18:10.080 --> 0:18:13.600 five year old newcomer Heather O'Rourke, the one Spielberg met 0:18:13.640 --> 0:18:18.000 in the MGM Commissary is the manifestation of Life magazine 0:18:18.119 --> 0:18:22.080 psychokinetic child. She doesn't move objects with her mind, but 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.639 she is clairvoyant and communicates with ghosts directly through the 0:18:25.680 --> 0:18:29.359 family's TV set. Heather talked to the TV set the 0:18:29.400 --> 0:18:32.399 way she talked to her stuffed animals and dolls. It 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:35.920 was make believe. She knew not to be scared for real. 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:40.520 Her performance, however, in the movie as a whole, scared 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:44.480 the pants off audiences in the summer of nineteen eighty two. 0:18:44.600 --> 0:18:49.159 It also scared up some serious box office box throughout 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:51.080 the summer of eighty two, and well it's the fall. 0:18:51.240 --> 0:18:55.440 For twenty four weeks, Poltergeist raked in more than seventy 0:18:55.480 --> 0:18:59.879 five million in domestic gross. That said, the number was 0:19:00.160 --> 0:19:02.480 peanuts compared to the money that the other Out of 0:19:02.480 --> 0:19:05.960 This World Steven Spielberg blockbuster made when e T was 0:19:06.000 --> 0:19:10.399 released the very next week. One cast member in particular, 0:19:10.800 --> 0:19:13.639 was never able to see Poltergeist reach its full box 0:19:13.760 --> 0:19:17.000 office potential when she was cast as he yelled this 0:19:17.119 --> 0:19:20.640 freeling sibling. Dominique Dunn was a twenty two year old 0:19:20.680 --> 0:19:23.520 actress with a handful of TV roles under her belt. 0:19:24.160 --> 0:19:28.399 Poltergeist was Dominique's first movie role, in her big Hollywood break. 0:19:29.080 --> 0:19:32.160 Her potential as one of the decades defining scream queens 0:19:32.320 --> 0:19:37.960 was palpable. Audiences loved her. One person in particular professed 0:19:38.000 --> 0:19:41.600 to love her more than anyone else. But Dominique knew 0:19:41.640 --> 0:19:46.200 that John Thomas Sweeney was confusing love with obsession, which 0:19:46.240 --> 0:19:50.200 was why she broke the relationship off. Sweeney was more 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:54.400 than just jealous and possessive. He was volatile, unhinged. Even 0:19:55.280 --> 0:19:58.160 in August, when Poltergeist was putting fear in the hearts 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:01.840 of moviegoers, Dominique was busy dealing with the horror film 0:20:01.880 --> 0:20:06.400 that was her life. During an argument, Sweeney grabbed Dominique 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:09.200 by the hair and pulled so hard that he ripped 0:20:09.240 --> 0:20:12.960 out a chunk by the roots. Dominique wrote Sweeny a letter, 0:20:13.000 --> 0:20:16.320 but never sent it. We are not compatible. It red. 0:20:16.760 --> 0:20:19.040 When we are good, we are great, But when we 0:20:19.080 --> 0:20:22.920 are bad we are horrendous. The bad outwetes the good, 0:20:23.440 --> 0:20:26.840 the whole thing is made me realize how scared I 0:20:26.880 --> 0:20:31.120 am of you. A month later, against their better judgment, 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:36.360 Dominique was living with Sweeney again. Around three am one night, 0:20:36.600 --> 0:20:41.080 they fought again. Sweeney wrapped his hands around Dominique's neck 0:20:41.400 --> 0:20:43.959 and the two fell to the floor. He was on 0:20:44.040 --> 0:20:48.000 top of her. He squeezed tight and Dominique struggled. She 0:20:48.119 --> 0:20:50.760 managed to escape. She scrambled out of the house of 0:20:50.800 --> 0:20:53.840 the bathroom window. Sweeney heard her car start up and 0:20:53.920 --> 0:20:56.520 ran outside. Suddenly he was in front of the car, 0:20:56.560 --> 0:20:59.679 but Dominique smashed her foot