073 Professor on Elm Street transcript (Wes Craven)

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Michael: [00:00:00] Hello, this is Michael Osborne. You're listening to Famous and Gravy, life lessons from dead celebrities. Today's episode is a little bit different than normal. Recently, we were invited to record at a live event in Waco, Texas. So today's episode is a live recording. Unfortunately, Amit Kapoor, my normal co host was not able to join, but I was lucky to be joined by a wonderful host.

Sometimes co host Morgan Honaker. We began the live event the way we begin every episode of Famous and Gravy with an opening quiz to reveal today's dead celebrity. This person died 2015, age 76. He taught English at Westminster College in Pennsylvania. And at Carleton College in New York, he also taught one year of high school.

Oh, geez. Uh, I don't know. I don't know if he's dead. Who played professor Xavier in X Men? Is he still alive? Sir, Sir Patrick Stewart. Is Sir Patrick Stewart alive? Oh, uh, the [00:01:00] first actor that played Gandalf or, uh, um, no, no. Dumbledore in, uh, Harry Potter, Richard Harris, Richard Harris, Richard Harris. Not none of those people.

He directed the drama music of the heart based on the true story of a woman who taught violin to underprivileged Children in Harlem Meryl Streep was nominated for an Oscar for her performance. Oh my word He's a director. He's a director. I feel like just saying like Wilt Chamberlain just to get to the next one I don't know.

Not, not director Wilt Chamberlain. Not Wilt the Stilt director. Early in his career, he directed, wrote, and edited pornographic movies. Oh, yeah, now I got it. Um, Red Auerbach of the Boston Celtics. Not, not pornographic director Red Auerbach, but good, good guess. All right. He directed his first feature film in 1972, The last house on the left.

I, I am, I, I don't even know if I'm in, I'm not even playing the right game right now, [00:02:00] like I, let alone the, the, the ballpark. Uh, I, I, I'll give you the final clue. You ready? Final clue, final clue. Perhaps his most famous creation was the serial killer, Freddy Krueger, who, with his razor blade glove, haunted the dreams of high school students in A Nightmare on Elm Street.

He also directed Scream. Oh, man. Freddy Krueger himself. No, uh, Mike, help me, Mike. Somebody's gotta know this. Give me a name. Today's dead celebrity is Wes Craven. Oh, man. Well done. That's good.

Not finished yet. Final question. Are you ready? Please, please leave me alone. Answer the question and I will. What are the[00:03:00]

main doors to your house? The front door and the patio doors? If you answer correctly, you live. Very simple. Don't do this, I can't, I won't. Your call. So, uh, today I'm joined by, uh, my sometimes co host, Morgan Honaker. Morgan, thanks for being here. Of course, of course. Is, uh,

Morgan: do a check one two. Alright.

Michael: So the way we do this show is we kind of tell their life story through a series of categories.

And again, the whole question is about desirability. Would I want that life? The very first category to kick us off is grading the first line of their obituary. So I'm gonna read it, and you and I are gonna score it on one to ten. Ready to go? Yep, ready. Okay. Wes Craven, a master of horror cinema and a proponent of the slasher genre who is best known for creating the Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream [00:04:00] franchises, Died on Sunday at his home in Los Angeles.

He was 76. Initial reactions.

Morgan: I think it's very informative. Doesn't have a lot of color to it. When we think about like, making us think about the personality of someone. Yeah. But film directors don't tend to display as much personality unless you're Quentin Tarantino.

Michael: It's what slasher genre gets at.

Like there's some,

Morgan: I don't know. My, my biggest issue with it is the word proponent. Because I, Yes! Yes, that was exactly

Michael: what like proponent that makes it sound like political you're for horror movies or against yeah Yeah, what does proponent mean?

Morgan: It's weird too with what I've researched about Craven.

He, he liked being a director. He liked horror. He liked his genre, but he wasn't very effusive about it in the way that someone like Guillermo del Toro might be. Right. Del Toro talks about horror and sci fi and fantasy and he's so into it. So excited to talk about it. Craven was always kind of like hedging his answers a little bit.

Michael: 100%. I mean, if anything, I felt like he was a [00:05:00] reluctant, you know, pioneer, right? I mean, I, I do think that. It's not totally inaccurate. So I went to the dictionary on it cause it, a person who advocates a theory proposal or project. So I don't know that he's necessarily an advocate. It feels like the wrong word, although I do think he is unapologetic about being somebody who's willing to put gore and violence and you know, some scary stuff on the screen.

, you know, pioneer proud or somebody who was, you know, bold, bold, even. But , proponent? I

Morgan: don't know. Yeah, I feel like visionary is better. Um, I actually found a quote from him in an interview where this interviewer was asking him, , why is the Academy Awards, why are the Oscars so disdainful of horror?

And he says, I think because in some ways the material isn't that deep. If you look at Science of the Lambs, they're willing to go there, but it has to have adult intelligence in order to be nominated for something by adults. Which I think kind of shows how, you know, He [00:06:00] appreciated the career he had, but he wasn't necessarily, , mega proud of being a horror director.

