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Enter Hollywood Hotel Hello - if you dare
Halloween means haunted party at this Danville home

by Julie Nostrand

The attractive flagstone path of the house in West Danville no longer leads to a friendly front door. The entryway has been ominously draped with burgundy and a lighted sign fades in and out, spookily proclaiming: The Hollywood Hotel Hello.

It's the home of Mark Costella and Larry Varela, and the decorations are evidence that Costella is hard at work transforming the venue into a haunted 1930s-era Hollywood hotel.

"It will be a 1939 Hollywood Hotel Hello that has been taken over by Halloween town," quipped Costella about the party they are planning for this year's Halloween celebration.

For Costella, putting his home through "an extreme makeover" is a normal activity in early October. For the past three years, Costella and Varela have hosted elaborate, themed Halloween parties. The events take the men one to three months to concoct, and they enjoy every second of the effort.

"It started with a Christmas party, then it grew," said Varela, a director of Hospice Nursing and After Hours Advice for Kaiser. "We wanted something to connect food and decorations."

Families and friends agree their Halloween parties are spectacular, and it isn't the only annual event hosted by the two. Their summer party is also a "must-attend," and guests know that regardless of the season or the theme, they are expected to show up in costume and participate in the shenanigans.

For each party, the pair works as a team. Costella does a majority of the structural transformation. He uses his skills as a plumber, electrician, builder and seamstress to create ingenious settings. While Costella is busy building, Varela is pouring over menus searching for exactly the right food and drinks to round out the theme.

"We start off with a theme and then creativity kicks in," says Costella. He is a general contractor and works at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory as the associate director of Facility Management, and Environment, Health and Safety Operations manager.

While some of Costella's handiwork is visible from the street, much of the transformation occurs inside the home. This year they plan to convert the living room into a hotel lobby complete with a front desk and elevator to whisk guests to the haunted 13th floor. The master bedroom will serve as a perfectly frightening ballroom. The kitchen will morph into a classic '30s hotel room - but with a haunted canopy bed, which will be used to serve up the food. Since no hotel is complete without a banquet room, the home's dining room will be outfitted to serve the feasting guests.

Haunted chandeliers and candelabras will hang in every room for effect. Rumor has it Costella has been buying motors to animate many of this year's props, but the two are quiet on the details.

While Costella is busy with the props, Varela researches old cookbooks, the Internet and other publications for period recipes to balance the decorations. For their Halloween parties, Varela also searches for "dark" dishes to increase the spookiness of the holiday's theme. Then, like the mad scientist, he enters his kitchen laboratory and starts experimenting. He often hosts a pre-party before the big event to test recipes and get a feel for the amount of work each dish requires.

Not a cook by training or trade, Varela spends the week before the party preparing dishes and drinks for the lucky 120 guests. While he does much of the work beforehand, the day of the party is always hectic.

"We end up having to borrow refrigerator space and stove tops from our neighbors to make it work," said Varela.

The neighbors enjoy supporting their efforts. Beyond kitchen help, they also offer up parking spaces and heavy lifting for the party setup, if required. Needless to say, neighbors are among the first people to receive invitations to what is arguably the hottest party in town.

The neighborhood kids benefit from Costella and Varela's work, too: They enjoy fame at school. After all, these kids get the behind-the-scenes tours of the house before the party starts.

One neighbor, who wished to remain anonymous, said that he is constantly approached by friends looking for ways to get onto the guest list.

"The parties are great," he said. "They work for weeks and it is really inventive."

Neighbors say it is common for people to drive up and down the street just to take a look at the exterior decorations. On Halloween, many people bring their kids to the neighborhood to see the Verona Avenue home.

Last year's "Mad Scientist" clock facade and lighting effects were so realistic, the men reported that more than one trick-or-treater ended up in tears of terror on their front porch.

"They do such a great job," said the neighbor. "You never know what they are going to come up with."

As the specialized lights on the sign fade in and out, it begs a question: Are visitors checking into the Hollywood Hotel Hello or the Hollywood Hotel Hell? Only guests of this spectacular party will find out.