CMCs Haunted House Review (2026)

Even though the haunted house is CMC’s annual fundraiser event, that doesn’t mean they’re phoning it in by any means. Pulling in from the main road is made easy by the bright lights at the parking lot, coupled with the large skeleton props. Parking attendants point the way, and the best part is it’s a paved lot. No mud here on a rainy night! The queue for the ticket booth is well lit and very very easy to find. This is also where you’ll get your group number for the virtual queue. Once “inside”, there are plenty of seats around fire pits where you can watch a movie or grab a snack from the concession stand that has a good selection of candy, hot foods, and all sorts of family friendly drinks. Guests can also snap some selfies with the animatronics on display near the attraction queues. While there’s not a huge variety of activities or any queue actors, it’s difficult to complain about being bored while waiting for your number to be called.

When we arrived on site, they were calling for group number 8 or 9, and we had 15. Even still, we didn’t wait but 15-20 minutes or so before it was our turn. We headed up to the check-in spot and were pointed to the first haunt where we then had to wait about 5 minutes. This was also the case for the second attraction, although the second attraction’s wait time was a little closer to 10 minutes. All said, the wait was basically non-existent, and this is the absolute beauty of a virtual queue done right.

There are two attractions at CMC this year; Strange Things which is based heavily on the popular TV show “Stranger Things”, and Classic Scares, which is a variety of scenes based around horror movies, classic phobias, you know – spooky stuff. Strange Things is the more immersive attraction in my opinion as we followed a fairly linear story, experienced familiar characters, and most importantly, the sets were very well made and really brought us into the space quickly. While I have only seen small parts of the show on social media, I was able to recognize main characters and places like The Upsidedown, and this wouldn’t be possible without a great amount of detail in costumes and scenery.

Classic Scares is less linear in the sense that there’s not an overarching story being told. Scenes jump around without much narrative reason to link them, but I think this attraction is meant to be viewed more as a collection of short stories. Each scene is fairly easy to recognize the reference being made such as Alice in Wonderland, where we met the Queen of Hearts, or the spider cave that must be downright awful for guests with arachnophobia. The small flaws inherent in building haunt scenes really melt away very quickly thanks to the great interaction with actors, and their commitment to each theme.

Usually when you hear about unique special effects, it’s when talking about high budget professional haunts with full creative teams. Why or how a dance school is more creative with some effects than a permanent, professional haunt, is far beyond me. The Strange Things attraction featured two effects back-to-back that, while simple, captured my attention so quickly that I had to stop and stare for a moment. The first is while walking down a hallway toward the finale scene. The ceiling is covered in cotton to give the appearance of clouds, while a rope light set on the “chase” function is hidden behind it, giving the illusion of moving lightning. This is something that used to be somewhat popular in the 2010s for party decorations and “mood lighting” for lack of a better term, and for whatever reason fell out of fashion. It’s still a really cool effect, and it fits the theme of travelling between dimensions so well. The only thing I would add to this effect are stationary mini strobes to add a little more texture to the storm.

The other effect comes from a viral video from the early 2020s. The floating Max effect. Yes, of course it’s a lightweight dummy in a costume being held up with fishing line. But when there’s a bunch of things happening around you and the lighting makes the fishing line disappear even when you’re looking directly at it? It’s perfect. Could this sample principle be applied to countless other scenes? Yes, of course! It’s such a simple effect and yet, this is the first time I’ve seen one in use.

We also saw a classic illusion that comes straight from the world of stage magic. In the Classic Scares attraction there’s a scene featuring the Queen of Hearts from “Alice in Wonderland”, and we hear the iconic line “off with her head!” We’re presented with a large guillotine set, complete with the condemned, and an executioner. We watch the blade drop, and the victim’s head fall into a basket. It’s not often that I get to see classic magic tricks being employed in haunts, so this was such a nice surprise.

Throughout both attractions we found the usual assortment of effects like fog, ambient sound, and strobe lights. However, I am absolutely astonished at the range of effects and the creativity that we saw. Again, all of this for a fundraiser event!

As you might expect, Strange Things featured several characters from “Stranger Things”. While these costumes are commercially available, and often just street clothes, there were a few that caught my eye. First are the several demogorgon characters that appear in almost every scene. While the costume is just a body suit with a head piece, it helped the continuity of the story to have this recurring character “following” you and tying scenes together. The other was a character called Vecna. This costume is just full of detail and texture, and I suspect that fans of the show would be terrified of the iconic villain in the flesh.

Classic Scares delivers a wide variety of characters from scene to scene. The creepy twins in the intro scene, the hillbillies in the cabin, The Queen of Hearts and Jack of Spades, they all did such a great job of being realistic to the character, and the costumes matched very nicely to their scenes. One downside is that characters wearing masks had a noticeable lack of makeup to blend visible skin around eyes, and mouths. This is a very small complaint compared to the overall quality of this show, but something that would help elevate the realism and depth of characters.

I really enjoyed the amount of interaction from every single actor, though. Everybody had lines of dialogue, choreography, and importantly, improv skills. The character we meet in the first scene of Strange Things was able to stay in character and get us headed in the right direction while I inadvertently tried to go the wrong way. The Jack of Spades had enough improv chops to make light banter as we came through their scene, and it should not be overlooked that a large majority of these actors are kids. They are such great performers, and I suspect that this is a skill they learn through dancing.

Both attractions deliver a nice variety of scares. Lots of jump scares are sure to be found, but my favorites are the scares we don’t typically see. Strange Things features a guard tower with a large search light that kicks on at just the right moment, making patrons feel very seen and vulnerable to the demogorgon that’s lurking nearby. Heading into the infirmary scene, we saw an excellent body snatch scare which might be my favorite type of scare. Classic Scares is more of the same, mostly jump scares and a few opportunities for distractions that were well met. This is also where we see the guillotine illusion along with a chainsaw scare in the hillbilly scene.

Finales are a bit mismatched. Strange Things is a lower energy scare, although it did leave us with a sense of finality. The appearance of Vecna was a great way to cap the story and bring things to a close, but I would have liked to see a much more energetic performance from this actor. Classic Scares really turns the dial up, though. Heading into the final scene, there are multiple scares coming from opposite sides of the room and the big scare as we head out the door features a character that literally jumps off of the wall towards us, all while laughing maniacally. This was a nice big scare to properly end the attraction, and it was a very nice change of pace to see something other than a chainsaw ambush at the very end.

Twenty-five dollars gets you roughly ten minutes of haunts, and while that leaves the minute-per-dollar calculation on the low end, that is an absolute steal of a price. The quality of this show is one-hundred percent worth the cost of admission. Not only are there two high quality attractions, there’s multiple fire pits where you can hang out while watching a movie, or you can grab a snack and a drink for some of the most reasonable prices I’ve ever seen at a haunt. There are photo opportunities around the common area, and the best part is the virtual queue means you won’t spend all night standing in line doom-scrolling on your phone until it’s your turn.

CMC Dance Company puts on one of the most celebrated and loved haunts in the Central New York area, and there is no question as to why. This is by and large one of the best ways to spend a fall evening and you don’t even have to leave town to do it.