The Exorcist Stairs

I have been a huge horror movie fan for as long as I can remember. When I was a little kid I used to spend every Saturday with the monster matinees on TV. I loved the classic Universal horror and of course Godzilla and all of his (her?) Monster Island cohorts. Those films were campy and cheesy fun, but not particularly scary. I had a feeling of invincibility when it came to horror. I had seen it all and nothing could shake me. I was arrogant. All of that changed when I saw The Exorcist. Director William Friedkin's 1973 masterpiece is widely considered the scariest movie ever made and I tend to agree with that. That thing scared the ever-loving crap out of me and freaks me out to this day.

Back in ancient times, before the internet and satellite, we had this stuff called broadcast TV. It was the only form of electronic entertainment and it sucked. You got 3 networks and maybe a couple local UHF channels and the reception was just terrible. There was never anything on with the exception of Saturdays. There was cartoons in the morning and then kung-fu and horror movies all afternoon. Most of the time I'd be out playing with my friends, but Saturday afternoon I was watching The Man With The X-Ray Eyes or Rodan.

In 1978, when I was 9 years old, we got got this miraculous new technology called cable TV. The reception was perfect and there was a slew of new channels to watch. The coolest thing was HBO which showed full-length movies that hadn't been edited for TV. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal now, but back then it was groundbreaking. The first night we had it, The Exorcist was on and I really wanted to watch it. I had heard about the movie and knew it was supposed to be really scary. My dad, who had seen the film in the theater, was hesitant to let me see it. After begging and pleading, he caved in and we settled into the couch with some Jiffy-Pop.

For a kid that was used to two-headed freaks and Smog Monsters, The Exorcist started out pretty slow. I was young and didn't pick up on all the mood and subtleties. At some point, I kind of figured out what was going on. This wasn't a movie about giant city-crushing lizards, it was a realistic look at demonic possession. I remember a sense of dread sinking in. When we got to the scene where Reagan, Linda Blair's character, starts shaking in her bed I freaked out and made my dad turn off the movie.

I had a friend that had watched the whole thing and he would tell me about all this cool sounding stuff that happens. I pretended that I hadn't had a chance to see it yet because I didn't want to look like pussy. Clearly I had to see that thing in it's entirety. I tried a couple more times and eventually got through the movie. I'm not exaggerating when I say it chilled me to the bone. For weeks after watching The Exorcist I had trouble sleeping. I would lay wide-eyed in my bed convinced that every little noise I heard was a demon coming to get me. Looking back now, I think this movie gave me the heebie-jeebies so bad because it was very realistic. A giant ape going crazy in NYC seemed unlikely, but a getting possessed by the devil wasn't that far fetched to me.

I didn't know it at the time, but The Exorcist is actually based on a true story. It would seem that a 13 year old from Mount Ranier, Maryland, a slum suburb of Washing D.C., was possessed and subsequently exorcised in 1949. In fact, a jesuit priest performed two separate exorcisms on the boy to rid him of his demons. Durring one of the rites, the kid broke free from his bindings, ripped out a bed spring and gave the priest a 100-stitch slashing. It's actually a fairly well-documented case. As an interesting side note, I used to have a friend that was a black female skinhead (no I'm not making that up) whose grandfather was the mayor of Mount Ranier.

A few years after seeing The Exorcist we moved to the Washington D.C. area. It was in the back of my mind that this was the place where that movie that scared me so much took place. In an odd twist of fate, I would end up throwing myself into the belly of the beast. I couldn't escape demon possession movie. I started hanging out in the D.C. hardcore scene. When we weren't at show, we'd kick it around the Georgetown area of Washington. One of the places were punks liked to congregate was the Exorcist Stairs. That's right, the actually long staircase from the film. It's where Father Karras tumbles to his death. It's a real place that connects Georgetown University with M Street.

It was an ideal place to hang out. Number one, when you're a punk, you want to be someplace creepy like a graveyard and the Exorcist stairs were even better. There was a liquor store close to the top as well as another near the bottom. We didn't have far to go to get a quart bottle of Black Label. Best of all, the cops never came around, so it was a perfect hidden spot to party. One of the things we'd do was throw our empty beer cans at cute college girls walking the stairs. I don't know if this was a juvenile attempt at a pick up line or if we were just being assholes. Probably the later, but one time it worked and I ended going back to the dorm room with one of my targets.

I have to admit that the first time I went to the stairs I felt a little unnerved. It was surreal. It seems irrational now, but the film had such a profound impact on my psyche. I was older and I knew there was no danger of demonic attack, but the place had a spooky vibe, especially at night. It was just a movie, but I felt the area had power. I was so in awe of the stairs that when I was singing for a thrash metal band called Wreckage I insisted we take our promo pictures there. Adding to the surrealism, one time we ran into NBA great Patrick Ewing on the stairs. It was an odd place indeed.

There were other spots around town that us punk rockers would hang out, but I always liked it best when we ended up on the stairs. I remembered how much The Exorcist had scared me, so I felt like I was conquering my fear by being there. It was a scary place that I had made my own. In a weird way, I had beaten the first movie that really terrorized me by sitting on a staircase and drinking a 40 concealed in a paper bag.

How to avoid demonic possession

While writing this, I started thinking about the devil and it occurred to me that you only ever hear about Christians getting possessed. More specifically, it seems pretty limited to the Catholic faith. This could be for a couple of reasons: Catholics are so indoctrinated with fear that they are the only ones that believe in this crap or atheists and people from other religions are already going to hell so the devil doesn't bother with them. In either case, the best way to avoid a possession seems to be simply not being a Christian. The cool thing is, Christianity lets you repent for any sin or blasphemy you may commit. So, live your life demon free, and then embrace the church right near the end.