Much more hilarious, however, is the plot of this play they're performing. Naturally, the kids are determined to poke around and find out the truth of the matter. There is a rumor that the play was performed seventy years ago, but the boy playing the Phantom disappeared without a trace and the play is supposedly cursed now. where the hell do they go to middle school?), and some mysterious agent is trying to sabotage them. The plot of the actual book isn't all that strange the kids are putting on a play entitled The Phantom at their middle school (dude, these kids did Guys and Dolls last year, too. This book's in the grand tradition of horror Phantoms starting with Lon Chaney's in 1925, and uses a lot of the same tropes and ideas, just rendered down for a younger audience. This series hits pretty much every major horror archetype out there, so it's no surprise that a version based on the Phantom story came along. Obviously, my adult wussiness when it comes to horror is not a new phenomenon these, and many other patently ridiculous horror stories for kids, scared the bejeezus out of me, even when their premises were beyond laughable (there was one where a sponge from under the kitchen sink was possessed and evil. My ten-year-old self found it absolutely terrifying, and often restricted herself to only reading one book at a time so as to keep from overloading herself with too much panic to handle.

Phantom of the Auditorium by R.L. Stine