Ready to Get Your Fright On?

A new factory has set up shop in Belleville. But instead of car parts or widgets, this manufacturer produces high-pitched screams of terror and spooky thrills, all courtesy of “workers” who look like they just wandered off the set of a George Romero movie.

The Scare Factory, a haunted-house attraction, opened this past Friday in the parking lot of State Fair, 229 Main St., and runs every weekend through Halloween (click here for complete schedule and ticket information)*.

Scare Factory is the brainchild of Lodi native Anthony Giordano, who was first bitten by the horror bug when he visited Brigantine Castle in Wildwood at the age of five. A few years ago, he approached Al Dorso, the owner of State Fair, and asked if he could use some storage space on the property for his fright-filled vision. Scare Factory is now in its third year.

Giordano, 35, drew inspiration from a photograph taken in the 1920s of an industrial facility. Beginning in August, using that basic template, he recreated a factory within the cavernous State Fair space, filling it with period touches including separate entrances for men and women as well as a “break room” where hokey -- but actual -- occupational safety films play on a small screen.

The rest of the haunt features other workplace staples -- a human resources department, a loading dock -- but each with a macabre twist. (Don’t ask what they’re serving in the cafeteria.)

“I go to estate sales to get props,” Giordano said. “I’d say 90 percent of everything in there is antique.”

For Giordano, however, putting together a truly memorable experience is more than just assembling the lighting and smoke machines. Giordano, who once reviewed haunted attractions for Time Out New York magazine, has actually pondered the science of fear.

“There are studies that show men tend to be scared of large objects falling from above,” he explained. “Women are more frightened of small things crawling at their feet.” (Both principles are incorporated within Scare Factory, although to find out how you’ll have to check it out for yourself.)

But what really makes the Scare Factory, well, scary, are the actors Giordano has hired. Each one underwent an “American Idol”-style audition to get the job. Each also has a memorized back story.

“They might not ever use it, but if a customer asks, [the performers] will tell them,” Giordano said.

Giordano’s ghoulish workers are so motivated, in fact, they actually begin their routines even while customers are waiting on line. This past Friday, under a fittingly bleak cloudy sky, a reporter had a tough time getting them to emerge from character. There’s Jose, a fiendish mechanic with a talking arm stump, and “the boss,” a towering fellow who motivates his employees primarily by growling at them (perhaps not an altogether unfamiliar experience to some of us working stiffs).

One worker who did reveal his more human side was Woody Alfonso, a construction foreman by day who volunteered at the “bucket brigade” that cleared debris from the World Trade Center after the 9/11 attacks.

“I have a thing for watching people cringe, in a healthy way,” the strapping Alfonso explained. “I think it’s a healthy adrenaline rush. I love it when people claim they have no fear, because they easily show it here.”

*The evening Scare Factory is a bit too intense for very young kids, but there are Sunday matinees from 4 to 6 pm appropriate for children under 12, who must be accompanied by an adult. Tickets for those shows are $8.