“A Nightmare on Elm Street” fans can finally breathe a sigh of relief. Their favorite horror franchise is seeing the light of day again with a proposed remake/sequel that is “set in the world of ‘A Nightmare on Elm Street’,” per an exclusive announcement for The Hollywood Reporter.
The new film will be produced by Wes Craven’s estate, including his widow Iya Labunka and son Jonathan Craven. Copyright law attorney and producer Marc Toberoff teams up with the estate to produce.
Labunka and Jonathan Craven reveal what fans can expect from the new installment, which follows the 2010 remake, helmed by director Samuel Bayer and starring Jackie Earle Haley as the central villain, Freddy Krueger.
Paramount Inks Deal for Original Screenplay
“A Nightmare on Elm Street” will be based on Wes Craven’s original screenplay.
“We know that Wes would have been thrilled to see how horror is taking its long-overdue place in the cultural canon,” Labunka says. “We can’t wait for all of us to sit together in a dark theatre – around the campfire of today – as the next chapter of the ‘Nightmare story’ unfolds.”
Paramount’s new genre label, Paramount Primal, led by J.D. Lifshitz and Raphael Margules (“Barbarian”), will produce the new film that will “welcome Freddy home,” they continue. “We can’t remember a time before we were fans of Wes Craven. The fact that Iya and Jonathan have entrusted us with this opportunity to help usher a new story into this world is an honor beyond words.”
The series launched into pop culture canon in 1984 with Heather Langenkamp playing Nancy, one of horror’s standout Final Girls, and Robert Englund slipping into the glove of the finger-knived antagonist, Freddy, a child murderer with a thirst for revenge. The first film birthed one of the most lucrative horror franchises, with a TV series, six sequels, a faceoff with Jason Voorhees (“Freddy vs. Jason”) and a 2010 remake. “A Nightmare on Elm Street” also put production house New Line Cinemas, founded by Bob Shaye, on the map.
Franchise Lied Dormant for 16 Long Years
The 2010 remake stopped the franchise in its tracks, with the general Rotten Tomatoes consensus raking it over the coals for its lack of “depth and subversive twists that made the original so memorable.” Fans also harpooned the entry, despite making $63 million domestically and $115 million globally.
The Craven Estate did not regain the rights of the 1984 original screenplay until 2019, courtesy of Marc Toberoff, due to a copyright law loophole that allows estates to reclaim rights 35 years after initial release. Soon after that news broke, the estate started accepting pitches for both TV and film ideas. At the time, HBO Max was a possibility to land the IP.
With Paramount Primal landing a deal, production won’t begin until later this year at the earliest. Script writer, director are cast are not currently attached to the project. “A Nightmare on Elm Street” fans finally have more than just Freddy haunting their dreams. What the franchise could look like next is limitless.
