Interview: “The Pumpkin Man” Takes Root

Thanks for having me! I’m an indie filmmaker who’s tackling his first feature film with my awesome fiancé Janae Muchmore. We couldn’t be happier to be bringing this to life after so many years of making short films.

Without spoiling too much, who IS The Pumpkin Man?

The Pumpkin Man is the Demon of Fall. He’s a demon that absolutely thrives on the evil and mischief that gets celebrated every Halloween. His only goal is to spread chaos.

The Pumpkin Man is your first feature film, expanding on lore established in your Pumpkin Man short films. How did that (pumpkin) seed first get planted?

Halloween has always been a huge part of my life. I grew up in Northern Indiana and every October was so special up there. When the leaves all changed to orange, it just gives you a certain feeling that is hard to describe. It sets the perfect mood for all things Halloween. So when it came time to do a class project at Ball State University that would be due in October, I knew I wanted to do something Halloween related. The original name of the script was actually ‘The Pumpkin Chaser’ and it was almost going to be like something out of ‘The Purge’. It was going to be a guy in a black hoodie with a pumpkin mask chasing a woman through our college campus. But when I went to buy the mask from Spirit Halloween, everything changed. The manager noticed I had been coming in quite a bit and asked why I was buying all this stuff. I told her and she quickly asked if I’d ever want to film at a haunted house. I couldn’t say yes fast enough. She got me in contact with her son in law, Micheal Keihn (the magnificent Kreepy The Clown), and I changed the script to fit a haunted house. I also bought a different mask than the one I was planning to get that day. I came home and asked my roommate Jeff Rhodes to put it on and he suggested changing the name to ‘The Pumpkin Man’. Six short films later and we’re onto the feature! While never reaching the level of views as my short film ‘Alone’, The Pumpkin Man has always been my number one favorite project and I’m hoping that this film will entertain for years to come!

Without a doubt, going to the Niles Scream Park in Niles, Michigan every October. That place is so special to me. I cite many different things as leading me on the path to horror filmmaking, like Jurassic Park and Alien, but the Niles Scream Park is I think where I totally embraced it. I remember walking through those mazes the first time, my heart beating wildly out of my chest, and thinking ‘this is the kind of emotion I want to get out of an audience’. I think fear is one of the most memorable responses, and if I can scare people with my films, they’ll remember the film because of how I scared them. Niles really helped shape my love of horror and how I view Halloween. I still carry a lot of the memories from Niles with me while making this film, and I hope to capture the same feeling of pure Halloween spirit that I felt every single time I went to that beautiful Midwestern Scream Park.

Your production company, South Ridge Films, is based in Florida. Are you fans of Universal Orlando’s Halloween Horror Nights?HUGE fans. Before I moved to Florida, Niles Scream Park was my Horror Nights but every year I’d watch the walkthroughs on YouTube of all the mazes. I finally went for the first time in 2019 and it was everything I wanted it to be. But HHN 30 was just about as perfect as you can get. I went so many times last year because in my opinion there wasn’t a weak house. But what kept me coming back was The Wicked Growth: Realm of the Pumpkin. Talk about an absolute perfect house. It was actually perfect timing that they had this pumpkin themed house because right around the time HHN opened last year, we were writing The Pumpkin Man script. So after work I’d go over to Horror Nights for an hour and go through The Wicked Growth a few times to put myself fully in the Halloween mood. One night I actually managed to do The Wicked Growth seven times in a row because it was raining and no one was there. I walked through the house completely alone at one point and that was a next level experience. But then I’d come home, brew a pumpkin spice coffee, light a pumpkin spice candle, and start writing. I hope we capture a bit of the spirit of The Wicked Growth, especially in our pumpkin patch scene in the film. I owe a lot to that house because it truly helped us get in the right mentality for this film. I mean every time I really need to get focused on The Pumpkin Man, I listen to the song Black Star by Lustmord which played in the queue for The Wicked Growth and it just puts me right back in front of that house staring at all the pumpkins. Who knows? Maybe one day we’ll see The Pumpkin Lord and The Pumpkin Man square off in a house together. That would be a dream come true!

I’ve always said my ultimate goal for The Pumpkin Man is for him to get his own haunted house somewhere so if he’s fighting The Pumpkin Lord, I’d say we did pretty well!

Where can we keep up with your progress and see The Pumpkin Man in action?

You can find all of our updates on our Instagram pages @pumpkinmanfilm and @southridgefilms as well as my personal Instagram @theryansheets. We’re also posting updates to our South Ridge Films YouTube channel and our website www.southridgefilms.com