Adult Swim launched a new animated series last night called JJ Villard's Fairy Tales. The show features bizarre and visceral takes on classic Brothers Grimm tales and boasts an incredible cast filled with talent like Robert Englund (A Nightmare on Elm Street), Linda Blair (The Exorcist), Alan Oppenheimer (Neverending Story), Warwick Davis (The Leprachaun), John Kassir (Tales From the Crypt), Finn Wolfhard (Stranger Things), Keith David (Community), and numerous others.
We recently had the opportunity to chat with Robert Englund in support of JJ Villard's Fairy Tales. In addition to discussing the new show at length, we also had time to pick his brain about his most notable role, Freddy Krueger.
Englund was happy to share lots of information with us, including why he said yes to Wes Craven to star in A Nightmare on Elm Street in the first place and what it was like to do his own make-up during his theatre career.
Take a look at our conversation below!
Joe: I want to say it is an absolute honor to speak with you. You are a household name, a horror icon, and without a doubt one of the best character actors to ever grace the big screen. I want to thank you for the influence you have had on the horror genre and films in general. I'm curious, how did you originally become involved with A Nightmare on Elm Street?
Robert Englund: Well, you know that’s that great happy accident that happens to an actor’s career. You know as a child I was obsessed with Lon Chaney, the man of a thousand faces, I discovered him in an old coffee table book. And I think I kind of loved effects makeup back in the day. I loved the episode called Ugly Woman on Twilight Zone where she’s actually beautiful and everybody thinks she's ugly and everybody else has a pig nose.
Some of those things get deeply buried when you become a professional actor and I was doing a lot of Shakespeare and the classics in avant garde theater for years and I sort of suppressed all of that. But I realized about ten years ago that some of my latent childhood fanboy stuff kind of went into my decision when I said yes to Wes Craven.
Coming from the Union a big requirement is that you do your own makeup. Now especially great theaters like the Stratford Theatre in Ontario Canada or the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis and Lincoln Center in New York. Along with costumers they have some make-up people with wigs and hair pieces but basically you have to do your own make-up unless it's something that's really tricky like Phantom of the Opera and then you can get somebody to help you apply it.
So I always kind of looked forward to that challenge and I sort of was into that because of my childhood fanboy love of horror and fantasy and science fiction.
What do you guys think of these comments from Robert Englund? Share your thoughts with us down below, and be sure to check out the trailer and synopsis for JJ Villard's Fairy Tales!
A new, twisted, fun take on the classic Brothers Grimm fairy tales like Cinderella and Snow White. The charm and cuteness of the original stories remain, but now they've been updated and packaged into a ball of raw, visceral, gross weirdness.
The animated quarter-hour series is created, and executive produced by JJ Villard (King Star King) and produced by Cartoon Network Studios. Voice talent this season includes Linda Blair, Warwick Davis, Robert Englund, Corey Feldman, Alan Oppenheimer, Jennifer Tilly, and Villard himself among others.
In the premiere episode titled, “Boypunzel,” a long haired boy is trapped in a tower by a witch.
JJ Villard's Fairy Tales airs Sundays at 12:15 am on Adult Swim.