44 THE QUEENS COURIER • MARCH 17, 2022 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM
Sci-fi , cosplay fans turn up for annual Winter Con at Resorts World
BY GABRIELE HOLTERMANN
EDITORIAL@QNS.COM
@QNS
Winter Con returned for the eighth year
to the Resorts World NYC in South Ozone
Park on March 12 and 13.
Th e event featured two days of sci-fi
stars of today and yesterday; panels with
Q&A sessions; cosplay; celebrities; and
vendors.
The fiction fans — many of them
dressed up as their favorite characters —
had the chance to chat with some of the
artists, illustrators and writers who had
prominently displayed their work in the
Wintercon Artist Alley or to meet their
favorite sci-fi actors.
Paul Varrachi, who hails from New
York City, had a replica revolver from the
movie “Tombstone” signed by Michael
Biehn, who portrayed Johnny Ringo in
the 1993 Western.
He thought it “pretty awesome” to
talk to an actor who stared in what many
believe is the greatest Western ever made.
“He Michael Biehn plays one of the
greatest bad guys ever in this movie,”
Varrachi said. “So it’s a pretty iconic role,
pretty iconic movie, and then to have a
replica pistol that was from his collection
to have him sign it, and then for him to
immediately recognize the pistol was also
very cool.”
Mykal McCulloch and his brother Eric
came all the way from Pennsylvania. Despite
treacherous weather conditions, they
had left early in the morning to meet their
childhood hero.
“We grew up with these characters
and these actors. And I had to be
here,” Mykal McCulloch said.
“I’ve never met them before, and
childhood wouldn’t be complete
if I didn’t actually meet him
fi rst.”
Legendary Nick Castle, who
played everyone’s favorite slasher Michael
Myers in John Carpenter’s 1978 horror
fi lm “Halloween,” said it was great to
be back and say hi to the fans — something
that he had missed during the COVID-19
pandemic.
Castle shared that no one had expected
the movie to become a blockbuster. Originally
“Halloween” was supposed to be
called the “Baby Sitter Murders.”
“And that’s really as deep as it really
started out,” Castle chuckled. “John hit
lightning in a bottle, and him and Deborah
came up with a script that resonated.
Tommy Wallace, the production designer,
found the mask, a William Shatner mask,
and converted it turned into this crazy
iconic character. So you got to get lucky
sometimes.”
When asked why he thinks the horror
classic is still drawing such a large fan base
over 40 years later, he said it was mindboggling
that the fi lm was still getting so
much adulation.
“For some people, it’s the fi rst time
they ever got scared, really scared,” he
explained. “It becomes a primal link to
your mortality somehow. And then some
people just have fun with these kinds of
things, you know, so it’s mind-boggling,
really.”
Michael Monsanto from Bayshore,
Long Island, said he tried to go to every
local show and meet the “heroes of the
past.” He had a bunch of photos signed
by the legend.
“Th ey’re always so nice to speak to and
it’s nice to see the people that you see on
the screen,” Monsanto said.
Friends Steven Barbato and Felix Bones
III were dressed from head to toe in “Halloween”
swag. Barbato was about 4 or 5
when he saw “Halloween” for the fi rst
time and said Michael Meyers had been
his “favorite” slasher ever since.
“Th e original from ’97 is my favorite one
of all times,” Barbato said. “I must have
seen over 1,000 times. Every time I see it,
it’s like I’m watching it for the fi rst time.”
Bones said he was 13 when he saw “Halloween”
for the fi rst time.
“It just gets better the more I watch it,”
Bones said. “Because every time I watch it,
there’s little things I don’t notice before,
and then I do.”
Shinnequa Clemente of Sheek Visual
Arts was one of the artists displaying her
work in the event’s Artists Alley.
Th e high school art teacher and Hofstra
graduate shared that her stories tend to deal
with children and she’s currently working
on a children’s comic book about
a young boy.
Cosplayers attend Winter Con at Resorts World NYC in South Ozone Park on March 12, 2022.
“I’m inspired by them,” the cartoon illustrator
said. “Th e cuteness of them, like this little
boy’s story. I got a whole story.”
Besides producing the past few years,
“Alien’s” Ricco Ross also stars in the movie
“Do Something,” about three generations of
Black female activists. Th e fi lm has already
won multiple awards and was shot during
the pandemic.
“Half of it was done with cell phones, but
that’s in the story. So it works,” Ross explained.
” And during the time when they were doing
all the marches and everything, we were capitalizing
on that, so we got great production for
that. So it’s good stuff .”
Denise Crosby, who, among others, played
Lieutenant Tasha in “Star Trek: Th e Next
Generation” and Mary in “Th e Walking
Dead,” said it was great to see people coming
back together. Th e actress had just returned
from a seven-day “Star Trek” cruise in the
Caribbean.
“It was so much fun, and people were so
joyful and happy to be out with each other
and it was it was great,” Crosby said.
She thought it was wonderful that the
Photos by Gabriele Holtermann
sci-fi classic was still popular among all ages.
“It’s such a profound message that people
get from this show: Th at there will be a future,
the future will be better, not dystopian, like
so many are, and that we actually improve as
a species,” Crosby said. “Th at’s an inherently
positive message.”
See more photos on QNS.com.
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