HomeHalloween in Adelaide
The season of it
Halloween in Adelaide
Most Halloween events in this city involve a costume and a queue. This one involves an hour in a dark room with objects that people were genuinely frightened of.
What is actually on
Adelaide does Halloween in bursts. There are club nights, a handful of haunted house setups, ghost tours of the Gaol and the old asylum, and a great deal of themed drinks. Most of it lands on the weekend nearest the 31st and then vanishes for another year.
HAUNTED is the other option. It runs every Thursday at The Lost Dice in the CBD, all year round, which means it is on through Halloween week the same as any other week. No costume required, and no queue in the cold.
Why it works for Halloween
The show is built on real objects. Kevin Kopfstein brings out pieces from his collection of hauntiques, which includes vampire hunting kits, voodoo dolls, cemetery padlocks and haunted dolls, and tells you where each one came from and what people believed about it. Then things start happening in the room.
There is no gore and nothing leaps out at you from behind a curtain. The unease is slower than that, and it tends to last longer. People report thinking about it on the drive home, which is not something anyone says about a haunted maze.
Making a night of it
The Show & Meal Deal is $74 per person and includes the show, a burger or pizza, a drink and access to the venue's library of more than 650 board games. Arrive by 7pm to eat, then go up for the 8pm show. For a group it turns an hour into a full evening, and the bar is open afterwards.
Groups of four or more pay $32 per person on standard tickets. If you are organising something larger, or want the room to yourself for a private event around Halloween, see group bookings and get an enquiry in early. Late October fills up.
Worth knowing. HAUNTED is best suited to adults and mature audiences. It is genuinely eerie and it is not a children's Halloween activity. If you want something for kids, this is not it.
Other spooky things in Adelaide
If you are building a whole season out of it, Adelaide has a decent supply of the genuinely grim. The Adelaide Gaol runs ghost tours and paranormal investigations, there are dark history tours of Z Ward at the old Glenside asylum and of West Terrace Cemetery, and during Adelaide Fringe in February and March there is usually a run of supernatural shows including Kevin's own HAUNTED 2.0: The Witching Hour.
Check each operator directly for dates and prices, as they change year to year.
Book a Thursday
Every Thursday, 8pm to 9pm, at The Lost Dice, 111 King William Street, Adelaide.