into the gas pedal. Sweeney 0:20:59.760 --> 0:21:01.760 jumped out of the way to avoid getting hit, and 0:21:01.840 --> 0:21:06.679 the car sped off into the La darkness. Dominique Dunn 0:21:06.760 --> 0:21:10.360 escaped for their life at least that time, but there 0:21:10.400 --> 0:21:14.000 was no escaping the fear she lived with constantly. She 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:16.760 hit out at her friend's house. She only showed her 0:21:16.760 --> 0:21:19.120 face in town when she was one hundred percent sure 0:21:19.200 --> 0:21:22.679 that Sweeney was at work. It wasn't ghosts or an 0:21:22.760 --> 0:21:26.320 unsettled dark presence that would come for Dominique Dunn, but 0:21:26.400 --> 0:21:30.240 it was a beast, and not a make believe beast either. 0:21:33.720 --> 0:21:35.479 We'll be right back after this. 0:21:35.640 --> 0:21:37.000 We're We're where. 0:21:40.119 --> 0:21:43.480 Dominique Dunn decided that she had left John Thomas Sweeney 0:21:43.560 --> 0:21:46.800 for the last time. She didn't care that he was 0:21:46.880 --> 0:21:49.960 the right hand man to fame chef Wolfgame Puck in 0:21:50.000 --> 0:21:53.680 the kitchen of the Shishi Mamaison restaurant on Melrose Avenue, 0:21:54.359 --> 0:21:56.919 or that he continued to profess his undying love and 0:21:56.960 --> 0:22:01.600 remorse with a fistful of flowers. In actuality, he did 0:22:01.640 --> 0:22:06.040 more evil with those fists than prepping food and carrying flowers. 0:22:06.560 --> 0:22:09.720 Dominique cared about her own safety. She cared about the 0:22:09.720 --> 0:22:11.879 fact that, when she filmed the cameo was a victim 0:22:11.960 --> 0:22:15.080 of abuse on the gritty TV cop drama Hill Street Blues. 0:22:15.640 --> 0:22:18.760 She didn't need any makeup to look battered. The black 0:22:18.800 --> 0:22:20.760 and blue bruises on her neck that she wore to 0:22:20.840 --> 0:22:24.480 set were real. Every time she looked in the mirror, 0:22:24.680 --> 0:22:27.040 it was a reminder of that cycle of violence that 0:22:27.119 --> 0:22:33.240 she continued to fall into, and she wanted out. October thirtieth, 0:22:33.600 --> 0:22:39.040 nineteen eighty two, eight thirty pm, Poltergeist was still showing 0:22:39.119 --> 0:22:42.280 well at movie theaters across the country, even if it 0:22:42.280 --> 0:22:44.679 had slipped from the upper echelonne of the box office. 0:22:44.720 --> 0:22:47.240 While movies like First Blood and An Officer and a 0:22:47.280 --> 0:22:52.000 Gentleman Dominated, not to mention Spielberg's et, which was well 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.800 on its way to becoming the year's runaway smash, didn't 0:22:55.840 --> 0:22:58.960 matter much to Dominique Donne. She was already moving on, 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:04.359 prepping for the next thing, the next big success. Dominique 0:23:04.440 --> 0:23:06.879 was at her one bedroom home on Rangeley Avenue in 0:23:06.880 --> 0:23:09.919 West Hollywood, the same one she had once shared with 0:23:10.040 --> 0:23:13.800 John Thomas Sweeney. She was running lines with fellow actor 0:23:13.920 --> 0:23:16.480 David Packer for the pilot of a new TV mini 0:23:16.560 --> 0:23:21.280 series called V. Dominique and David paused when they heard 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:24.639 a car pull up outside the house. A car door 0:23:24.720 --> 0:23:29.639 opened and slammed shut. A voice, A knock. Fuck. She 0:23:29.760 --> 0:23:35.440 knew it was Sweeney again, always fucking Sweeney. Dominique opened 0:23:35.480 --> 0:23:38.240 the front door, but left the door chain attached. She 0:23:38.280 --> 0:23:40.840 looked through the two inch gap and saw Sweeney staring 0:23:40.880 --> 0:23:43.480 back at her. He said he wanted to talk. He 0:23:43.560 --> 0:23:46.840 was worked up, out of breath. She wasn't about to 0:23:46.880 --> 0:23:48.959 let him inside, but she knew she had to get 0:23:49.040 --> 0:23:51.400 rid of him. She hoped she could reason with him. 0:23:51.600 --> 0:23:54.960 She told David to wait inside. She undid the door 0:23:55.080 --> 0:23:57.879 Jean walked out onto the porch and closed the door 0:23:57.960 --> 0:24:01.639 behind her, looked over the script in his hands and 0:24:01.680 --> 0:24:04.160 began to run lines on his own. He could hear 0:24:04.240 --> 0:24:08.840 Dominique and swing He talking outside. Their voices slowly began 0:24:08.960 --> 0:24:13.399 to escalate. Sweeney's voice erupted. It dominated the argument with 0:24:13.440 --> 0:24:17.800 aggressive force. David could no longer concentrate on memorizing lines. 