New York City’s famous Halloween parade is rising from the dead.
After being canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Village Halloween Parade will be back on for its 48th year on Oct. 31, the longtime head organizer of the annual tradition said Thursday.
“It’s just in my bloodstream. I’m committed to this parade, because I see it as a spiritual act for the soul of New York City,” Jeanne Fleming, the artistic and producing director of the parade, told The Post. “I keep reading about Broadway returning. I’ve been thinking in my mind that the parade is live Broadway in the streets.”
“They are as hungry to perform as any Broadway actor is,” she said of the spooky costumed revelers who turn out in Lower Manhattan each Halloween.
The parade organizers have obtained a permit for the boisterous affair, according to a City Hall rep and the parade’s website. Comedian Randy Rainbow is slated to serve as the parade’s grand marshall, Fleming said.
The Greenwich Village Halloween Parade will be back on for its 48th year on Oct. 31, 2021. Taidgh Barron/NY PostFleming said reprising the parade — which started in 1973 with a puppeteer marching with his family — was motivated by a desire to “keep the [artistic] spirit alive in New York City.”
Out of caution, participants in the outdoor parade will be required to mask up while in the staging area, and spectators lining the streets are encouraged to as well.
“But truth be told, this is an event where people wear masks,” she told The Post with a laugh. “We want them to do something creative with their masks.
“We’re figuring out how to do this safely, because that’s our ultimate concern we have to do that first.”
Funding is yet another new challenge for this year’s rendition.
Two police officers pet a pair of corgis at the 2019 Village Halloween Parade on 6th Avenue. Taidgh Barron/NY PostOrganizers need to raise $150,000 by Oct. 5 to put on the show, according to the the site. So far, just $1,127 has been donated for the yearly spectacle.
“We don’t have the money,” said Fleming. “We’re trying to raise the money.”
In 2020, before the coronavirus vaccine rollout, several of the city’s Halloween traditions were nixed. Last month, the West Indian Day Parade and J’Ouvert were officially canceled due to the pandemic — though discretely organized and unsanctioned versions of the Central Brooklyn Caribbean celebrations raged on Monday.
On Wednesday, Mayor de Blasio hinted the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade will likely return this November.






