October 19, 1999: Spirits, Trapped Souls, & the Afterlife - Laurie Jacobson
The conversation deepens when Jacobson recounts Ricky Nelson's daughter Tracy describing violent poltergeist activity in Errol Flynn's former estate, where rooms shook with the sound of crashing furniture and gold records being smashed, yet nothing was ever disturbed. Jacobson shares her own experience at Grauman's Chinese Theatre, where an unseen presence angrily shook a floor-to-ceiling velvet drape, later identified as the ghost of a former employee named Fritz who had hanged himself behind the movie screen.
Art reveals a mysterious photograph from his webcam taken at the exact moment he was discussing a Satanist guest, showing an unexplained white mass gathered above his head. The pair debate reincarnation, near-death experiences, the dangers of Ouija boards, and whether the manner of death directly shapes what happens to the spirit afterward.
Key Moments
Trapped on Earth: a different kind of hell: Art and author Laurie Jacobson discuss why so many Hollywood spirits remain earthbound. Jacobson says the dead may not realize they are dead, that other spirits try to help them cross over but cannot reach them because they don't believe in ghosts - a catch-22 that for some becomes 'an eternal hell' on Earth.
Jay Sebring's three afterlife visits: Jacobson shares the case of celebrity hairdresser Jay Sebring, killed at Sharon Tate's house by the Manson family. Sebring appeared to his ex-wife in three dreams: first heartbroken, second teaching her his haircutting technique so she could support herself, and finally - twenty years before computers were common - in a white room of computers and machines, in charge, dressed in white, alongside a happy Sharon Tate.
Lucille Ball watches her house demolished: Jacobson recounts a friend of Lucille Ball driving past her former home being torn down by new owners. He glimpsed a tall, thin redhead - Lucy - walking the perimeter, melancholy and confused at the destruction. The story leads Jacobson to her rule that 'spirits do not like remodeling' and often don't recognize remodeled spaces.
13th-century Bohemian demon caught on Instamatic: Jacobson describes a friend in San Fernando Valley snapping rooms with an Instamatic in a house she felt held heavy negative energy. Developed photos showed bizarre honeycomb-like white spirals - one pushing down on her cat, one clamped onto a calendar of Mary and the baby Jesus. Looking up the figure in a book, they matched it to a 13th-century Bohemian demon.