Dreamers and screamers at old “Woodsboro High”
By Cat Smith —
In December 1996, I attended a matinee of Scream during opening weekend. Living in San Diego at the time, I had heard it was filmed in Sonoma. The Sonoma Community Center graced the big screen as Woodsboro High.
I was excited to see cameos from horror legends Linda Blair and Wes Craven, but even better, glimpses of people I went to Sonoma High with. At one point, the character Sidney Prescot ran from the staircase to what was a restroom in the film. I elbowed my friend pointing out that it was actually the dance studio.
Fast forward to 2022. The fifth film in the Scream franchise was about to be released, but more importantly, I had started working at the Community Center. Since then, I’ve discovered an interesting phenomenon. Fans from all over the United States make a pilgrimage to Sonoma County just to see locations where this horror classic was filmed. The staff at the Community Center now lovingly refer to these visitors as “Screamers.”
The high school scenes were originally set to film at Santa Rosa High and they would have received $50,000 for its use. Just before the cameras arrived, the school pulled the plug. That’s when SCC Executive Director at the time, Daniel Casabonne, saw an opportunity to raise much-needed funds for the Center.
“I reached out to the production company and told them that the Center was originally a schoolhouse and would potentially make a great location for those scenes,” Casabonne said. Crediting the negotiation of this deal as one of the events that launched him into real estate, the Center was paid well over three times the amount promised to SRHS for the three days of filming.
It’s easy to spot Screamers wandering the halls of the Center because while only five short scenes were filmed there, it went through a huge transformation which leaves the fans a little lost. Lockers were brought in and a mural of the Woodsboro Panther decorated the hall. The movie classroom is still lined with chalkboard walls but now houses printing presses rather than desks.
Screamers never seem disappointed though. They take pictures in every location acting out their favorite scenes knowing that Neve Campbell or Courtney Cox once stood there.
Low-budget horror film producers Joseph Dean Martinez and James Neff of Night Walker Cinema recently visited the Center for a “top secret Scream-related project.” A huge fan of Scream, Neff said that approaching the building was “Surreal. It was amazing seeing it in person after seeing it on film so many times!”
Franco Caramelino (pictured at top) travels all the way from Iowa to visit. During his first visit, he quickly befriended another Scream fan, Dane Petralli, who has been running “Scream Tours” at Spring Hill Estate in Tomales since 2019.
Fans will recognize the estate as Stu Macher’s house where the final 52-minute party scene takes place. Caramelino quickly joined Petralli as a co-host of the tours, appearing as the iconic Ghostface villain from the movie. The tour happens three times a year and when they take place, we notice an uptick in Screamers at the Center.
The Sonoma Community Center is open daily from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. Screamers of any age can stop by and visit Woodsboro High and its three locations featured in the film: front of the building, upstairs hallway, and classroom (Printmaking Studio). On the first floor, a display case commemorates Woodsboro history.
