Horror Movie Filmed At Atlantic Highlands' Strauss Mansion; Streams Aug. 26

MIDDLETOWN, NJ — Troy Burbank just loves to make movies.

Burbank, 53, who lives in Leonardo, lived in Middletown all his life. A father of five, he owns his own construction business and is a landlord of multiple rental properties in Leonardo, among other work.

But Burbank's true passion is writing movie scripts and making movies. It's something he does on the side, through a small production company he named LeonardoBoyz.

Burbank's most recent work is a horror movie called What Lives Here, and it will be streamed on Amazon Prime and other platforms (full list below) starting Aug. 26. Ron Milkie (Officer Dorf in the original Friday the 13th) is in it, plus Ernie O'Donnell from all the Kevin Smith movies (Clerks, Dogma, Chasing Amy) and Ming Chen from the AMC reality series "Comic Book Men."

It's also being shown at Smodcastle Cinemas in Atlantic Highlands, which is now owned by Smith.

Middletown locals will recognize nearly all of the scenes: They filmed the entire movie over a 10-day period in November 2023 at the infamous Strauss Mansion in Atlantic Highlands. The movie was nearly entirely filmed in AH, except for some bar scenes shot at this extremely creepy, isolated roadside bar called Snyder's in West Shokan in the Catskills.

"The idea for this movie came so out of left field," Burbank shared this week. "Two years ago, on Super Bowl Sunday, my wife and I were walking into the Harborside in Atlantic Highlands and this lady stops me and goes, 'When are you gonna shoot something in the Strauss Mansion?' I said well, I don't even know if I can get in there. She goes, 'I now run the Atlantic Highlands Historical Society. Come tour it tomorrow.'"

From the second he walked inside, Burbank said he was chilled by the Victorian mansion's dark wood paneling, its winding staircases, multiple floors and attics — and possibly by the fact that it was February and the heat was barely on.

"I said to her: If you give me and my team the run of the place, I will write a script for this house."

His movie is about a Pennsylvania company that does real-estate cleanouts, and they are hired to remove a lot of junk from an old estate several hours away. The clean-out crew is curious why they've been asked to take a job so far away, and they are then forced to sleep in the mansion for four nights when a motel loses their reservation.

Interestingly, this is the second movie to film at the Strauss Mansion: The first was a 1977 horror flick called "Don't Go In the House," and it became somewhat of a small cult classic. It starred Dan Grimaldi, who later was Patsy Parisi on "The Sopranos."

"Every aspect of (the Strauss Mansion) was well worth my money," said Burbank of his $25,000 budget to shoot the film. "Every room in that house is amazing. We filmed overnight from 5 p.m. to 6 a.m. I've heard the stories about that house, and it really was like someone was watching me when I was up there alone. It's easy to psych yourself out."

As of now, the movie will begin streaming Aug. 26 on Amazon Prime, DirectTV, Dish Network, Google TV and InDemand, which is the movie streaming service from OnDemand. After that, you'll be able to find it through the free TV offerings such as Pluto and Tubi.

Burbank's made lots of films, which you can see on his YouTube channel, TroyBurbankFilms. (We liked the trailer for "Garage Sale.") He's next working on Christmas at Aunt Betty's, a Christmas horror movie that will shoot in Middletown this December — stay tuned to find out where.

"I write the scripts for my movies, with my wife now helping me, and then I work with a distributor called MVD Entertainment in Pottstown, PA. They shop it around, they pitch it to whoever. If they like it, they pick up. Comedies are hard to sell, unless you have a big-name actor in it. Horror movies are much easier to get picked up. People always seem to like gore, suspense, the demonic stuff."

Burbank is like Adam Sandler in that a lot of the actors he uses have now become his friends, and he likes to use the same actors over and over again in his movies. He also puts out casting calls on Backstage and gets referrals through the Atlantic Highlands Playhouse.

He started shooting films back in 2008 (his first was "White Trash Cribs," filmed all around Navesink, Leonardo and Atlantic Highlands) and one of the first horror shorts he made was nominated to be in the "Days of the Dead" horror film festival in Atlanta.

"I made that short for $600 and it got nominated for Best Picture up against multi-million-dollar movies," he said. "When everyone heard my budget, they were blown away."

Sound familiar? Smith, who grew up in this area, filmed Clerks at the Leonardo QuickStop for under $30,000. Faster than you can say bada bing, the movie became an insta-classic and turned Smith into a major Hollywood director. Burbank counts Smith as a friend and a mentor.

But hands down, John Carpenter (Halloween, The Thing, The Fog) is the filmmaker Burbank most admires.

"Bar none, it's John Carpenter. I look at his work and say that's what I want to do. The way he shoots, his direction. So much of his work is from his own vision and perspective — he writes in the truest form. His writing is very realistic. It almost could be real life, but it's not."