Teen helps bring innovation to entertainment
Ashton D’Avanzo programs a Fouth of July show in Grand Terrace, California, called Forever Magic. • Photos Submitted
By Tom Victoria
Ashton D’Avanzo’s idea for an amusement park dark ride in his garage kept expanding until he ended up the vice president of an entertainment technology company.
At 17, Ashton is an executive with Adrenalin Attractions, a California company servicing the hospitality industry by offering dark rides, design, fabrication and immersive lodging, which entails creating a unique experience in a hotel or motel room.
“You dream, we theme,” he said, citing the company slogan.
Ashton started the company with his father, Scott D’Avanzo in 2016.
“I do make a lot of decisions with my dad,” Ashton said.
Among the projects Ashton worked on is Stay&Scare, which utilizes sensors to make almost any room the host to a myriad of special effects.
“Stay&Scare is a patented technology that allows us to know a person's location inside a hotel room,” he said. “With this technology, we are able to activate events to go off within the room to scare people with precise timing.”
Ashton explained Stay&Scare is never the same for each participant.
“In the room will be several different effects from audio and projection to lighting and mechanical effects, all connected to a central system,” he said. “This computer will activate, depending on the guest's location, an effect at a precise time to ensure to give the best effect and scare to the guest. The same effect will never go off for the same person on the same stay giving a truly realistic experience.”
Scenes of Kooky Trails as a completed dark ride and while under construction.
The sensor effects aren’t restricted to frights. Ashton said there is the potential for multiple themes.
He also is involved with the development of the company’s own amusement park ride vehicle called the Adrenalin Dark 3.0, which would be included with its total ride package, and even a theme park.
“Mystic City is our proposed theme park idea in the works,” he said. “One way I would describe Mystic City is a unique type of theme park. A park (where) exploration and curiosity are at every turn. With one central story, this gives an immersive and different experience than what’s currently offered by parks. Designed with beautiful landscapes, inspiring mountains and rock structures, the immersive park is built for everyone in the entire family to enjoy together and will feature never before seen attractions.”
Seeds for the company’s genesis were sown years ago when Ashton visited Walt Disney’s first amusement park.
“I was fascinated with Disneyland as a child,” he said. “We always had a pass.”
Ashton eventually was inspired to have a dark ride constructed in his home to be both rider and ride operator. After trying unsuccessfully for years, he finally convinced Scott by buying him an electric tool, demonstrating how serious his desire was.
Ashton and his dad, Scott, debut Mystic Motel's expansion in 2015. The in-house ride, which initially lasted 30 seconds, featured characters haunting the motel years after an explosion occurred at a nearby research facility. Among the creepy inhabitants were a maintenance man and an older woman holding a baby. Ashton and Scott present Journey to Polar Point in 2018. Each year, the father-son team enhanced the Halloween ride. They later added a Christmas ride, Journey to Polar Point.
“It was when I bought him a drill, he said he (Ashton) really wants this,” Ashton said about his father’s reaction.
Father and son had to teach themselves how to build a ride.
“He wasn’t a handy guy,” Ashton said about Scott’s lack of construction skills. “Now, he is.”
Ashton said the running joke in the family before Mystic Motel opened in 2013 was that his dad couldn’t even hang a picture frame straight.
The in-house ride, which initially lasted 30 seconds, featured characters haunting the motel years after an explosion occurred at a nearby research facility. Among the creepy inhabitants were a maintenance man and an older woman holding a baby.
“The story goes Jack Turner, the owner of the Mystic, decided to hire a maintenance man, Charlie, to keep the place safe,” Ashton said about the ride’s premise. “Since he has been there for so many years by himself, he is getting a little bit crazy in the head. The old lady is Helen. She is one of the guests of the Mystic the night the explosion happened.”
The ride car had a wooden frame, a motor from a mobility scooter and a battery under the seat as it traveled along a metal track. One scene featured a simulated collapsing roof while another depicted an exploding boiler room.
“My advice is take every opportunity you can. You have to have failure to have success. It’s better to pursue ideas that may not work out. You never really fail until you give up.”
Each year, the father-son team enhanced the Halloween ride. They later added a Christmas ride, Journey to Polar Point.
Fortuitous timing occurred when Ashton and his dad listed the ride for sale.
“It really came out of nowhere in November 2015,” Ashton said. “My dad put the ride on eBay and from there, a guy named Albert Rodriguez came to us to build him his own dark ride called Kooky Trails. By January 2016, we started the design of his ride and the rest is history.”
Ashton specializes in lighting.
“Some lighting effects I do consist of many different things, like nighttime shows with lasers, fireworks, flame throwers,” he said. “I have also programmed many different scenes in several projects, such as a crystal light scene inside a mine. Another is having a colored fog come out of a dragon and even simulated sparks providing an amazing fire effect.”
Ashton taught himself how to use and program DMX, or Digital Multiplex, the standard for lighting effects. He also learned how to operate firework and laser systems.
Ashton has not wasted any time moving on with his life’s work. He graduated high school a year early.
“I’m so glad I did it,” Ashton said.
He is uncertain about whether further education lies in his future.
Ashton works on wiring with an able assist from his sister, Ava.
“I am letting God open the doors that need to be open at the right time and trusting him,” Ashton said. “There are so many different directions this company can go and that is a big deciding factor.”
He stressed how vital it is for people to pursue their passion.
“The reason it is so important to have a job you enjoy is that you spend about one-third of your life working,” Ashton said. “If you work in a miserable setting where you aren’t happy, then you won't have that drive in life, that passion that makes you keep going. Doing what you love means you never
work a day in your life. You don’t dread coming into work. You are excited to have that passion and that motivation to do something truly amazing in your life. God made us all have a special interest in something. He wants us to be happy with what we do and it's our job to grab a hold of that special talent or interest and make something out of it.”
Ashton encouraged others to weather bad times, when it’s easy to become discouraged, and be unafraid to follow dreams.
“My advice is take every opportunity you can,” he said. “You have to have failure to have success. It’s better to pursue ideas that may not work out. You never really fail until you give up.”
Ashton is glad he didn’t give up on having his own dark ride at home as he now does what he loves, brightening others’ days with entertainment.
“I can make any day happy.”
The link to Adrenalin Attractions is: https://www.adrenalinattractions.com/
The link to Ashton's Instagram is: https://www.instagram.com/ashton_davanzo/