St. Armands hosts spooktacular fright night

The 10th annual event featured candy, costumes and of course, a "Thriller" performance by the Sarasota High School Drama Department.

By Katie Johns
| 10:20 p.m. October 31, 2018

Longboat Key
Neighbors

There were plenty of treats, and of course, some tricks at St. Armand Circle's 10th annual Fright Night.

On Oct. 31, creatures of all kinds crawled around St. Armands Circle in search of candy from participating stores and restaurants.

Characters of all kinds, from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Moana to chickens and lobsters, were out and about this Halloween.

Kids raced around the circle as their parents tried to keep up to see who could collect candy.

Lucas Cortes, Violet Valla and Jessa Winn, who trick-or-treated with Tomas Cortes, said their favorite part of Halloween was dressing up and getting candy.

Elsewhere on the circle, Nova and Chevelle Marrero thought the same.

Likewise, the two groups of trick-or-treaters agreed on something else. There would be no sharing later. It was up to everyone to collect their own treasure.

After collecting candy, families headed to the park for a performance of “Thriller” by the Sarasota High School Drama Department. After a slight delay, the performance began, and this year, alumni came back and performed with current students as after this year, the department is taking a break from performing at St. Armands Circle.

Sarasota High School drama teacher and director for this performance, Melissa Dweck said there is a chance the performance will return in a few years. Over the past 10 years, Dweck has led more than 1,500 students through the “Thriller” performance.

This year, alumni came back for the performance to celebrate the 10th anniversary. The alumni also helped with make up and taught the students the choreography, which the students started learning Oct. 1.

Although Dweck loves working with the students, arriving at St. Armands and seeing people’s excitement is an exciting moment for her.

“Some of the best moments are when we pull on to the circle, and all the people know they’re (the students as zombies) coming and they wave and point to the school buses,” Dweck said. “That’s probably one of my favorites.”