It seems like he wanted something more sophisticated. Which, , Proponent, which I think is a hole for one. Horror not being sophisticated is ridiculous. But also Yes, obviously. He, he didn't, like, fully embody being a horror director to be

Archival: You said earlier on in our conversation that you initially didn't want to get into horror movies.

It was just your way of getting into the film industry. Now that you've had some big successes like Nightmare on Elm Street, are you trying to get out of that genre? Well, I would love for people to say, uh, you know, filmmaker Wes Craven instead of horror film director. Uh, so to that extent, to the extent that I would like to feel less bounded, that I could have, you know, People come to me with projects that are not considered a horror film.

That's important to me. Uh, I hate being restricted by myself by, uh, other people's concept of me.

Michael: Okay, let's talk a little bit about the rest. Otherwise, other than the word proponent, I thought they actually did pretty good. I do [00:07:00] think that, , what do you know this man for? And this is, the first line of an obituary is a news headline.

Yeah. And Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream. Those are it. That's it, right? And they got the word franchises in there, not just those movies. And I think that that's important, because he created franchises. , Slasher genre? He was also, I don't know, that's right,

Morgan: isn't it? Yeah, that's definitely right.

That's definitely right. Both of those movies, Scream is playing with the slasher form, Nightmare is like very, uh, solidly a slasher movie. Yes. Those feel right. Yeah. Okay.

Michael: Uh, one more question. I want to, I want, I'm curious to hear your action master of horror cinema. I mean, is that cliche? Is that corny?

It's true. If you were to come up with like great horror directors of all time. Yeah. I mean, I do think you're thinking you're talking to John Carpenter, Toby Hooper, maybe. I mean, well, especially of this generation. Yeah. Of the West Craven. I mean, he is, he created You know, franchises that changed film forever.

Yeah. So master feels a little cliche, but it's

Morgan: actually really true. No, I think it's true. I think it's, [00:08:00] um, I mean, especially like his creations also spawned like a whole new genre of horror aside from the slasher scary movie only exists. That whole franchise only exists because of scream. I think that's fair.

All

Michael: right. What do you got score wise?

Morgan: Uh, I'm knocking off a few points for proponent. Cause I just think it's. It's inaccurate. So seven.

Michael: Okay. Wow. Horse

Morgan: grader. I don't know. It doesn't feel right. It's just, it's also a weird word. It doesn't sound good in the sentence. It's just

Michael: weird. Yeah. It does. It doesn't honor him.

That's for sure. It mischaracterizes him. So I agree. I, I actually was, I was in a nicer mood today. I said two points. So I'm giving an eight out of 10 for exactly the same reason. Yeah. Part of what the first line of an obituary has to do is honor this person, catch their attention, but it's also got to be accurate.

And this is not accurate. So, seven and an eight, let's move on. Next category, five things I love about you. , this category, , we come up with five reasons why we love this person, why we want to be talking about them. [00:09:00] Um, I got a lot of stuff. Do you want to lead us off? You can, you

Morgan: know, I'll start. Um, he was a bird watcher and I really liked, I don't know.

There's something I work in the film industry. He means this literally. Yeah, literally, literally Audubon Society has an article about him on their website. Um, but like I, I work in the film industry being in film is really fast pace. It's really tiring. And I like the idea of Wes Craven having this. Um, and then there's this like quiet time where he's just sitting around watching birds and listening for their calls and stuff.

It just seems like such a nice foil to what he was doing for 40 years. So I really like this idea of him. And also, I actually read some stuff where he used birds in the sound design of his films a lot because he loved birds so much. Oh, no way. Which is really cool. That is really cool. So yeah, it's just like a weird thing.

Uh, totally different interests that combine in a really interesting

Michael: way. Surprising. You wouldn't get the guy who's hanging out, [00:10:00] dreaming up Freddy Krueger is , then going to go watch Robbins. Yes,

Morgan: but he is. Yeah. And he loved it. Are you a burger?

Michael: No. Okay. Um, have you ever tried to be a burger?

Morgan: No.

Have you ever interacted with burgers? No. Okay. Um, aside from the fact that I know once you become a burger, it seems like it's impossible not To be one. Yeah. They get really fixated on birds. Yeah.

Michael: It's a, yeah. It's like, it's like golfer or Yeah. Fishing. It is mean. It's like one of those things where Yeah, totally.

You need, people are into it and they're like crazy into it. It's like cult-like that way. Yeah. My grandmother was a birder and a great lady, but I, I, yeah. Never got it. . That's awesome. You know what? I'm going to skip ahead to my thing number two. Um, I love that he was a recovering academic. This guy is a total nerd.

He is. He is. He was getting a PhD at Johns Hopkins in humanities. And, uh, I mean, there's something really bookish about him. Yeah. And he, you know, he's extremely well educated. It turns out a lot of these Her [00:11:00] directors from the 70s like have great, , liberal arts educations. They're really well read people who are drawing inspiration from 18th and 19th century literature.

Yeah. Um, super

Morgan: surprising. He had a lot of training in philosophy also. Yes. Which You see in his movies very clearly, which is really interesting, but it's

Michael: but also super surprising. Right? I mean you I just well, I don't know. Maybe you know more about this, but I expected Wes Craven to be I don't know a little goth maybe and like dark eyes and a little like I figured he'd freak me out It's like this guy's a professor.

