To The Ends of The Earth

Things are moving along at a rapid pace -- so rapid, in fact, there aren't enough hours in the day to keep up with the workload, much less find time to blog, but who am I to complain when I am working on the coolest horror retrospective ever made?

I am amazed that this project has become such a huge, multi-national/transcontinental extravaganza. I honestly didn't see it coming, and still am not quite sure how we managed to pull it off. We chased Ronny Yu across three continents for several months trying to lock down his interview -- and, by God, we finally got it! Through the magic of Skype and a fortuitous stroke of luck (we just *happened* to locate a Los Angeles cameraman who just *happened* to be working in Beijing, China at the time!), Ronny Yu is officially part of the "Elm Street Legacy."

From a frigid New York City to the southern-most tip of Corpus Christi ... from Vancouver, Canada to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico ... from our modest soundstage in Burbank to the woodsy backroads of Meadowvista ... we have searched out and brought to our proverbial hot seat well over 100 "Elm Street" alumni from every corner of the globe for this once-in-a-lifetime "family reunion."

While we wish we could have gotten everyone from the series (Ms. Arquette and Mr. Fishburne are particular sore spots), I don't think anyone has ever assembled such an enormous and varied cast for a horror retrospective (though I'm sure I will hear about it if I'm wrong -- and I stand humbly corrected). But rest assured: there will be no shortage of colorful stories from the set of all eight "Elm Streets." (The irrepressible Lezlie Dean -- and her strangely inanimate "lap friend" -- who was interviewed by our remote crew in Texas, will certainly be one for the record books!)

The stories we have heard are at once thrilling, hilarious and quite often ... heart-rendingly emotional. As far as we are concerned, these truly are the parting words of "The Last of the Elm Street Children," and it is an amazing feeling to see all of them interwoven into an amazing tapestry that brings together the joys, disappointments, frustrations and fears that Freddy Krueger and the "Nightmare on Elm Street" series have delivered for the past 25 years.

Despite its "election year" promise, I can't help but quote the famous "Freddy's Dead" tag line: "We saved the best for last!"

You better believe it!

The Fast and the Furious (and Fantastic!)

That's the only way to describe the aftermath of production and the post production process on this incredible ride down Elm Street.

It seems like barely yesterday we finalized and filmed our last interviews. Every time we thought we might be "done," another incredible person from the cast and crew became available and wanted to be part of the show. It makes us proud to know that so many people who made the "Nightmare" films possible have been so supportive.

So, with production and interviews wrapped, here we are now, deep in the thick wilderness of post production. I have to say that it can often be one of the most stressful times in a production's life, but this show is proving to be well worth every moment. The cuts we have been seeing have been incredible, interesting, entertaining...there's no real way to sum it up other than to say: this show is going to be spectacular.

Everything we have in terms of interviews (over 100!), footage (some incredible behind the scenes material) and photos (dozens and dozens of never before seen cast pictures) is coming to life in a way that we could have only hoped. Seeing it bit by bit, over and over again has only done one thing: make me want to grab a bowl of popcorn and sit back to enjoy an awesome look back at Elm Street like never before!

And remember: you can follow all the latest Elm Street Legacy goodness on our site: http://www.elmstreetlegacy.com/

Metal Monday!

I never get star-struck. Living and working in Los Angeles killed all those early fanboy jitters long ago. But walking into a Santa Monica radio station on a Monday morning to meet and interview the legendary Alice Cooper gave me Wayne & Garth sized butterflies. To anyone who grew up a horror-loving rocker (which would be 90% of you), Alice Cooper is like the President, Emperor, and Don Corleone of our world. He’s one of the men who lit the switch for our day-to-day passions. And when it comes to meeting your heroes, there’s always that anxiety that you’ll walk away disappointed. Thankfully, upon instantly meeting the man, all those worries were dashed: Alice Cooper couldn’t be further from the egomaniacal self-important rock-star type. Out of the hundred-something people we’ve interviewed, he was the group favorite; the kind of nice, articulate, down-to-Earth horror fanatic you could geek out with all day.

Mere hours after that interview, we found ourselves at the Sunset Strip’s infamous Rainbow Room with three of the band members from Dokken (Don, Jeff, & George) who were cool enough to appear and discuss their song for Dream Warriors. In a strange twist of fate, we conducted the interview in the rock star VIP balcony area of the bar, called “The Lair of the Hollywood Vampires” where Alice Cooper was listed as President. With others like Keith Moon, Ringo Starr and John Lennon mentioned, one can only imagine the kind of historic rock star debauchery that took place in that room. An employee said that John Belushi was listed as a member, until some random asshole painted their name over it. Fuck you, “Tammy Constable.”

With three rockers in one room, you can imagine the kind of craziness that came out of the Dokken interview and every minute was a blast. The guys sang the original unused version of Dream Warriors, reminisced about shooting the video and even gave the crew stock tips! When they joked about doing a song for the end of the documentary, I had to contain an excited banshee scream. If only…

We’ve gone to the ends of the Earth to try and get as many Elm Street faces as possible, but our final day of rolling cameras on these rock stars proved to be the ultimate dark frosting on this over-sized cake!

The perfect end to an amazing shoot...

--Andrew Kasch (co-director/editor)