You Call It a Cornfield, but He Calls It Maze

Build it and they will come.

Well, sure, but how about shave it and they will come?

Don Frantz, for one, hopes so.

The 47-year-old founder of American Maze Co. was so inspired by the movie “Field of Dreams” that he decided to plow a four-acre cornfield in Camarillo and turn it into . . . no, not a baseball diamond, a maze.

The Amazing Maize Maze!

“The movie gives you this feeling that anything is possible,” says Frantz, who anticipates about 30,000 visitors. “I had been reading about mazes in England, so I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be fun to build one?’ ”

If you think Frantz’s harvest has come up a little short, he’s got it together more than you know. The Pennsylvania native has been sculpting mazes out of cornfields since 1993--a respite from his day job as an associate producer of Broadway musicals for Disney (including “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King”).

His credits also include seven other maize mazes, located in Pennsylvania, the Carolinas, New York and New Jersey.

“After all the high-tech work that I’m used to,” says Frantz, “it’s kind of fun to go out and work with corn.”

That may be, but what would an ordinary cornfield be without a little Broadway pizazz? Frantz’s vegetable labyrinth will feature more than two miles of pathways, interactive games and a cast of role-playing characters. A maze master will keep a watchful eye from a 20-foot tower. Pieces of a map and “kernels” of knowledge will be scattered throughout the maze, all to assist the wayward navigator.

In addition, says Frantz, educational programs on map reading, data collection and agricultural history will be offered outside the maze for children and adults.

“Three generations ago, nearly every family had a farm,” says Frantz, who confides a newfound interest in farming. “Now kids don’t know where milk comes from.”

From an aerial view, all of Frantz’s mazes depict an image consistent with his theme of “the making of America, in corn.” (The Camarillo maze will look like a California Mission; others include the Liberty Bell, and George Washington crossing the Delaware.)

“I’ve always been able to conceive things on a grand scale,” says Frantz.

But, even a Broadway production lowers its curtain one final time. For Frantz, who leases the land from farmers rather than purchasing it, that time comes in late fall, when the scythe falls and the maze is cut down for good.

“But none of the corn is wasted,” he insists. “We feed it all to the cattle.”

The Amazing Maize Maze opens to the public on Saturday. Tickets cost $8 for adults, $5 for children, with discounts given for group sales. For more information and advance ticketing, contact American Maze Co. at (805) 495-LOST or log onto https://www.americanmaze.com.