Horror is back, says Howard Beige, executive vice president for Rubie’s Costume Company, who spoke to US radio station NPR in the lead-up to Halloween.
Interest in horror comes and goes in cycles, Howard explained to the news-focused media outlet.
“We had been [in] a lull period until last year. That was when we noticed the pick-up. And then this year’s popularity is growing again from there,” he said. “So, we’ve definitely noticed that, for Halloween, horror is back.”
Howard says the last time Rubie’s saw a trend like this was a decade ago, around 2005 or 2006. This year, he says he can point to exactly what spurred the interest in horror-themed costumes: IT.
Once the movie started performing well at the box office, Howard says he knew IT would be a Halloween staple.
“There’s no question there was an explosion right after September 8 – [that was] the day the IT movie came out and the very next day, we got calls from retailers saying ‘We need IT products!'” said Howard. Luckily, Rubie’s official classic Pennywise mask was already in stock.
The film went on to make box office history as the highest-grossing horror film of all time, and has netted $666.6 million worldwide, according to Box Office Mojo.
