Monday, February 24, 2014

Ghost Adventures: Madame Tussauds Wax Museum

I really enjoyed visiting Madame Tussauds Wax Museum in Los Angeles, so when I saw that Ghost Adventures did a 2011 episode at the Madame Tussauds in Las Vegas, I just had to watch it!  The show stars Zak Bagans, Aaron Goodwin, Nick Groff and airs on the Travel Channel.  Zak, Aaron, and Nick start out at the David Saxe Theatre (hey, I saw the fake Beatles there!) at the Planet Hollywood Resort and Casino.  David Saxe tells Zak that he used to work at the Sands Casino (which is where the Ventian, where Madame Tussauds is located, now stands), and things used to wrong with his sister’s magic act…things that could hurt or kill her.  They installed security cameras because they thought someone was tampering with her props, but they never caught anyone on camera.  David says that he doesn’t believe in ghosts, but he leaves a ghost light on in his theatre anyway; Zak and David see smoke in the theatre, and David can’t explain where it’s coming from.

The Sands used to be owned by the Mafia, and the team talks to a few people in Vegas about the mob activity that went on before arriving at Madame Tussauds Wax Museum.  When they first get to the museum, they talk to Chris Mayes, the show manager at the museum.  Zac wonders if any spirits of dead celebrities are inhabiting their wax likenesses.  Chris gives them some history about Madame Tussaud, saying that during the French Revolution she was forced to find the heads of the deceased and make death masques.  Employee Kurt Mayne tells the team that he has seen ghosts in the maze where the Halloween show takes place.  Another employee, Stephanie Freitas, says that one night at closing, she heard the voice of Elvis Presley, who had performed at the Sands.  Along with another employee, she followed the sound; when they figured out which room it was coming from, they opened the door and felt “a very cold chill…and Elvis was singing louder than ever.”

The crew sets up night vision cameras in the Viva Las Vegas Room and by the staircase.  They begin walking around and hear something laugh at them; this is caught on the camera by the staircase, as well as one of the REM pods lighting up to signify electromagnetic energy.  Zak places a recorder, an EMF detector, and some casino chips on a table, and they soon hear the EMF detector go off.  They crew goes downstairs and try a new device called the Ovilus II that “contains a phonetic generator that spirits can manipulate and choose specific words by using their energy.”  Zak asks if there’s someone in the room, and the word “Noah” shows up in the Ovilus II; the device then shows the words “play,” “corner,” and “tied.” Zak asks the spirit if the Mafia tied him up, and “contract” shows up on the Ovilus II, so the guys deduce that the Mafia put a hit on Noah.  Zak asks what happened after Noah was tied up, and “cave” appears on the Olivus II, so Zak then asks what happened in the cave, and “dig” appears.  Zak asks Noah if he had to dig his own grave, and he answers “throat” through the Ovilus II; he then asks if the Mafia strangled him and Noah answers “lash.”  Zak asks if Noah died then or if the Mafia left him in the cave, and Noah answers “alive.”

The guys decide to split up: Aaron goes to the Scream Maze, Nick goes upstairs, and Zak stays downstairs.  Zak walks around the Spirit of America room with a thermal imaging camera, then heads to the Viva Las Vegas room, but he doesn’t catch anything.  In the Scream Maze, Aaron asks if there’s anyone there who enjoy scaring people and asks if they’ll show their presence…then he feels something go through his body.  Aaron asks the spirit what show it performed in and if it was in a show with three other people…a female voice answers “singing in the rain.”  They wonder if Judy Garland might be the spirit, and Kurt tells Zak that Liza Minnelli’s wax figure is standing right outside of the door to that room.  Upstairs, Nick hears a noise, then takes a picture in which a transparent figure can be seen standing at the bottom of the stairs.

This was a great episode, and watching the Ghost Adventures crew investigate in dark rooms surrounded by wax figures was pretty creepy.

My rating: 8/10

http://www.travelchannel.com/tv-shows/ghost-adventures

Watch the episode here:


And just for fun, here's my favorite photo from my visit to Madame Tussauds in L.A.:


1 comment:

  1. This was one of the few episodes that Zak didn't have a freak out lol

    I love working with the Ovilus although my team didn't have the version the GAC has

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