Did you know Stranger Things is actually based off of a true story? Stranger Things is a Sci-Fi series on Netflix created by The Duffer Brothers. I’m credible on this topic because I did research. Today I’m going to be talking about the inspiration behind Stranger Things, how they shot certain scenes, and how the actors got their parts. 

Stranger Things is based on an actual event in Montauk, New York many years ago. In the television series, there is an illegal experiment lab called Hawkins Laboratory where they experiment on young children. These kids are expected to control objects with their minds. According to Rollingstone.com, in New York, throughout the 20th century, there was a program called MKUltra and the Stargate project. 

According to History.com, Project MKUltra was a secret CIA mission. It started during The Cold War because the government thought the other countries such as North Korea and China were using mind control on American prisoners and brainwashing them. That’s when the director of the CIA, Allen Dulles, approved of the project. The agency conducted hundreds of experiments on innocent American citizens in prisons, hospitals, and even universities. The test subjects would be put on psychedelic drugs (meth, heroin, magic mushrooms), electroshock therapy, or paralytics. The government even knew the CIA was giving people drugs and approved it because they were so desperate to win the war. The scientists thought giving the subjects drugs would make controlling their minds easier but it was just psychological and physical torture. Another part of Project MKUltra was the Operation Midnight Climax. The CIA hired people to take unsuspecting men to places called “safe houses” which is where the drug experiments happened. The employees would give the men cocktails with LSD in them while CIA agents watched them behind a two way mirror. Cameras were also placed in the mens’ bedrooms which were disguised as electrical outlets. George White, an agent, wrote to Gottlieb “Of course I was a very minor missionary,actually a heretic, but I toiled wholeheartedly in the vineyards because it was fun, fun, fun. Where else could a red-blooded American boy lie, kill and cheat, steal, deceive, rape and pillage with the sanction and blessing of the All-Highest?” The MKUltra program lasted from 1953-1973. The public finally found out about this project in 1975.

According to warhistoryonline.com, Project Stargate is very similar to Project MKUltra. It also took place during The Cold War but the tests they were conducting were slightly different. The CIA spent millions of dollars trying to get ahead of the Soviet Union. Agents were again drugging innocent people and experimenting on them. They wanted to figure out reading someone else’s thoughts, telepathy, predicting the future, and being able to see a time or place without being there. Obviously the experiments didn’t work and they had to stop trying once the public found out.

Millie Bobby Brown, who plays the main character Eleven, has to do multiple stunts because of her supernatural abilities in the series. During Season 3 she said, "I had to do a rotation stunt once where I was just constantly going upside down, which kind of sucked, I threw up after. So that one was pretty hard. I don't like anything with a harness, really,” Joe Keery, who plays Steve, said that during the lake scene, they had built a tank that was 16 feet deep filled with water and he had to stay there until they got the shot. 

According to Teen Vogue, Noah Schnapp originally tried out for the part of Mike Wheeler but ended up getting Will Byers. Schnapp said, "I go to camp every summer for seven weeks and it’s like sleepaway camp," "You have three phone calls every summer with your parents and I was on my last phone call. And this was some audition blurred with all the other auditions I did, so I didn’t remember what it was, but I remember them calling me." Stranger Things was originally going to be called Montauk and at the time, Noah didn’t even remember what it was about. Then

he said, "They called me and they were like, ‘Hey, Noah!’ and I was like, ‘Who’s this?’ and they said, ‘Oh, you got the role of Will Byers on Montauk!’ and then they explained the whole thing and I was like, ‘Oh my God!’ and I was so excited and things have just been going from there," he remembers. "It was just very different from things I’ve seen." Outside of Stranger Things Noah has acted in Hubie Halloween, The Angry Birds Movie, and The Making of the Peanuts Movie. He also owns a company called TBH that’s a healthier version of Nutella.

Millie Bobby Brown said in an interview with IndieWire  [my audition]“It really came out of the blue, to be honest,” “I was in England, and I didn’t get a lot of auditions there. So I did the first audition — a very emotional audition — and they said, ‘Come back for a callback.’ And I was like, ‘Okay!'” After Millie had her final audition she remembers, “So I’m standing in the room with them, and Ross Duffer comes over to me and is just like, ‘Bzzzzzzzz’ on my head, and I’m like, ‘What’s that mean?'” Brown said. “And Ross said, ‘Well, you’ve got to shave your head!'”“My mum’s reaction was like, ‘Oh my God, nooooo!’ [laughs] ‘I don’t want you to do it! Please don’t do it!’ And me and my dad were like, ‘Mum, it’s okay! It’s just my head!'” So Mille buzzed her hair and got the role of Eleven. Outside of Stranger Things she acted in Enola Holmes and Godzilla.

Today I discussed where The Duffer Brothers got their inspiration for Stranger things, how stunts were done, and how a couple of the actors got their part. While Vecna and the demogorgon aren’t real, Hawkins Laboratory is rooted in reality.