Allen Thompson

Allen Thompson is the Director of Operations at Scarizona Scaregrounds, the family-owned haunted attraction on Alma School Road in Mesa. Under his direction the haunt has run its October seasons for over two decades, earning a spot on thrill-seekers’ annual tours across the East Valley and greater Phoenix.

He runs the show like a production. The cast, the set, the special-effects makeup, and the intellectual property are all built and staffed in-house: an immersive post-apocalyptic scaregrounds meant to play, in his own framing, like the equivalent of a movie or a TV show you walk straight into.

That approach earned outside recognition in 2024, when The Scare Factor named Scarizona’s cast the Highest Rated Cast in the Southwest, with a 9.0/10 cast score inside an 8.35/10 overall review. It is credit for a real, in-character cast and hand-crafted, single-artist SFX makeup rather than shortcuts.

Every October he and the seasonal Scream Team rebuild and reimagine the attractions, and the door stays open to Arizona locals who want to stop being just ticket buyers and join the cast and crew for the season.