The fog seeped between the trees, rolled over the water and settled into the imaginations of those at Camp Crystal Lake on Friday the 16th. No, it was not the 13th, a date far more linked with that day of the week, especially in these parts and at this time of year. But around northwestern New Jersey, every day is Friday the 13th to those visiting the filming locations of the iconic 1980 horror movie by the same title. From Blairstown, home to a quaint Main Street and beloved diner, to Hardwick, the site of the area’s famous campground, woods and lake. That, of course, is where the franchise made its first splash and its most recent rise to the surface with the release of Peacock’s prequel series “Crystal Lake” – which tells the origin stories of Pamela and Jason Voorhees. Audiences were first introduced to Jason 46 years ago when – the spoiler alert statute of limitations has long expired – he jumps out of the lake where he drowned and pulls his victim into the water during one of the movie’s most iconic scenes.     A scene that the new series recreated, albeit in a different body of water and with a different character in the canoe. Linda Cardellini as Pam Voorhees in”Crystal Lake.” (Peacock) “It was a little brutal,” Linda Cardellini, who plays Jason’s mother Pamela, told NBC Local last month of filming the scene. “I mean, we had to get that stunt right. It was like I got whipped back a little bit too hard at one point. But, you know, that’s the fun stuff. When you’re recreating something and then seeing it happen and always trying to make it so the fans will be happy with it. That’s the fun challenge of it all.” Challenges certainly arise when crafting an origin story within an established universe inhabited by passionate and possessive horrorphiles resistant to change. There are altered storylines and new timelines, there are introductions to new characters and reintroductions to old, there are meticulously reconstructed sets and new backdrops taking the place of originals. All to tell the earliest chapter yet in a franchise that has produced 12 movies sending Jason from outer space to hell and everywhere in between. “I think it’ll be fun for fans to see that monsters are made, not born,” showrunner Brad Caleb Kane said. “And maybe there was an actual relationship between mother and child here, and the Pam that we know and the Jason that we know had to go on a journey to become the monsters that we know from the movies.” Brad Caleb Kane, Linda Cardellini, Callum Vinson and Gwendolyn Sunstrom of “Crystal Lake” at New York Comic Con on October 8, 2026. (Peacock) Taking viewers on that journey was surreal for Kane, a lifelong horror fan who also recently helped create the “It” prequel, “Welcome to Derry.”     “Just being at the camp,” he said, “knowing we were making a ‘Friday the 13th’ piece of entertainment with Pam and with Jason, it was a dream come true.” As it was for those who were around town, in the fog and on the shore at the original camp earlier this month on Friday the 16th — the day after the series premiered. THE DINER The Blairstown Diner in New Jersey, where a scene from the original “Friday the 13th” was filmed. (Mike Gavin) Just hours prior, at 3:30 a.m., an all-night “Crystal Lake” watch party wrapped up at the Blairstown Diner. A 15-minute drive from the lake and camp, the diner is famed for its cameo in the original “Friday the 13th.” “The diner was in that movie, and it’s kind of like the iconic spot of Blairstown and the area and the movie itself,” owner Mike Rumsey said. Naturally, it adopted a “Friday the 13th” theme – with Jason masks hanging from the ceiling, Jason’s likeness emblazoned into burger buns, and a life-size Jason statue standing just a few barstools down from where fictional camp owner Steve Christy sat for his final meal one rainy Friday evening.   Jason masks and “Friday the 13th” memorabilia hang inside the Blairstown Diner. (Mike Gavin) The stool he sat in, on this night, was one of the hottest seats in town. The modestly-sized diner sold 75 tickets to its watch party, and the event sold out within 48 hours. “Peacock historically only released episodes once a week, and then when I found out that they were releasing all the episodes on the same night, I was like, ‘Hey, why don’t we do an all-night watch party?’” said Brian Emenheiser, the diner’s events coordinator who began organizing monthly events last November. “And Mike said, ‘You know what? Let’s do it.’” A “Crystal Lake” watch party at Blairstown Diner. (Blairstown Diner) The center tables were replaced with folding chairs. Booths and barstools were at capacity. Guests enjoyed a buffet and, after the first episode, a cake topped with the Camp Crystal Lake sign. “Blairstown was all over it,” Rumsey said. Even Pamela Voorhees herself was in attendance – with the diner’s new resident cosplayer, Marlana Bierly, dressing up in the blue sweater and short blonde wig to take photos with fans.   “To be watching the series in the town where it was filmed, in the diner where the original movie had a scene, with other ‘Friday the 13th’ fans, it was just awesome,” she said. How did she think Cardellini portrayed their shared character? “We really didn’t know a whole lot about Pam, so I’m sure there’s a lot she had to come up with on her own,” she said. “And I think she’s doing a fantastic job…just the slow unraveling of her development I think has been very good.” The audience at the diner agreed. “With the kills they were oohing and ahhing,” Emenheiser said. “They were laughing at the jokes. They were applauding. They were cheering. So, it was really great to see the fans loving it because the last time we got anything ‘Friday the 13th’ related was back in 2009. So, they were hungry for something, and everyone loved it.” The Blairstown Diner’s resident cosplayers: Brian Emenheiser and Marlana Bierly as Jason and Pamela Voorhees. (Colleen Rose Arancio) All eight episodes were shown, but not all of the crowd remained past their bedtime to watch the entire series in one sitting at the diner. “We started with like 75,” Emenheiser said, “and only six brave souls had made it to the very end.” But the crowds returned when the diner opened for business just two and a half hours later at 6 a.m. on what was a foggy but busy Camp Crystal Lake tour day. The following weekend, the diner hosted sold-out hay rides that retraced Annie’s walk down Main Street in the movie – with the actor who played Annie, Robbi Morgan, along for the ride through Blairstown. “Blairstown is like the Mecca,” Emenheiser said. “Blairstown is where it all started because that was the opening credits with Annie walking through town. And with ‘Crystal Lake’ now out, it’s opening up the town to newer fans of the franchise. So, I expect that we’ll have even more people come visit now that Blairstown was put on the map again.”   THE TOWN Main Street in Blairstown, New Jersey — where scenes from the original “Friday the 13th” were filmed. Matthew Keller’s parents would only let him watch scenes in “Friday the 13th” that featured Blairstown. A near lifelong resident of the town, Keller was 8 years old in 1980 when the movie starring his hometown was released in theaters.   “It was filmed here, but I was far too young to watch it when it came out,” he said. “I just remember being very excited that our little town was in a movie.” Decades later, he was very disappointed that their little town wasn’t showing the movie on Friday the 13th. “I was saying to somebody, ‘How come they’re not showing ‘Friday the 13th’ on Friday the 13th in the town where ‘Friday the 13th’ was filmed?!’” he said. So, he gave the town what it wanted: Jason Voorhees. Keller bought a Jason mask and jumpsuit, grabbed a chainsaw out of his father’s barn, took the teeth off the chain, splattered it with red paint and stood on the steps of Roy’s Hall, a theater on Main Street whose exterior was in the movie. “I walked around and I would greet people on Friday the 13th, and I would stand on the steps of the theater as a personal protest that they weren’t showing the movie,” he said. “And then suddenly people were stopping and taking pictures of me.” Matthew Keller in his Jason costume outside the Blairstown Inn, where he has worked as a chef for 30 years. Keller dressing up as Jason and greeting passersby along Main Street became a Friday the 13th tradition. He said he even started leading a bar crawl. “All right, fine, it’s only two bars,” he said. “But still, it’s a small town.” A small town where he holds a big role, in addition to being the executive chef of the Blairstown Inn for the last 30 years.   “He’s the true hero of town, in my opinion, as far as keeping the franchise alive,” said Emenheiser, himself a longtime cosplayer known in town and on social media as South Jersey Jason, who dresses in various versions of the character at the diner. Friday the 13th – a date that can occur on the calendar anywhere from one to three times a year — evolved into something of a town holiday. Keller remembers the pizza parlor starting to make pies with a hockey mask made of pepperoni, and the salon charging $13 for a haircut, and people flocking to town from different states and countries looking to purchase anything that said “Blairstown” on it, whether as small as a matchbook or as large as a canoe. “The town has definitely embraced it,” he said. “Everybody does something ‘Friday the 13th’ related because there’s so many people just walking around and they bring a lot of money. So, either you’re on board or you close up shop and you hate it, right?” Added Emenheiser: “They embrace it because it brings a lot of tourism to the town and boosts the economy. Blairstown is a small town and not a lot goes on throughout the year. So, these type of events helps the small businesses get that extra boost of income.” Tourists who come to spend their time and money find that many of the sites seen in the movie still look very much the same. From Annie’s Arches to the storefronts to Roy’s Hall. “It’s kind of like the town of time forgot,” Emenheiser said. “When