Thomas Dekker is quickly becoming an expert on reinventing classic characters from our childhood. He played teenage John Connor in, I’ll just say it, the best non-James Cameron Terminator sequel, TV’s The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Now he’s one of the Elm Street children in the new Nightmare on Elm Street.
Englund on A Nightmare on Elm Street
“I think this movie is made for the generation that the original films aren't working for anymore,” Dekker said. “That's the bottom line. The people who loved this film and hold the original film, especially at the beginning of the series, they hold it in their hearts with a lot of love, regardless of the camp, or the comedy, or the humor. But the kids of today watch the original and find it funny, it doesn't scare them. And that's a shame because the idea is still terrifying and the idea, maybe, exceeds the execution that this generation is used to. So I think this remake's purpose is to reinvent this idea, and still terrify a generation that the original isn't working for anymore.”
Jackie Earle Haley terrorizes the new batch of kids as Freddy Krueger. “I just felt bad for him,” Dekker said. “I think I was too busy feeling sorry for him being in that prosthetic and trying to shoot as fast as we could so he could get out of it. Although when he was chasing me or screaming at me, it was kind of [scary]. Then halfway through, we were all kind of just, 'Whatever…'”
A Nightmare on Elm Street
With a hint at his own death scene, Dekker revealed Haley’s behind the scenes care for the kids he was terrorizing. “The worst thing was, he'd be in the make-up and you'd be so nice. I'm hanging upside down, and he's supposed to be menacing and he'd be like, 'This kid's been up there too long, get him down!' Freddy's a nice guy.”
A Nightmare on Elm Street opens to theaters on April 30th.
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