The Making of a Cult Classic

Playing alongside Actor Nick Smyth in this soon-to-be-cult-classic QUIET ROOM BEARS by Creator and Director Lee Howard was one of the highlights of my year. You'd never guess this bloody masterpiece was filmed in beautiful Muskoka, home to some of Toronto's Wealthiest cottagers. Hats off to the crew for never missing a spot of blood during the clean-up of our haunted estate. I wouldn't want a lingering blood patch to morph into another session of Howard's Quiet Room Bears. Finding such a bear will be sure to make you spiral into self-induced madness.

You may have already caught the gory flick at Frightmare in the Falls or Blood in the Snow Film Festival in Toronto but if not, and you're in the Jersey area, check out the next screening at the New Jersey Horror Con and Film Festival.

Friends, admirers and comrades in the Horror Industry encouraged Howard to make this film based off the years of creating one of a kind, mutated teddy bears. Some prominent horror icons who have their hands on a bear are Marilyn Manson, Mark Patton (Nightmare on Elm Street 2 : Freddy's Revenge), Lezlie Deane (Freddy's Dead : The Final Nightmare, and front for the band Scary Cherry and the Bang Bangs), and Jen and Sylvia Soska (the Twisted Twins).

Please read on to devour the legend of the Quiet Room Bears, as told by Lee Howard himself:

It was once said that in an unknown location, there is a mental institution that sits beyond a forest of live oak trees and the atrocities that reside within are reserved for a special place in Hell. When one of the inmates gets 'out of sorts', they are placed in the 'quiet room'. Nobody really knows what goes on inside that room. Nobody is meant to. The inmates are placed inside for a 'session' to work out their childhood traumas. They are placed inside with Teddy Bears, children's toys, strong, needles and knives. So many knives. Not standard practice by any means, but the doctors are only doing what the Quiet Room itself insists. When (if) the inmates comes out, they come out missing parts such as teeth, ears, maybe a finger or a patch of skin, and no soul. The inmates literally pour their madness into each Bear. A monstrosity made of fur, blood, cotton, human skin. A plush abomination. A nightmare in the daylight. It is within these walls, the 'Quiet Room Bears' are born. But the Bears are not alive, you see. They are merely vessels of madness. A way for the Quiet Room to spread it's terror and insanity beyond the walls of the hospital. You think you want one, but it's the Quiet Room that has chosen you as an owner. And that is the beginning of the end. Keep your eyes peeled, beware, and be QUIET.