you walk on Main Street you feel like you’re transported back to 1979 because it still sort of looks like the way it did in 1979.” So much so that when “Crystal Lake” came to Blairstown to shoot on Main Street, drastic changes were not needed. “We did do a shoot day there and we just went up and down the street and tried to match as many storefronts to what was there back in ’79,” said “Crystal Lake” production designer Lester Cohen. Linda Cardellini as Pam Voorhees in “Crystal Lake” during a scene filmed on Main Street in Blairstown, New Jersey. (Matt Infante/Peacock) Cohen recalls his team replacing some doors, making window displays, adding an awning, removing and later restoring a steel railing, and designing period-appropriate signage. “It was kept very quiet all the way up until the end,” Keller said. “Suddenly, we just saw all the storefronts change.” Trudy’s luncheonette, where Annie initially stops for directions to Camp Crystal Lake in the movie, is made to look as if it’s located on Main Street. It’s actually about seven miles south in Hope, New Jersey, and is now an antiques store. Cohen’s team rebuilt Trudy’s elsewhere in New Jersey, using two empty storefronts to recreate the set. Also built on screen in the Blairstown area, but not on location, was Pamela’s house for the first time in the franchise. Callum Vinson as Jason Voorhees and Linda Cardellini as Pam Voorhees in “Crystal Lake.” (Peacock) Linda Cardellini as Pam Voorhees in “Crystal Lake.” (Matt Infante/PEACOCK) “I really love Pam’s house because that wasn’t in the original movie, and it was really nice to delve into her as a character and her and Jason’s relationship,” Cohen said. “We tried to really make it as warm and typical as any mother and child’s relationship could be, and I think that just makes it more powerful when all the violence erupts.” He had high praise for actual Blairstown residents, as well.      “The people there were great,” Cohen said. “It’s a really sweet little town, and they really have embraced their place in history…It’s really fun to see how something like this impacts a sleepy little town like that even [nearly 50] years later.” Roy’s Hall and Nature’s Harvest Blairstown on Main Street in Blairstown, New Jersey. (Mike Gavin) At Roy’s Hall, the theater whose steps Keller once stood on dressed as Jason, “Friday the 13th” now plays every Friday the 13th – including a double feature next month. “Very satisfying,” Keller said. “It’s worth coming to town and watching the movie on Friday the 13th in a theater that’s in the movie ‘Friday the 13th.’” Annie walks by that very theater early in the movie shortly before famously asking, “How far is Camp Crystal Lake from here?” THE CAMP The lake at Camp NoBeBoSco, known on screen in “Friday the 13th” as “Camp Crystal Lake.” (Mike Gavin) Alongside the lake, a yellow flag waved beneath a gray sky blanketed by fog. The contrasting colors made its distinctive red font even more recognizable from the nearby wooded paths and lakefront cabins: “Welcome to Camp Crystal Lake.” The flag invites visitors to the filming location for the climactic scenes of “Friday the 13th” that still looks very much as it did in 1980 when the movie was released. And while it stands on the grounds of an active camp, it goes by the name of “Crystal Lake” only on flags, on screens and in the minds of fans. Camp NoBeBoSco, the actual namesake of the fictional Camp Crystal Lake, is situated on 380 acres of private property in Hardwick, New Jersey. The camp — whose name is an abbreviation of North Bergen Boy Scouts — has served thousands of Scouts as it heads into its 100th year of operation in 2027. One of them was Joey Sclafani, a fan of the movies growing up who three years ago while in Scouts camped in one of the lakefront cabins. “I stayed in a spot where a really famous movie was filmed, and it made me feel more special to be there than the other campgrounds,” he said. “It definitely felt like it was kind of creepy knowing they filmed pretty gruesome scenes here.” On the way back to the cabins after dinner one night, his troop had a close encounter with Jason…kind of. “One of my scoutmasters brought a Jason mask and he jumped down and scared us,” he said. “But after everyone was laughing.” A sign welcomes campers to Camp Crystal Lake. (Mike Gavin) A visitor bringing Jason’s hockey mask to camp is about the only way it will be seen on the grounds. The camp’s website and promotional materials understandably make no mention of the area’s most notorious camper And the entrance gates were not always open to “Friday the 13th” superfans who made the pilgrimage to their wooded, waterfront Graceland, where over 80% of the original movie was filmed. That changed in 2011 when a group of camp alumni began organizing guided tours of the filming locations. Crystal Lake Tours operates only when camp is not in session, with a portion of the proceeds supporting restoration and maintenance projects on the grounds. Some tours have sold out in as little as eight seconds, drawing fans from across the world to the woods of New Jersey. “They’re starstruck. It’s like, they’re living their childhood fantasy,” Emenheiser said. “For me, when I first visited town, first visited camp, it was like, ‘Wow, I’m here where Hollywood was!’ The diner, the camp, they’re like a celebrity in themselves.” So much so that demand surged and offerings expanded, with the additions of after-dark tours, overnight stays, cast reunions and canoe rides on Jason’s lake. There are photo ops with movie prop replicas like the famous “Welcome to Crystal Lake” sign, Ralph’s bike, and Pam’s Jeep – all of which can be printed on a vintage 1980s-style Polaroid. The gift shop offers just about everything but hockey masks, including small glass bottles with Crystal Lake branding that visitors can personally fill with water from the lake. You can even buy the flag off the camp’s lakefront flagpole (Author’s note: I did)…     Guests on the Camp Crystal Lake tour can purchase the flag waving off the lakefront flagpole. (Mike Gavin) The grounds became an attraction that turned Blairstown into a destination. “It is really a tourist town now. It’s wonderful,” Keller said. “It really started taking off when the camp started doing tours and having people stay.” THE TOUR The Camp Crystal Lake sign at Camp NoBeBoSco in Hardwick, New Jersey. (Mike Gavin) Shortly after “Crystal Lake” was released, cars began driving down a winding road leading to the camp’s entrance gate. They continued through the woods down a single lane and under a wooden Camp NoBeBoSco sign Visitors pulled straight into Hollywood history, traveling along the same path as teenage camp counselors who met their on-screen demise. They approached a sign with a far more familiar name — Camp Crystal Lake — and soon began a three-plus-hour walking tour. “It has been on my bucket list,” said Anthony Cicali of Cinnaminson, New Jersey. Cicali had wanted to visit the camp since he was in high school and saw it mentioned in Weird NJ magazine on a list of unusual places to travel. Tours were not yet available, and more than 20 years passed until Cicali and his wife, Taylor, booked a trip for his birthday. Anthony and Taylor Cicali while taking the Camp Crystal Lake tour in October 2026. (Anthony Cicali) “I think some people might think it’s more like a haunted trail, people jumping out, but it’s not. It’s the backstory,” said Cicali, a content creator for Nerdthusiast. “The people showing us around had done the research, they were showing us exactly where things happened. So, getting all that nerd background knowledge that I’ve never heard before was definitely worth the experience.” The tour started in the same room where the movie began: around the fireplace in the dining hall. The fireplace from the opening scene of the original “Friday the 13th.” (Mike Gavin) Like the movie, it soon heads to the two-story boathouse where Claudette and Barry sneak away to the upper level and never come back down. Tour guests climb those very wooden stairs for a perspective between each step that’s eerily similar to the shots seen in the movie’s opening sequence. Cane wanted those steps and shots, and that structure and scene, reconstructed to perfection for “Crystal Lake.” He toured the original camp’s boathouse structure, officially called the quarter master shed, and tasked its construction to production designer Lester Cohen. “There were certain scenes that Brad felt very strongly about trying to recreate,” Cohen said. “And I think the scene in the boathouse was one of them because it’s pretty iconic.” The boathouse at Camp Crystal Lake where an iconic scene from “Friday the 13th” was filmed. (Mike Gavin) The upper-level of the Camp Crystal Lake boathouse. (Mike Gavin) Cohen said the design process for the boathouse went on for about three to four weeks, and the construction lasted about the same. The structure was painstakingly recreated at Camp Ocawasin, a stand-in about 40 miles east of Camp NoBeBoSco, which was unavailable for long-term filming because of summer camp. “We built a few structures in the camp,” Cohen said of Camp Ocawasin, which is no longer an operating camp and rents out its cabins as residences. “Some of them were to hide things that we couldn’t move. Like, there was somebody living in a trailer in one section of the camp, and we couldn’t move them. So, we basically built a cabin around the trailer so the guy would exit his trailer then exit the cabin.” Back at Camp NoBeBoSco, still standing are the original but refurbished or updated “Friday the 13th” cabins that housed some of horror’s most memorable on-screen kills. The tour passed through them – with each featuring replica movie props from memorable scenes like a blood-stained rubber axe resting on a pillow, a Monopoly board surrounded by vintage Budweiser bottles, or a machete and black snake (both also rubber). Alice’s cabin at Camp Crystal Lake in “Friday the 13th.” (Mike Gavin) The main cabin at Camp Crystal Lake. (Mike Gavin) The tour concludes with a short stroll through the woods to the camp’s archery range, but not before visiting the site’s top attraction: the lake. Guests stood in the very spot where Pamela died; they filled bottles with lake water and took photos on shore inside a replica of Alice’s canoe. They then made their way to the location where she was pulled out of that canoe in Jason’s lone but immortal scene in the movie.   