This past weekend’s San Diego Comic Con was filled with all sorts of surprises, and the news just won’t stop coming in. B-D stringer Jeff Otto had the opportunity to chat one-on-one with Robert Englund, who played the infamous Freddy Krueger in eight films and a TV series (and almost a reality show). Inside, the actor discusses Freddy’s future slashing possibilities, even though most have been left in the dust.
Bloody-Disgusting sat down with Robert Englund at Comic-Con for an exclusive chat about two new projects he has upcoming — Zombie Strippers (with Jenna Jameson) and the Evil Dead-esque Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer. More to come on those two projects shortly, but first we wanted to bring you what Freddy Krueger himself had to say about the future of his trademark character.

“The most recent rumor I’ve heard that has legs is that Michael Bay is going to produce a remake of the original Nightmare on Elm Street through Warner Bros.,” Englund told Bloody-Disgusting.

We asked Englund whether he would be up for playing Freddy in the remake. “Well I doubt it because I made Nightmare on Elm Steet. That’s me. This is a remake of the original and I’m sure they want to take advantage of the new special effects to exploit the dream landscape and that they would want to reinterpret everything. I would hope that they would. I would hope that Freddy doesn’t look like me. I would hope that maybe he’s wearing janitor’s overalls and maybe he has an old baseball hat on instead of my fedora. Let a new actor reinterpret it. That’s the fun of remaking it. Obviously he needs to be burned and disfigured. That’s part of the myth. Obviously there needs to be a Nancy and there needs to be this back story, but it should look different.”

“A lot of people are worried about all the remakes — if ever there was a film franchise that could stand a remake [it’s Elm Street]. [There is] so much of the movies that takes place in the dreams, the nightmare, in that landscape of the mind which is very surreal. This is a perfect place to exploit CGI and really embrace that. I’m all for it. If they want to ask me to play the dream analysis expert, that would be fun.”

John McNaughton, director of the classic Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, has also been mentioned as a potential director for a Nightmare prequel almost a year ago. “I heard there’s a prequel script,” England confirmed. “[That’s] a great idea. There’s a lot there and I would love to be asked to do that because I think I can still play Freddy out of makeup.”

A Freddy Vs. Jason sequel has been on the table for some time now, with possibilities ranging from strictly Freddy Vs. Jason tangling mano a mano once more or throwing down with the addition of Halloween’s Michael Myer’s or even Evil Dead’s Ash. “There is no Ash,” says Englund. “That’s off the table because I think Raimi is remaking Evil Dead.”

“They were talking to John Carpenter which leads me to believe they would bring Michael Myers into the mix somehow. I had heard one great story about maybe making it a little bit period [and] still having Jamie Lee Curtis alive as an adult and having her move somehow with a young Christina Ricci niece or something into Springwood. Then of course we could all be there and go after her.”

“I’d like to throw down with Jamie Lee.“