He's a nerd. This is always I mean in a good way. Yeah, that is a positive this

Morgan: is always because clearly like i'm i'm slight goth, but like This is always the misconception. It's a compliment with you, too. Yeah It's always a slight misconception. I feel like with horror Authors and directors that you like you get this idea that they're going to be You super kind of morose and, and quiet.

And you get this like idea of who Edgar Allen Poe was. And you [00:12:00] just map it onto horror directors. When in reality, a lot of the people who make horror content are very positive in real life. There are two, like two famous, uh, Japanese artists, one being Hayao Miyazaki and I can't, uh, Junji Ito, who's the other one.

Hayao Miyazaki makes pastoral fantasy movies. And he is so depressed in real life. And then Junji Ito makes these like, horrible, disturbing comics. And he's the most upbeat person you've ever met. And I feel like the latter is true of most American horror film directors too. Yeah. They're just , very nice and enjoyable to be around.

But they make this really awful content.

Michael: I mean, on some level you see that in a lot of art, right? People do surprise you that way. Where it's like, they You, you see one thing when you look at them and meet them in person and feel like you take the pulse of their personality and they're, they are able to express a completely different subconscious side, you know, and, and, and that's true here, but I was delighted to learn

Morgan: it.

Yeah, and he is such an academic, I mean, [00:13:00] in his interviews, he talks like

Michael: one. No, well, can you imagine, , . He was taught high school for a year. Can you imagine being in Wes Craven's high school class and then five years later seeing Nightmare on Elm Street? No, I can't. It's crazy. I was the guy who made me read To Kill a Mockingbird, you know, and he was like, with his gloved hand.

Um, anyway. All right. You want to take number three?

Morgan: He was, uh, a sound editor was one of his first roles breaking into the film industry, which I like because no one ever thinks about us and we get forgotten. So I liked that he was one and that's really all I have is just as a sound editor, I was like, yes, great.

Amazing. So

Michael: Morgan and I work together on a number of projects and you do, , you handle a lot of the technical production, but Morgan also has a lot of talents in terms of sound design. And I, , sound design and film is so underrated, um, it's , I don't know, I think somebody said to me once about video, , if you want to pay attention to how information is being communicated, [00:14:00] you can mute the TV and see what's happening, and if you can follow the story, or you can close your eyes and just listen to the story, and that tells you which is the richer experience, and like, great sound design, you know.

Uh, can really elevate a project.

Morgan: Yeah, and for horror it's very important. Essential, yeah. Score and sound design are very important for horror. ,

Michael: cool, okay. Uh, Are we on number four? Yeah, okay, number four. I'll take number four. Um, I wrote that he was a late bloomer. , so he grew up in a, in a very strict household, , it was, you know, a household of faith.

His dad died when he was four or five years old. His mom, , worked and it sounded like the church played a very big role in, in just his upbringing. , but he didn't see any movies that were not Disney movies until his senior year of college.

Archival: You actually didn't see your first movie until relatively late in your life.

That's true, I was a senior in college. With the exception of Disney movies, I was raised [00:15:00] in a very strict fundamentalist family, church, where going to movies was considered too sinful. Yeah, and I went to a Christian college, too, where it was forbidden, so I would have been expelled if I had been caught. I hitchhiked to the next town and saw To Kill a Mockingbird.

And literally, that was it. Like the epiphany for me. It was like, if this is considered sin, they gotta be wrong. So, um, it was, it was there. And then I went on to graduate school. Uh, it was a master's degree in one year. Wow. I didn't see any movies. And then when I started teaching, I was teaching in a, uh, a town where there was an art, a little art house that was showing all the cinema of Europe in the mid sixties, and that was it.

I just was captured.

Michael: So here's what I love about that. I, I, I think it's a real. When it comes to creative pursuits, I think, sometimes I know I feel like I missed the boat. Like if I, if I didn't grow up, you know, playing guitar from age [00:16:00] eight, then I'll never be able to pick up a guitar or I'll never be able to, , I don't know.

I think it's an important lesson overall. So it's never too late to learn a new skill. And this was an example of someone who was very late to the party. Of how to make great movies. And yet he had, you know, as much success as anybody. So, uh, I just love that he's a late bloomer. Yeah, that's good. I like that one.

Thank you. All right. You round us out with number five. What do you got?

Morgan: Um, so it's, you know, it's kind of ties into him being a late bloomer. By the time Craven was making movies, he already had a family. He had kids and a lot of the. really important creative decisions for A Nightmare on Elm Street seem to have come from him listening to his teenage daughter.

Yeah! Yeah! So Johnny Depp's first role is Nightmare on Elm Street. , that's his, his first casting was Wes Craven, Wes Craven's who made him. And the only reason they cast Johnny Depp is that his daughter saw a picture of him in like the back of Craven's car and was like, Oh! He's really cute. That should be the [00:17:00] boyfriend in the movie.

And Wes Craven had intended on like casting someone who was bigger, more of like a, like a jock type football player and they changed it to be someone who's a little more, not feminine, but less masculine than that. And who was a little more boyish, like who looked more like a teenager, um, than like an actor pretending to be a teenager.

