Reaction was quick, sad and peppered with family memories. \u201cThank you for creating so much magic for my family as well as so many others,\u201d wrote one admirer on Instagram<\/a>. \u201cMy kids and myself will forever walk around in a squeaky voice reciting: \u201cHelp meeee…I feeel like a yo-yo.\u201d<\/p>\n Former \u201cSimpsons\u201d producer Rick Polizzi in his Sherman Oaks treehouse, known as \u201cBoney Island,\u201d in 2025.<\/p>\n (Juliana Yamada \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Boney Island, a playful homage to Coney Island, was born in the late 1990s when Polizzi set out to build a Halloween attraction in his Sherman Oaks front yard for his family and neighbors. He was joined by Aqua Dazzle owner Rex Danyluk and friends as they designed an immersive, imaginative experience without a haunted house, a maze or jump scares. Instead it featured cavorting skeletons, magic acts and water shows.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not all the gore and horror stuff that everything else is,\u201d Polizzi said. \u201cI started it for my daughters.\u201d<\/p>\n Eventually, the yard\u2019s tall treehouse and growing crowds each Halloween led to permit disputes<\/a> and the prospect of criminal charges.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were a victim of our own success, because it got so crowded we had to hire traffic control,\u201d Polizzi told Spectrum News<\/a> in 2025, adding that \u201cone neighbor across the street always hated it.\u201d Polizzi estimated that he\u2019d spend more than $50,000 trying to get proper city approvals before dismantling the treehouse in 2025.<\/p>\n \u201cI had the cool experience of actually ascending into the treehouse,\u201d said Kim Cooper, co-owner of Esotouric tours and former visitors to the treehouse. \u201cYou look at this thing and you think: Wait a minute. That\u2019s possible?\u201d<\/p>\n Polizzi, in 2025, flips through a scrapbook he made about Boney Island.<\/p>\n (Juliana Yamada \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Boney Island\u2019s red-tape battles with the city of Los Angeles, Cooper said, show that \u201cthere is sadistic, demented element in the city [government] that does not like to see people who have an independent sense of \u00e9lan and freedom.\u201d<\/p>\n Still, Boney Island seemed likely to live on elsewhere. While the red-tape battles were being fought, the attraction moved from Polizzi\u2019s yard to Griffith Park in 2018, went dark for several years, then resurfaced at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles<\/a> in 2023 and 2024, drawing tens of thousands of people. But the Exposition Park location proved difficult for many guests, Polizzi said, and the event went dark again last year while organizers searched for a new location, preferably a gated space with at least 70,000 square feet. Polizzi said he explored many options, including the L.A. Zoo, another corner of Griffith Park, Descanso Gardens, the L.A. County Arboretum, but none quite fit. Some of those spots host elaborate holiday light displays that require set-up in late October.<\/p>\n The best option seemed to be the soundstages at Santa Clarita Studios. \u201cIt was going to be challenging to have it inside to begin with, but I was looking forward to it,\u201d Polizzi said. <\/p>\n At this point, he added, it would take a last-minute location discovery to change things.<\/p>\n \u201cI would love to keep it going, I just don\u2019t have a place for it,\u201d Polizzi said.<\/p>\n ![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786886223_23_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Polizzi,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786886225_524_.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n