Johnny Depp is an absolute Hollywood icon and when it comes to his first movie, he had it far better than many other Hollywood A-listers did. Not only would Depp go on to become a big deal all over the globe as did the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise and even more so, its villain, Freddy Krueger who was brought to life by Robert Englund. We are taking a little trip to Elm Street today to have a look at how important this role was in Johnny Depp’s career as well as some fun bits of trivia!
The following video, part of the series “Celebrities’ First Movie Appearance”, shows Johnny Depp in his very first movie role in A Nightmare on Elm Street:
The Birth Of An Icon!
It is so awesome that A Nightmare on Elm Street is Johnny Depp’s debut film! You could easily make the argument that Freddy Krueger is the greatest horror movie icon of all time. Yes, we have Jason, Michael Myers, Leatherface, and if you want to get more modern, Ghost Face and perhaps even Art the Clown. However, Freddy was an absolute pop culture icon, and the first movie and to a degree, the second movie were much darker than what would come after it. Freddy would eventually go on to crack jokes and make people laugh as well as terrify them, but there was none of that in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street.
Never Sleep Again
Ok, so the story of Freddy Krueger is well known, but we want to give you a quick recap about the story of A Nightmare on Elm Street. The teenagers of a typical American suburban town are being haunted by strange dreams of a man with a burned face and knives for fingers…. Freddy Krueger! Freddy was a child murderer that the parents of the town hunted down and killed and now he is back to take revenge on the kids of these parents in the one place they cannot be protected, their dreams! Our main character is teenager Nancy Thompson. If Freddy Krueger is horrors greatest slasher villain, Nancy is right up there as horrors greatest ever final girl! Nancy decides to take a stand against Krueger and try to finish what her parents started!
The First Johnny Depp Movie!
Ok, so A Nightmare on Elm Street comes down to a final confrontation between Freddy and Nancy, but Johnny Depp’s first movie role is a very, very important one. You see, Depp plays Glen, Nancy’s boyfriend and he is a pretty great all-around guy. He clearly loves Nancy and pretty much right from the start, he is very likable. Getting a role like this so early in his career is awesome and he is one of the most important parts of this movie!
Clean Up In Glen’s Room!
One of the things that the Nightmare on Elm Street is known for is crazy kills filled with blood. As the series progressed, these kills would get more and more intense and most movies would have grotesque and scary kills along with some that were far more comedic. There is nothing to laugh about with the way poor Glen meets his end at the sharp hand of Freddy Krueger. Glen can no longer stay awake and upon falling asleep Freddy pulls him and everything else into his bed before blowing out tons of blood like a geyser! It truly is a very memorable Freddy kill and that does help his first movie role be even more memorable as this character comes to a very bloody end!
I Am Just Here For A Friend
While there has been a whole bunch written and filmed about the history and the production of A Nightmare on Elm Street, but the casting of Glen is one aspect of the production of this movie that is very interesting. But there is a story that he was not serious about auditioning! It has been said that he just went to support his friend, Jackie Early Harley who was auditioning for the movie. It is not just the fact that Johnny Depp got the role that makes this interesting, but the fact that Jackie Earle Harley over two decades later would return to Elm Street as Freddy Krueger in an attempted reboot of the series!
Two And A Half Men
While there is some debate if the Jackie Earle Harley story is 100 percent accurate, one of the best bits of trivia about Depp’s debut movie revolves around Charlie Sheen! Sheen was actually offered the role of Glen before him but turned it down. Originally, the story was that he was asking for too much money. However, he himself has said that is not true, he simply did not get the script so he decided to pass on it and he does sound like he regrets it. Another part of this story is that Wes Craven eventually gave Depp the role because his daughters liked his headshot the best! Once the role was given to him, the character of Glen was changed from a typical high school jock to the nice and likable Glen that would grace our screen.
Never Forgetting His Roots
Johnny Depp is one of those actors that is just so easy to like. While some actors may try and shy away from their earlier roles, that is not the case with him. A Nightmare on Elm Street is his first-ever movie appearance and he clearly never forgot this! For the 1991 movie, Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare, Depp filmed a cameo scene where he did a parody of the “This is your brain on drugs” PSA that was popular at the time. To keep this a surprise, he was credited under a fake name! He would also be seen in flashback footage during the opening of Freddy vs Jason in 2003. Depp would go back to his roots once again in 2012 as he would do a cameo appearance in the 2012 movie, 21 Jump Street, reprising his role as Tom Hanson whom he played for four seasons from 1989 until 1991. It is so great to see that he was not scared to embrace the early days of his career.
When you think about it, Depp’s first movie could not have been any better! He had a featured role, he played a likable and memorable character that was connected to the main heroine and it was the first movie in one of the most popular horror franchises of all time! We have no doubt that if Hollywood decides to make a new Nightmare on Elm Street movie they would be able to get Johnny Depp back for a cameo! If you’d like to see more celebrities in their first-ever movie role, be sure to check out this video on YouTube.
