Campfire Stories: Inside the new book “Sleepaway Camp: Making the Movie and Reigniting the Campfire!”

We all remember the VHS box from the video store.

This year marks 40 years since the release of “Sleepaway Camp,” which is both hard and easy to imagine.  Easy, because it’s dated, yet hard because it hasn’t aged.  It’s still the deranged slasher wrapped around a sweet tween romance (and for some reason, an entire baseball game).  Not to mention one of the most infamous endings in horror.  While it’s celebrated at cons and revival screenings, author Jeff Hayes has written “Sleepaway Camp: Making the Movie and Reigniting the Campfire,” a new book chronicling the making of the film.

Mike Kellin (Mel) was worried about his death scene in the aftermath of “The Twilight Zone: The Movie” incident, but he was a trooper.

In 1982, 25-year-old Robert Hiltzik traveled to his old summer camp in upstate New York with a film crew and a busload of kids to direct his first script.  It was a gamble for the first-timer, but he had an arsenal at his disposal in the form of makeup artist Ed French and the effects crew from “Creepshow.”  Hiltzik managed to graft their grisly effects with memories of childhood summers spent at the aforementioned Camp Algonquin.  There’s a sense of nostalgia and love into the film, which Hayes captures through interviews and anecdotes with most of the major cast and crew.  There’s even a bit about a rogue hot air balloon that comes out of nowhere during filming.  With a movie as controversial as “Sleepaway Camp,” one would think the resulting book would be a salacious tell-all, at least partially.  Not so here, as there’s not really a bad word in any of the interviews.  Well, aside from Hiltzik making producer Michele Tatosian a last-minute stunt double in one scene where she had to fall in a cold lake.  Tatosian was dating Hiltzik, and later married him, so it’s all water under the canoe. 

Felissa Rose (Angela) and Jonathan Tiersten (Ricky) weren’t getting along, so they were taken bowling in order to bond. Scandalous!

Books like these usually mention how everyone on set was a big ol’ family, but here they really were.  Felissa Rose, the infamous “Angela,” even met her husband on the set of “Return to Sleepaway Camp,” which wouldn’t have even been made if it weren’t for Hayes tracking down Hiltzik and Rose two decades after the original film’s release.  Yes, Hayes does touch on the sequels, but focuses mainly on the original and how it spawned one of the first “legacy sequels,” which are now all the rage.  The making-of section comprises the first half, while the second half is about Hayes tracking down the people who made it 20 years after its release.  It’s endearing to learn that nobody really knew how the film’s cult popularity had grown over the years, until a major Fangoria convention appearance.  Hayes is just as enmeshed in the legacy of the film as his subjects.  He moderates the DVD commentaries and to this day acts as webmaster of the Sleepaway Camp movies website.  If anyone’s going to write this book, of course it would be him.  He even mentions writing a sequel where the killer is Chef Artie, which is incredibly bonkers in the “Sleepaway Camp” tradition.

Look at those crazy kids. Just making a movie in the woods with Robert Hiltzik (holding the face)

While many remember the ending of “Sleepaway Camp” as controversial, Hayes bypasses that conversation, pretty much entirely.  If you’re looking for an analysis on the latent trans themes and where the film exists in today’s queer horror canon, this isn’t that book (personally, I don’t think Hiltzik was trying to make a political point, but the film’s ultimate message is a warning about the dangers of forcing someone to be who they aren’t.  But that’s another article).  Hayes aims for more for celebration than introspection, which is perfectly fine and suited to his style. His book is for everyone who loves Hiltzik’s film.  There’s no campfire to reignite.  It’s been burning for 40 years.

“Sleepaway Camp: Making the Movie and Reigniting the Campfire” is available where you buy books and from 1984 Publishing along with soundtrack bundles.

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