Horror comedy filmed in Chico will screen at the Pageant Theatre on Oct. 14

Animator Julia Nevers works behind the scenes of 'The Fuzzies.' Courtesy photo

More than 40 Chico State students helped give The Fuzzies an intricate, entertaining and creepy life

By Odin Rasco

What happens when the charm and magic of a children’s show is left to fester in isolation?

After the cameras stop rolling and audiences turn their televisions off, what happens to the characters that the show gave life to? 

In The Fuzzies, a new horror-comedy filmed in Chico, a group of childhood friends reunite following the death of their friend, Shirley, the former host of a children’s television show. While visiting Shirley’s estate, the group discovers that the puppets from the show are alive — and hungry for a new audience.

With no strings to hold them down, or hold them back, what will the grotesque puppets and stop-motion creatures do to the unsuspecting visitors in their basement?

The result of five years of iteration, planning, filming and post-production, The Fuzzies is a surreal and absurdist film that explores themes of friendship, legacy and the things that ought to stay buried while offering scares and laughter at every turn. It started off as a short film devised by director and Chico State art department professor Josh Funk; it made its debut at film festivals in 2021, where it garnered its fair share of accolades and awards, including Best Horror Short at the Astoria Film Festival (Astoria, NY) and Director’s Choice Short at the Chicago Horror Film Festival (Chicago, IL).

“It did very well, and we decided we wanted to expand it,” explained Funk, who worked alongside Dustin Vaught — who also served as producer and one of the actors in the film — to craft the script. “The inspirations came from a number of places. The puppets brought me back to my childhood; when I was a kid, for a few days my sister and I were on a children’s show called Romper Room that was filmed down in the Bay Area. We made some modifications and simplified things a bit, but at its core it is very similar and it has the same character in it, but we’ve really expanded on the world of the short film.”

The Fuzzies is set to have its world premiere at Chico’s Pageant Theatre on Tuesday, Oct. 14. The choice to debut the film in Chico is in large part to celebrate how integral the area’s community was in bringing its story to life. By Funk’s estimation, around 100 people contributed to the film, including more than 40 Chico State students who helped with animation and storyboarding. 

A blend of live-action filming and extensive stop-motion animation, the film’s preproduction took years. Animation efforts started in 2023, while dressing a house in Chico that served as the set took a year-and-a-half to get ready. Animation was led by Funk and Julia Nevers, a Chico State student at the time.

After graduating in December 2024, Nevers immediately secured an internship doing animation work in Southern California.

“I got to build a couple of the puppets that we worked with for the film, as well as animating them, and honestly it was a really really good challenge, especially as somebody at the very start of my career,” Nevers recalled. “There was one shot on a staircase that took us a good four or five hours to do. It was an absolutely massive puppet, and we were trying to suspend it in different creative ways, and I remember having to go up and down the staircase for every single frame, dodging all the wires and fishing line. It was a massive challenge, but it was very fun; there was that element of risk to it, you know, because if I bumped into one thing, all four hours of progress would be gone.”

In one sequence in the film, the stop-motion animation isn’t done with a puppet, but by one of the lead actors. Rocío de la Grana, who plays the grounded schoolteacher Rose, delivered a stop-motion performance that took more than an hour-and-a-half to capture frame by frame. With each second of footage consisting of 24 different movements, de la Grana had to micro-move her body and expressions and keep still between pictures, a new challenge for the Argentinian actor.

“I think it was the very last day of shooting that we did the stop motion; it was so fun,” de la Grana recounted. “It’s hard to explain, but you have to find a rhythm to it because you have to do 24 photos for every second. It required me to be very still and meticulously move in a kind of weird way.”

The film’s inspired animation is paired with a cast with clear passion for the project.

Shirley is played by Gordy Cassell, who felt drawn to the role given her own obsession with puppetry and experience as a children’s birthday entertainer.

“I know how to puppeteer and I love kids and I just felt like the character was one I would have a lot of fun with since I already kind of was like her,” Cassell explained. “What I love about The Fuzzies is that the world is kind of a scary place right now, and it’s a ‘scary’ movie, but it’s fun. I think that Josh and Dustin were very creative in their execution. They found the right people. If you want something that’s going to have a cult following to it, that would be The Fuzzies. It’s just like Pee-wee’s Playhouse but with a little bit more of that horror.”

The Fuzzies will be screened at the Pageant Theatre October 14-16 at 7 p.m., with each night featuring a Q&A session with Funk and members of the cast and crew. Tickets are available at thefuzziesfilm.com for $10.