Four actors in Poltergeist have since died and people think the film is 'cursed'
Topics: Film and TV, Halloween, Horror
Gabriella Ferlita
Featured Image Credit: PictureLux / The Hollywood Archive / Photo 12 / Alamy
Topics: Film and TV, Halloween, Horror
It’s almost Halloween, and we’ll soon be bundling up on the sofa with a pumpkin spice latte and a bucketful of popcorn before tucking into our favourite spooky movie.
And there’s one horror movie which is particularly ‘cursed’ - and we don’t just mean because of a terrifying plot twist, or two.
The film in question is none other than Poltergeist, after four of the actors in the movie have sadly died following their appearance in the horror fantasy. Watch the trailer here:
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If you cast your mind back to 1982, you’ll recall a family moving into their dream home, which, of course, becomes their worst nightmare when an evil spirit decides to corrupt their young daughter through their TV.
What ensues is the five-year-old generally tormenting her poor parents after the spirits use the child to bring them ‘to the light’ due to her life force.
But following the film’s initial release and its follow-ups in 1986 with Poltergeist II, and 1988’s Poltergeist III, four actors involved in the movies later passed away.
Those that died include Dominique Dunne, Heather O’Rourke, Will Sampson, and Julian Beck.
Beck, who played the evil priest, Kane, in Poltergeist II was diagnosed with stomach cancer in 1983 and died of complications from the disease shortly after he completed the second movie.
Meanwhile, Sampson, who portrayed the role of the shaman, Taylor, in the second film also had a poor prognosis after receiving a heart-lung transplant, and sadly died following the operation.
There were two more unexpected deaths following the trilogy, including Dunne, who played one of the lead roles of Dana Freeling in the first movie and was strangled to death the same year by her ex-boyfriend after she refused to date him again.
Furthermore, O’Rourke, who portrayed Dunne’s little sister Carole Anne Freeling - the iconic blonde little girl who perhaps best encapsulates the original movie - also had an unexpected and tragic death at just 12 years old due to a medical condition.
O’Rourke, who was also featured in the two sequels, was believed to have received an incorrect diagnosis of Crohn’s disease in 1987, which may have caused the actor to eventually die in 1988.
Could it be a real-life curse?
Well, onlookers seem to think so. “I’ve been studying the Poltergeist movie curse. It’s truly deep and crazy,” one social media user explained.
Another added: “The whole set was cursed. Some of the cast died. Weird things happened during production. Will Sampson, a Native American actor and shaman was in Poltergeist 3. He cleared the energy and lifted the curse.”
Spooky, right?