Fright Krewe

Did You Know?

• The series is set in modern-day New Orleans.
• The teens are blessed with powers from voodoo spirits.
• The evil the teens must stop is one they themselves unleashed.

Production

The idea for Fright Krewe first came about in 2015, when Eli Roth and James Frey talked about childhood favorites like Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! and Goosebumps. They felt that modern children's shows didn't have that same tone anymore, so they decided to make their own horror-themed project for kids. By 2019, they were putting together a pitch for DreamWorks Animation Television. Through DreamWorks executive Ben Cawood, they reached out to Joanna Lewis and Kristine Songco, who had written episodes of Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts. Lewis and Songco were interested in creating DreamWorks series aimed at older audiences, so they joined the project. On June 9, 2023, news broke that Roth and Frey were working on Fright Krewe for DreamWorks Animation Television. Roth, Frey, Lewis, and Songco were all set as executive producers, with Lewis and Songco also serving as showrunners. The series was renewed for a second season in November 2023. The early drafts of the show were more episodic, but after Lewis and Songco came on board, they switched to a serialized story. They thought this would make the series more appealing to older viewers by putting more focus on the kids' relationships and experiences. They also believed this approach helped the show stand out from other horror-themed children's series. Neither Lewis nor Songco had written horror before, so they studied horror films for research and drew inspiration from movies they watched as kids, as well as authors like Anne Rice and R. L. Stine. They deliberately avoided slasher material because of the young-adult audience, wanting the show to act as a bridge between something a bit older than Scooby-Doo and the kind of gory, slasher horror that younger viewers aren't ready for. The writers initially imagined the main characters as horror film stereotypes, then developed them into more layered personalities that still explored horror tropes but gave them a fresh spin through the show's world.