Freddy Krueger has a new home and he’s ready to carve up a new nightmare.
Paramount Pictures has closed a deal for the U.S. rights to the original screenplay of A Nightmare on Elm Street, the movie written and directed by Wes Craven that kicked off the popular horror franchise featuring the killer with the metal-claw gloved hand and burned face, and will adapt it into a new feature.
The new Nightmare on Elm Street will hail from Paramount’s new genre label, Paramount Primal, led by J.D. Lifshitz and Raphael Margules, the producers behind films such as Barbarian and Friendship.
The U.S. rights are being licensed from the Craven estate, which includes Craven’s widow Iya Labunka and Craven’s son Jonathan Craven. The duo will produce the new iteration with Marc Toberoff, the attorney-turned-producer who specializes in copyright law. Lifshitz and Margules will executive produce for Paramount Primal.
“We look forward to bringing the world of Wes Craven’s Nightmare on Elm Street to a new and completely engaged generation of fans,” said Labunka in a statement. “We know that Wes would have been thrilled to see how horror is taking its long overdue place in the cultural canon. We can’t wait for all of us to sit together in a dark theatre – around the campfire of today – as the next chapter of the Nightmare story unfolds.”
Lifshitz and Margules stated, “We can’t remember a time before we were fans of Wes Craven. The fact that Iya and Jonathan have entrusted us with this opportunity to help usher a new story into this world is an honor beyond words. We look forward to working alongside them to bring a terrifying new nightmare to audiences everywhere, and to welcome Freddy home.”
New Line Cinema, and later corporate owner Warner Bros. previously held all the rights to Nightmare on Elm Street as the company made the original movie in 1984. That movie launched a cash cow franchise for what was then an independent film company, earning New Line the nickname “the house that Freddy built.” The original was followed by seven sequels as well as a reboot in 2010, not to mention a TV series, comics, and endless merchandise.
Copyright law allows authors to reclaim rights 35 years after publication, which has been used by screenwriters and their estates to regain their works. The Craven estate regained the rights to the screenplay in 2019 with the help of Toberoff, who also regained the rights to another horror franchise, the original screenplay of Friday the 13th by Victor Miller. New Line retains the international rights to Nightmare on Elm Street.
The Nightmare on Elm Street movies centered on Krueger, a child killer who was burned alive by the kids’ parents but years later returns via dreams, in his now-iconic look of a fedora, red and green sweater, as well as burnt face and razor glove, to kill teenagers.
No details of the new take were revealed but it has been described as being “set in the world of A Nightmare on Elm Street, based on the original screenplay.”
Paramount Primal is the new name for the previously untitled label launched by Lifshitz and Margules, who formerly had a production deal at New Line. The duo are known for being prolific in the low-budget world and the intent for the new label is to partner with up-and-coming storytellers as well as established filmmakers to produce smartly budgeted films across a variety of genres, including horror, comedy, action, and grounded science fiction.
The Craven estate is repped by WME, Industry Entertainment and Ziffren Brittenham.