And then also his daughter helped him. , with what someone would actually do confronted with the things that are chasing them in Nightmare on Elm Street. And, not just run screaming out the door, but like, okay, if this happened to you, my 14 year old daughter, what would you do? And that's part of what makes that movie really interesting, is it feels very grounded.

And that is definitely his breakout movie. So pretty much the reason he's the name that he is now is because he listened to his kid, which I think is great. Well,

Michael: and more importantly, I think his daughter, I mean, you know, you and I talked a little bit about this before the recording that his first movie.

[00:18:00] Last House on the Left? Yes. That is a really, really problematic movie. It's sick. And it sounds like it was never really meant for a large audience. No, he didn't think it would. But , chronicled status, right? Yeah. And it does seem like if you, if you look at the trajectory of his career and his movies, , young women get more and more powerful in the story as they, as they, As, as he gets older, that's

Morgan: a lot of his legacy in terms of the art he made is like making, uh, teenage girls have significance and not just be these things that get killed and thrown to the side.

Michael: What's the line from screen of Campbell says?

Archival: Some stupid killer stalking some big breasted girl who can't act is always running up the stairs when she should be going out the front door. It's insulting.

Michael: Right? I mean, so he gets, he gets, you know, very self aware of how hard these things are. Um, Excellent!

Okay, I think that rounds out our five. Let's recap real quick. Number one, you said He's a birder. Birdwatcher. I forgot all about that the last 15 minutes. , number two, what did I say? Oh, he's a nerd. Which [00:19:00] kind of goes to us. I'll say recovering academic. Uh, I relate to that one too. I'm also recovering academic.

Uh, number three, you said? Sound editor. Sound editor! Number four, I went with Late Bloomer. And number five,

Morgan: Listening to Jennifer Craven. Listening

Michael: to Jennifer Craven. Alright, great list. Five things we love about Wes Craven. Okay, um Oh, Jessica Craven, sorry. I'm sorry, Jessica Craven. Alright.

Michael, I gotta tell you about this place. There is a bookstore I discovered, and they have prices on the books. They, in fact, named the store Half Price Books. Are you talking about Half Price Books? Yeah, Half Price Books. It's not Half Price Books. It's Half Price Books. It should be Books Half Price. It's Half.

H A L F. Half price books. Oh, as in one half? Correct. Yeah. No, no, no, but I, I want full books. Oh, [00:20:00] no, no. You get the full book and you get it at a fantastic price. That's why they call it half price books. Well, I think I have to go there now. I think you do have to go there now. Let's start by checking out the all new HPB.

com where we can find our local store, plan our next trip. Okay. Buy online, pick up in store, create our own wishlist, and more. HPB. com. I want a little audience participation in this one. So our next category is net worth. I wrote down a number ahead of time before I looked it up. , Should we hear from the audience first or should I?

It's the audience. Okay, who wants to guess Wes Craven's net worth at death? Show of hands. . Yeah. Three million. Three million? I have three. I'm gonna say ten. Ten million? Does anybody want to go one dollar? Do the Twelve. Twelve. Twelve million. Any other guesses? Twenty. Twenty million. Okay.

There we go. What did, what [00:21:00] did you say, Mike? I

Morgan: said thirty million. I said fifty million.

Michael: Correct answer. Forty million. Yeah. Yeah, right. Well done, Wes Craven. Forty million. How do you feel about that number? I mean, for franchises,

Morgan: right? That's the thing, is, for the franchises he created, it seems Right, especially, not as much for Nightmare, even though Nightmare on Elm Street, like Freddy Krueger, that name has like such significance culturally in

Michael: America.

I mean, I wonder about the rights too, Halloween costumes and lunchboxes, like the merch on

Morgan: Yes, and that's with Ghostface and Scream. Yeah. Just the sheer merchandising money from that costume alone made me push it up past like 25 million. Cause that's still one of the most popular, you see it at Spirit Halloween, you see it at Walmart, everywhere, you still see Ghostface.

And that's an original concept. So they're not paying royalties to the author who made it. And then Wes Craven, they're paying it to Wes Craven and the, um, screenwriter on screen, whose name is escaping me. But merchandising is huge for him. Do [00:22:00]

Michael: you, do you , is Freddy Krueger going to fade with age or is that?

still is he still kiddos? You're younger than me. Are

Morgan: you? Well, even in shows like Rick and Morty, he's like spoofed. Yeah. You know, the Simpsons had a version of Freddy Krueger in one of their like Halloween specials. He still is. Just extremely culturally

Michael: significant. There's a memory of Freddy Krueger, you know, and I mean, the same thing with Jason, you know, some of these movies like, but I mean, in a way, Freddy Krueger is definitely more famous than Wes

Morgan: Craven.

Definitely more famous, definitely more famous than Michael Myers or Jason Voorhees or anyone in the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. And I think partially he's very distinctive looking, but also like he kind of exists. as a more specific boogeyman. Like you say boogeyman, you don't really picture anything. And you say Freddy Krueger and there's immediate, like, I know exactly who that is.