The location at Camp Crystal Lake where Jason’s lake scene in “Friday the 13th” was filmed. “The tour has given me the ability to actually feel immersed into the film because now that I’ve been there, I feel connected with the film even more than I did before,” Cicali said. “Blairstown and the diner and the camp, they’re physical, real places. They’re not CGI places that were created nowadays for movies. It’s somewhere that people can actually go and connect.” THE FANS “Friday the 13th” fan Jader Mazo dressed as Jason at New York Comic Con in October 2026. (Mike Gavin) Fans were also able to go to a new Camp Crystal Lake cabin built, not in the woods, but in the concrete jungle of New York City. It was one week before the release of “Crystal Lake” and fans were welcomed into the cabin as part of an immersive activation at New York Comic Con. They played the role of camp counselors in training and were receiving an orientation when Pamela walked in. When she pulled out a machete and began talking to her believed-to-be deceased son Jason, the counselors were rushed outside into the woods. There, they stumbled upon the camp’s latest victim and had one final terrifying encounter with Pamela. The “Crystal Lake” activation at New York Comic Con. (Mike Gavin) Wrapped around the cabin was a line of fans waiting to dive back into the “Friday the 13th” waters. One fan stood about 6-foot-5, carried a machete, and wore a white hockey mask and a weathered, Hollywood-quality overcoat and outfit. So realistic and horrifying was this Jason lookalike that even the actors playing camp counselors struggled to remain in character in his presence. “It was a little awkward, me being in there dressed like this,” said Jader Mazo, a Jason cosplayer from Westchester, New York. “The actors couldn’t keep their faces straight. That’s all I’m going to say.” Mazo, a lifelong “Friday the 13th” fan who cosplays as Jason on social media and dreams of one day playing the character on screen, was asked what he hoped to see in the “Crystal Lake” series. “I hope they take care of my mother in the show,” he said. “Pull on the heartstrings. I need it to pull on the heartstrings.” A week later, he said it did just that. “Oh, yes it did. We all felt for young Jason!” he said. “People didn’t have any empathy for Jason at all, but then when you start seeing his character in the series, people actually felt for him. You see this relationship that he had with his mom, and he was actually a good boy. He was a good kid. I think it was so dope to understand that.” Callum Vinson as Jason Voorhees in “Crystal Lake.” (Matt Infante/Peacock) Other fans had mixed reviews. Dave Brown — a New Jersey native who made a fan film that was released on social media called “His Name Was Jason” — had already written his own script for a Pamela origin story. “But my storyline was totally different from what Hollywood finally came out with,” he said, adding that in his version Pamela killed Jason’s father while she was pregnant to escape an abusive relationship and then began a journey that led her to Crystal Lake. “The series kind of went a totally different direction, which is cool. I try to keep an open mind going into these things. A lot of it I liked, and a lot of it I was like, I don’t know if I would have went that way.” Still, he praised the performances and the nostalgic recreation of Blairstown, and said he’d be interested in a second season. “Let’s see a little bit more of Jason and his side of the story,” he said. “His motivation, his drive. I mean, other than we know, he’s a mindless killing machine that’s protecting his grounds and the lake. But there’s got to be a little bit more of a motivation that we haven’t seen that’s driving him to do this.” Fans pose for a photo in front of the “Crystal Lake” sign. (Mike Gavin) Mazo also had a suggestion for potential future seasons. “Make Jason just a little bigger. Maybe like 6-foot-4, 6-foot-5, 255 pounds,” he said of his own measurements with a laugh. “I would do that s— for free.” He plans to make his first trip to the original movie’s filming locations in the very near future, saying it will be a “pinch-myself dream moment.” “I think it would feel surreal but beautifully creepy,” he said. “It’s where it all started.” And where it forever lives on in the minds and on the masks of those who walk the streets of Blairstown, hike the woods of camp or swim the waters of Crystal Lake. “There is not one time when you drive around and you don’t see somebody wearing a black T-shirt that says ‘Friday the 13th’ on it,” Keller said. “You see people walking around town morning, noon and night.” Even on Friday the 16th. ...read more read less