Sean S. Cunningham, creator of one of horror’s most successful franchises of all time – the Friday the 13th film series – talks about the fusion of his slasher character Jason Voorhees, and how he ended up in a battle with horror rival Freddy Krueger after years in the making.
Sean says that before his horror genre history, he was actually making children’s films, but when one of his projects was held up due to financing issues, he came up the title Friday the 13th, but as a possible title for a soccer project that ended up becoming Manny’s Orphans.
“In the process of making lists, I came up with the title Friday the 13th, and out of frustration I said to myself, ‘If I had a movie called Friday the 13th, I could sell that.’” He added: “I thought what if you were to do Freddy vs. Jason – that just seemed silly and fun and you could set it up like a grudge match, so I wondered if I could figure out a way.”
“I knew a lot of people at New Line Cinema and I knew Wes (Craven), and I said what if we did that? And they said, we’d do it if you can get the rights… It took about nine months to get all of the rights, and we went to New Line and said, ‘We’re going to do Freddy vs. Jason,’ and we started working on script ideas and hiring writers,” he revealed.
“And it was at least six years before we came to any kind of a compromise that what this thing could be. We had such profound structural problems - taking two iconic villains and then trying to make a story, and the idea was they had to come together and fight, so who are you rooting for, and why? It was a very difficult and complicated time.”
Watch the full interview to also hear Sean discuss his collaboration with Wes Craven on the making of his 1978 movie Here Come the Tigers, and his experience watching Alien with O.J. Simpson.
Comments