I know who they look like, what they look like, what they're like, because it's still part of the substream of culture.

Michael: Yeah. Um, do I feel like we should tell the story [00:23:00] real quick of how Freddy Krueger came to be like the origin story. You take it. You want me to take this? Well, I mean, you correct me as, uh, if, where I did it wrong, but, So it's based on a couple things.

There was a, there was a semi true story of a, , I think Cambodian family living in L. A. or something where the son was having nightmares and was afraid to go to sleep.

Archival: He started staying up and refusing to sleep and the family became very concerned and nobody knew quite what to do. At one point he was downstairs watching television in the middle of the night and he fell asleep and his family noticed finally that he was asleep and they brought him up to his bed.

The whole family went to bed themselves, thinking, thank God, finally he's sleeping. Heard screams an hour later, ran into his room, he was thrashing in his bed. By the time they got to him, he was dead. Over the next nine months, I found two more articles like that.

Michael: But, and, but that's, so that's like the concept of a monster in your nightmares that can actually kill you.

That's where he got the inspiration for that. But the other part that I thought was really interesting was [00:24:00] his origin story with what and maybe you should take this part. Do you remember this the like vagrant that hung outside?

Morgan: Yeah, the homeless person. Yeah, he was outside. Yeah

Michael: when when Wes Craven's like six.

Morgan: Yeah, he's really young and he he sees a person outside Freddy Krueger famously wears like a an old floppy hat and this like torn sweater and he sees someone who looks kind of like that outside who Stares at him through his bedroom window as a kid and he leaves and comes back and this person's like still staring in the exact same spot.

Archival: I went and pounded on my brother's door. He was 10 years older than I was and I, there's a guy, he's coming for me and my brother literally went down with a baseball bat and the guy ran away. But the essence of that man was that he enjoyed terrifying a child and enjoyed sort of destroying the, the comfort of innocence.

So that's, that became Freddy.

Morgan: And of course, as a kid, that's terrifying. As an adult, that's terrifying. That's something that stays with you. , [00:25:00] there's also a little, I don't know. Is that what you want to talk about? Oh, no, not, there's, there's also at this time, , in the, you know, Nightmare on Elm Street came out in the mid eighties, but in the late seventies, there were some.

child sexual assault cases that were popping up in the news. And it's weird that in Nightmare on Elm Street, they always call Kruger like the child murderer, but like he's very clearly meant to be like sort of this pedophilic character. And they apparently changed it during production because there were some cases in the news that it would, they thought it would be insensitive to have this be like, Uh, mining the trauma of these children.

So they changed Kruger to just be , he kills children instead of being something more devious than that.

Michael: Wow. I didn't see that. Wow. Yeah. Um, well, the only other thing I was going to say about Freddy Kruger that it was all this, that how he thought of the gloved hand with the knives. I don't know this.

You gotta. Well, , he was very intellectual about all of this.

Archival: Speaking of Freddy Kruger, do you remember how you came up with that image [00:26:00] of a glove full of knives? It was a pretty, um, methodical, uh, sort of intellectual process. I mean, I was trying to work off of, uh, primal and ancient, sort of atavistic, uh, images and themes.

You know, um, I figured I was dealing basically with dreams, which were some sort of primal theater, you know, some sort of brain theater, if you will, brain cinema, I was trying to go back to the very beginnings of everything. So, you know, it was the father figure and it was, the weapon was what I thought was the epitome of human ability was the hand, you know, the human hand, which is so, so remarkable and so far advanced from any other and going back beyond that, the, the primal threat that I, um, must've faced.

Primitive man was, first of all, edged and pointed weapons of tooth and fang and claw and talent. And, and just attach that to the, to that extraordinary instrument of, uh, [00:27:00] both good and evil of the human hand.

Michael: I mean, that's the thing about Freddy Krueger. He's , very original as a monster, right? In terms of what he represents.

Definitely. Um, alright, uh, let's move on to the next category. So, this is one that we haven't done on the show for a while, but we call it Good Dreams, Bad Dreams. , does this person have a haunted look in their eyes? Something that suggests inner demons, inner pain, or unresolved trauma. , so this is our opportunity to talk about how, uh, you know, what you see.

Like, do you see darkness? You know, when you look at the pictures of this guy, uh, and it's also our opportunity to talk about potentially regrets, the kinds of things that wake you up in the middle of the night, uh, and , keep you awake. All right. Where'd you go from good dreams, bad

Morgan: dreams. Um, I kind of copped out and said both.

Uh,

There is a point at which it flips. I think he, Wes Craven has talked specifically about as a kid struggling with nightmares. Yes. But when I [00:28:00] see interviews and footage of him later in life, I think that's something that he moved past. And I think by the time he's directing, he seems very comfortable. He seems very personable.

He's very, uh, And like, in the interviews that I've read about him, you know, people who were with him actually interviewing him face to face, they say the same thing.

Archival: A lot of people think, oh, Wes

Craven, you know, he makes all these horror films, he's gotta be really sick and really twisted, and they always ask me that, and he's actually not.

He's very zen in a lot of ways, he's a very calm spirit, he keeps a very cool atmosphere on set, and he's very warm. warm and deep in a lot of ways. So it's kind of interesting.

