Basement

And now your eyes reproach me that my ache is awkward, And my arms are angular across my breast, Where emptiness is pressed.

Poet in the Basement by Genevieve Taggart Read for LibriVox.org by Newgate Novelist only to tell your loveliness this love only to tell pain's odor beauty burning miracle of my surrender late i flew but ever arrow straight i fly now from the shade that falls that fell lightly on you on me with a wave's weight oh i must go this city has a spell i never gave it leave to have still still to tell the weaving of your footsteps on the stairs with my slow-dropping love for you that wears cold stone i want my heart for still i stay put out the stars give me another day only to tell you are no more but sunken in a sea sheer into dream ten thousand leagues you fell and now you lie green golden while a bell swings with the tide my heart, and all is well till I look down and, wavering, the spell, your loveliness, returns.

There in the sea, Where you lie amber pale and coral cool, You are most loved, most lost, most beautiful.

End of poem.

Hi, I'm Joe, and welcome to Fear on Film as we wrap up our special four-part series, Shortcuts to Terror, Horror from the Newark Independent Film Festival.

Today we have Kazi Tuginas, founder and festival director of the Newark Independent Film Festival and producer of the 2015 short film, Don't Go in the Basement.

What's the matter, Paul?

I'm not pretty enough for you!

Yeah, no. You'd be surprised at...

There's a lot of filmmakers that don't really think about it that much, but it's pretty important.

I mean, that's actually why, ironically, you didn't really hear anything about Don't Go in the Basement until this, like, recently, was the sound issues on the film.

We didn't have the tools back in the day because we had some sound issues, unfortunately, due to the hiring process.

And I think it's an awesome...

It's a great way to show... just how wide this hobby can be and that's one of the things that excites me about the hobby so much is that there's so many great games out there so many different styles and so many different sort of focuses that are out there and and you know good society being one of them it's easy to kind of pick on it and i think it's like you know almost self kind of self recognizes that like it's a you know it's such a departure from dungeons and dragons and sort of the you know the Basement, you know, basement dwelling grognardy types who probably could enjoy a game of Good Society themselves.

I wouldn't expect that we're going to see a fifth edition version of Good Society anytime soon.

You know, probably not.

Little coat rack man.

So Marcus Klewer, the author of, uh, The Thing In My Basement Takes a Step Closer Every Week.

Every week? Yeah.

Um, which got a ton of traction online.

Because there's always updates.

Mm-hmm.

So you kinda get the best of both worlds of, like, reading the original and then being like, ooh, what changed? After we read the, uh, w- The Thing In My Basement Is Taking a Step Every Week, whatever, so many people I saw post and tag us, whatever, or so many people I saw post in the subreddit of, like, went out and got this.

And-

And when they rebuilt, they raised the street level.

the entire downtown area was elevated sometimes by as much as ten feet buildings that had survived the fire suddenly found their first floors below the new street level doorways that had opened at ground level now required descending stairs Basement windows became ground floor windows.

The official explanation is practical.

The city needed better drainage, needed to prevent flooding from Lake Michigan, needed to modernize its infrastructure.

I would prefer to be at a higher vantage point and start up there as compared to having to work our way up the stairs or the elevators.

Oh, I just thought we'd go down to the basement first.

Basement first? I mean, if you think it's a good idea.

Listen, I'm not saying that my idea is good by any means.

We all remember what happened just hours ago.

Just

downstairs safe and upstairs safe.

Basement's least security.

Now, often it's in an attic or somewhere, um-

Basement.

Mm-hmm

... what's the weirdest thing you've ever found?