0:24:18.320 --> 0:24:20.560 He couldn't make out what they were saying, but he 0:24:20.640 --> 0:24:24.399 knew it wasn't good. A loud, smacking sound made David 0:24:24.480 --> 0:24:27.720 jump and sent chills down his spine, and another one 0:24:28.000 --> 0:24:29.840 in the front of the house shook with each thud. 0:24:30.359 --> 0:24:32.560 David couldn't see what was happening, but he knew someone 0:24:32.680 --> 0:24:35.960 or something was hitting the house. It was rattling the windows. 0:24:36.600 --> 0:24:40.439 Then a scream. Another scream, this one more blood curdling 0:24:40.520 --> 0:24:44.680 than the last. It horrified David. The screams were followed 0:24:44.680 --> 0:24:48.280 by more thuds. David panicked. He picked up the phone 0:24:48.280 --> 0:24:51.560 and called the police. Lapd responded and told him that 0:24:51.760 --> 0:24:55.320 Rangeley Avenue, West Hollywood, that was out of their jurisdiction. 0:24:55.760 --> 0:24:59.680 Nothing they could do out of their jurisdiction. David couldn't 0:24:59.680 --> 0:25:02.359 believe he didn't have the number for the Sheriff's department 0:25:02.400 --> 0:25:06.119 off hand. Lapd wasn't in a call forwarding kind of mood, 0:25:06.520 --> 0:25:09.480 and David was terrified to open the front door. He 0:25:09.560 --> 0:25:11.879 decided to slip up the back door, and as he 0:25:11.920 --> 0:25:14.359 came up the side of the house and approached the driveway, 0:25:14.840 --> 0:25:18.000 he saw Sweeney trying to blend in with the bushes 0:25:18.040 --> 0:25:22.080 but failing, crouching hiding like the cowardly piece of shit 0:25:22.280 --> 0:25:28.520 animal that he was, and then David saw Dominique lying 0:25:28.600 --> 0:25:35.000 lifeless in the driveway. On November fourth, Dominique Dunn was 0:25:35.040 --> 0:25:39.320 taken off life support at Cedar Sinai. Her funeral was 0:25:39.359 --> 0:25:44.760 two days later. Four to six minutes that's how long 0:25:44.840 --> 0:25:49.600 medical examiners estimated John Thomas Sweeney strangled Dominique Dunn outside 0:25:49.640 --> 0:25:56.320 her West Hollywood house four to six minutes. The prosecuting 0:25:56.320 --> 0:25:59.920 attorney opened Sweeney's murder trial by letting a stopwatch run 0:26:00.160 --> 0:26:03.480 for an agonizing four minutes to drive the point at home. 0:26:04.720 --> 0:26:09.240 But despite those chilling four minutes of silence, justice did 0:26:09.280 --> 0:26:13.199 not prevail. First, the judge would not allow another of 0:26:13.240 --> 0:26:17.200 Sweeney's former living girlfriends to testify about the ten times 0:26:17.359 --> 0:26:20.920 he had beaten her during their relationship. About how Sweeney 0:26:20.960 --> 0:26:25.040 broke her nose, punctured ear drum, collapsed or lung. The 0:26:25.160 --> 0:26:27.800 judge said, quote the law says you judge a person 0:26:27.880 --> 0:26:30.439 for his acts and not for the kind of person 0:26:30.520 --> 0:26:34.240 he has been in the past. To make matters even worse, 0:26:34.600 --> 0:26:37.399 the judge then granted the defense's motion to reduce the 0:26:37.520 --> 0:26:42.320 charge from first degree murder to manslaughter. In the defense's eyes, 0:26:42.600 --> 0:26:45.439 the killing was not premeditated. It was committed in the 0:26:45.480 --> 0:26:48.800 heat of passion. Despite their personal views on the matter, 0:26:49.080 --> 0:26:51.560 members of the jury had to deliver a verdict within 0:26:51.600 --> 0:26:56.000 the strict confines they were being presented. Sweeney was saved 0:26:56.040 --> 0:26:58.679