Morgan: And I don't see anything keeping him up at night once he's actually directing these really scary movies, which is ironic, but.

You know, as a kid, he talked about having them. I don't think as a, as a Fully formed human adult. He had them.

Michael: Yeah, I mean, so are you saying good dreams or bad dreams?

Morgan: I'm saying good dreams

Michael: That's what I would do for exactly the same reason. I think that there's something cathartic about all this for him I [00:29:00] think that the idea of taking a childhood Experience of having a vagrant stare you down through your window while your parents are are gone and giving that person the power to kill You know In dreams with a gloved hand and knife.

There's something about like, well, that's my worst fear and now that I've seen it Yeah, I can deal with it a little bit better. I can confront it And I also don't think we mentioned this earlier that he's all that Regretful about some of his depictions of violence on screen and he's asked about this all the time.

Yeah So in terms of regret For what he's doing as a creative in horror movies, I don't see a lot. Where I do see a lot of regret, cause this comes up over and over again, is being pigeonholed.

Morgan: Yes, I think that's definitely true. Uh, it's, it's hard for any director, or creative person in general, actors to , you know, at this point it's impossible to imagine Tom Cruise in anything but Mission Impossible movies, cause that's what he does now.

Yeah. Um, and for [00:30:00] directors, especially horror. Horror is this, Really, uh, difficult genre to break out of once you're there. , I feel like, uh, William Friedkin, who directed The Exorcist, is a really great example of someone who directed one, one horror movie. And he made so many other great horror, or non horror movies, but what we remember him for is this one movie.

That is all he ever did, and that's pretty much, unless you're me, and you like movies a lot, that's pretty much anyone, , That's their association. They only know him for The Exorcist. Yeah. Yeah, and it's true of John Carpenter. It's true of Craven. Yeah. It's true these

Michael: days of moved beyond a problematic figure, but

Morgan: Polanski does Polanski, yeah, he's one that was able, but again, he only made the one.

He made Rosemary's Baby and that's it. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah. He kind of, he built One and done. Right, right. You can have, you know, people like Ridley Scott who make Alien, which people still argue if it's a horror movie. It's a horror movie, but like It's a horror movie. It's in space. It's fine.

But like he was able to get through it. Cause he kind [00:31:00] of genre blended, but when you make these like very. Unobject, or like very subjectively horror movies that are just , this is horror. There is nothing else here. It's really hard to break. And especially slasher.

Michael: , if you track his interviews throughout the years, he's like, yeah, I'd like to do something else.

Yeah. I'd really like to do something else. And he did one Meryl Streep movie. She got a nomination. She always gets a fricking nomination. And then he's like, yeah, back to nine.

Morgan: And he got to direct one segment in parish to Tim. And that was it. Yeah.

Michael: Um, but he also does, I think, even more than, and it's, I think it's because the name's so distinct.

He does become a brand. , it's not, it's not just Scream. It's Wes Craven's, and Wes Craven's new nightmare, right?

Morgan: It's John Carpenter's Halloween. Correct. Yeah, it becomes something that is bigger than just who he is as a person. It's kind

Michael: of your fault. It's kind of your fault. You know what I mean? Um, Yeah, so I but overall we both went good dreams.

Yeah that I mean, I think on balance and it does sound like the later interviews. He's like, look I had a good career He didn't mention the 40 million [00:32:00] dollars, but I'm sure that made him sleep. Well, I think So good dreams for Master of horror Wesker. All right. We've got three more categories The next one is a fan favorite coffee cocktail or cannabis This is where we ask which one would we most want to do with our dead celebrity?

This may be a question of what drug sounds like the most fun to partake with this person. Uh, so kind of a vibe, a hangout thing. Or another philosophy is that a particular kind of drug might allow access to a part of them that we're most curious about. Might unlock them somehow. I am dying to know what you went with here.

Coffee.

Morgan: Oh,

Michael: no, no, no, no, no. Okay.

Morgan: So I read a bunch of, uh, like written interviews with Wes Craven and pretty much every person talked about how he would bring them in for a meal, specifically like an early lunch. And all of these interviews, he, uh, the interviewers would talk about [00:33:00] like how much they chatted outside of the interview.

And it seems like. He gave them permission to print very specific things, but the overall experience was a lot more, , deep and personal than what he allowed them to print. Yes. And so, in my fantasy of meeting Wes Craven, I'm in Maine, and it's It's like really, really snowy outside and we are there at 7am at a diner and we're drinking coffee until like 4pm talking.

And I think that sounds really nice and cozy and he seems like someone that would like to talk for a long time over a cup of coffee.

Michael: I uh, I think he's a conversationalist. I also think he's got a sense of humor that never found an expression. I mean

Morgan: scream is hilarious. It is funny, right?

Michael: There's absolutely a self aware quality.

Yeah. And I think that . I almost went coffee for the same reason, Morgan. I think that , I, I love a great brain and I love an academic, if you get them in the right setting and, you know, sit and talk about literature and story and why a thing works and [00:34:00] you know, how he learned the language of film.

So, and I, I love the main diner scene. That's, that's pretty good. Okay. I went with, uh, I went with cannabis. I knew you were going to pick that. Well, okay, but I had, but I'm going a direction I'm not sure you're going to take. Okay, so, uh, I, I don't, I, you and I have talked about this a little bit. So, I am retired from drugs and alcohol.

I don't, I don't partake anymore, , and it's, it's been about 10 years since I have, but, uh, 10 and a half years ago, uh, I was, , I was at a, I was camping with some friends and I found myself around a campfire where somebody handed me a bong and there was some, uh, weed in there that was like, The kind of weed you'd see on, like, the cover of High Times, it was, like, crystal y and, like, sparkling and, , looked really potent.

Uh, I took one hit of this three foot bong and coughed my lungs out for, , the next 20 minutes and ended up having a, [00:35:00] like, total paranoia. Yeah. Oh my god. Oh my god. Right? I want to do that with Wes Craven. I want to, I, I, and I'm You want to

Morgan: bring up all the religious trauma. I

Michael: absolutely do. I, cause I was really Yes, I want to go to those depths.

Where I, cause I think that like fundamentally what He is doing and what people who are telling great stories are doing there is some element of confronting fear Right, and there is some element of some of your fears are Fanciful and and they come to you in the middle of the night and they are built out of whatever crazy story that your mind creates So there's an element of fantasy, but they're also symbolic There's there's something really important there to be looked and I do think overall the grand challenge of life is how you deal with your fear Right?

I mean, I really do think that at the end of the day, anything I'm proud of is, is fear that I've looked at and moved through and beyond. Um, and, and being able to [00:36:00] sort out what's real and what's not is, is kind of like the whole point to me. Um, and I kind of feel , I don't want a therapist for that. I want Wes Craven want Wes Craven?

I want to, I want to, I want to, uh, have a paranoid reaction, , to a bong hit, , with Wes Craven and him say, Oh my God. Let's, let's, okay, Michael, lean into the darkness. It's okay. Some of this is real. Some of this is not. You're probably going to wake up. You're probably going to wake up alive. And all this means something, and, and let's deal with it.

Archival: Our dreams must be dealt with. Our most, innermost, uncensored, uh, impulses must be dealt with, must be worked out in real life, within our lives. And that's, you know, to me, the thrill of making films for a young audience is that I am sort of writing scenarios for the apocalypse. You know, I'm dealing with, Very primal, raw energies and trying to put some form on them.

And I, I really truly believe that that is as much as anything else. Why my audience likes my films, not [00:37:00] that they're just bloody and scary, although that is a thrill, but that they have some inner sense to

Morgan: them. See, what he's actually going to do is tell you all of his crazy voodoo stories from shooting that serpent in the rainbow movie or whatever.

Let's go there. And you're never going to recur. Yeah,

Michael: no, there is a point of, of trauma. Let's be clear. , so yeah, I don't know. Maybe I can have. Something to offset that too. But anyway, You're

Morgan: definitely at a bonfire though. I can see it. Yeah.

Michael: I think that'd be great. Plus he does. I do think he has a little bit of a zen like quality.

Oh, there is. There is something grounded and secure about his presence. He's very comfortable. Yeah. , okay. Second to last category. The Vanderbeek named after James Vanderbeek, who said in the movie Varsity Blues, I don't want your life. The big question is, do you want this life?

Morgan: I mean, as, as a filmmaker, like, yes, this is the dream.

And this is something that Craven's talked about in interviews of like, he got to do the thing that we all want to do, which is to make art, That [00:38:00] really impacts people in a really positive way because, you know, disregarding the last house on the left, which he himself has disregarded and is infamous. Now he kind of spent most of his career making up for that movie.

And he did that really significantly. I mean, he pushed not just horror, but film forward in really interesting ways. Like I watched nightmare on Elm Street last night and it's, It's funny and it's cool, but like visually some of the effects are stuff we've never seen like still like he's done stuff that's really cool with like rotating sets and and even aside from all of the technological feats that he did as an artist like his movies are still significant and you know mean a lot, especially to teenage girls.

And I think that is beautiful. And he makes them feel powerful. He makes them feel significant, which is very hard when you're 14, um, to feel significant.

Michael: Well, let me push on it though. Cause that's sort of a legacy answer, right? He, he had an impact and he made a contribution and he [00:39:00] will be remembered and his creations will be remembered, but what about the inner life, right?

Morgan: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, his, um, you know, his, Marital life was a bit fraught, it seems. He had three wives, the second one seemed to go very badly. Yeah,

Michael: 1986 is a rough year in Wes Craven's life.

Morgan: Yeah, uh, I mean, dealing, cause I, I also grew up Baptist, and so I kinda know what that's like, and, uh, I'm okay now. So I can, I can deal with that part of it.

Um, but, uh, We didn't go, yeah, yeah, yeah, enough said. But, I don't know, watching him in interviews later and looking through the lens of his work, just like what his work tells us about him, I think that I would want to be that kind of person. I mean, he seems pretty content by the end. Yeah. Um, again, , just reading some of the, , behind the writing, um, Yeah.

In the interviews, well, they'll paint a portrait of like, Oh, he made [00:40:00] us lunch. Whatever. He seemed very at ease and very happy in his later years, even with having a cancer diagnosis. So I think I would. And it's hard for me as someone who works in film to be like, no, I don't want to make two of the biggest franchises ever that are still significant now.

But aside from that, I think he was. I think he had a pretty great life. It seems awesome. He did a lot before he even got into film, which I think is wonderful. And I think that makes the best filmmakers personally, but. So you're a yes. I'm a yes. I'm a yes. I'm a pretty, it didn't take me long to be like, yes.

Michael: Yeah. It seems like you're, you're pretty easily confessed. I think that's probably where I'm at too, Morgan. I think I'm a yes on, on the, I mean, I do think that. , one thing I really love about him as a creative is that there was never really a plan. , he's on his ass a few times in his life. Leading up to Nightmare before, uh, Nightmare on Elm Street.

, like, he's dead broke. And he, like, he did not want to take a job as a high school teacher. And he's [00:41:00] like, but, and so there is a kind of, , Artist's life of, you know, I'm committed to something that I really believe in. And I have an inner confidence and, um, faith that that's going to guide me to somewhere.

And then, you know, the stuff about being, uh, brought up in a, in a fundamentalist Baptist context, he never is exactly outright bad mouth in the church. I think he's more just saying, You know, there were things I was not exposed to. Yeah,

Morgan: his specific experience seemed a bit more rigorous than most people who grow up in the church.

Michael: Yes, you get that vibe and, and you kind of feel like he's reacting against something with these movies, right? There is a rebelliousness to it.

Morgan: , what's interesting though, is it's not a rebelliousness against Christianity. His movies are like very, the, it's, you know, it's about these girls who are all like, they're all virginal.

They all like wear like gold crosses around their necks and are very like girl next door. It's not even like Christianity that he's pushing against, but there is something. So what do you think he's rebelling against? I don't know. That's what's interesting. That's why I want to have [00:42:00] coffee with him in Maine.

Yeah. I would.

Michael: Yeah, I made it all about me and the campfire and you, yeah, and you're, you're like inquisitive. Yeah, I mean, I think that, I think that, I do think that some of it is. I mean, all of these directors who come out of the 70s are in some way, shape, or form responding to the experience of the Vietnam War and in their displays of violence.

They're saying something about like what it what it was like to watch the news and and and how confusing it was and how confusing adulthood is. So I mean, I think. There is a kind of like general unfiltered rebellion. I don't know that it's political, and I don't know that it's, uh, I think if anything, it's more about ourselves and our fears.

Um, yeah, it feels very personal. I, and on that, on that score, I'm also a yes. Yeah. I'm also a yes. I, I, and I don't have to think about it too much either. He is more well rounded and well, versed and [00:43:00] interesting than I ever would have thought. I, you know, I haven't gotten into birds yet, but I could, you know, like I'm holding out possibility for that.

I, I, I haven't. Um, and I, and I also think that , You know, you may have big dreams to be, you know, the next Spielberg or the next, , I don't know who you want to reference, somebody who gets to dabble in a lot of genres, but he does seem by the end like, I got, I had a good run and I've got gratitude around that.

Yeah. And, and you get that vibe.

Morgan: Well, and he did again, he, you know, mostly stayed within horror, but what he did within the genre was, It's extremely revolutionary, especially when you're talking about Scream. Like, Scream, you know, was released in 96, I think, right before Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which both of those together kind of reshaped what teen TV media is and also what, , horror is as a genre, that it can also be really funny.

You can mix being afraid and laughing at the same time. And often. That's way more [00:44:00] satisfying of an experience because it's much more three dimensional.

Michael: I, I think that there's at least three major legacy contributions. I think the work in the 70s, however problematic it is, does show a kind of renegade, you can do this on a shoestring budget, look what's possible and look at the aesthetics I created.

I do think, , Nightmare on Elm Street introduces this idea of dream logic. Yeah. You know, and, and that

Morgan: like What is it, uh, rubber narrative? There's something, there's a term for like, that, like, like in Hellraiser 2 where you don't know watching it as a viewer if it's real or imaginary. Yeah,

Michael: and, and, and, uh, and I, you know, that's what movies are all about.

Yeah, it's cool. Right? It's very meta that way. And then, and then as you said, Scream.

Morgan: Um, I do want to, before we go to our last, I do have one thing on Last House on the Left. Okay. That I think is also something I would want to experience. If I had his life, which is just having something that is such an unmitigated failure.

, I think that's really important for directors, for musicians, for anyone. We, we act like if [00:45:00] they make something bad, that means they're suddenly not as good as they were. When really, when people make bad art, usually it's because they're trying something different and they don't know how to do it yet.

You know, like today, this is the first live event for Famous Gravy. It's not going to be perfect, but we're doing okay. And for Wes Craven, Last House on the Left was his first feature. It was something that he had never really. Like written a full script before and I I would want that experience if I had his life of having something That really pulled me down because then you learn so much from it and he never Really made those mistakes again I

Michael: think that speaks to my point earlier about fear I mean a lot of it is risk, right?

A lot of it is the vulnerability of like screw it I'm going for it, which ultimately, you know, you don't know That, uh, somebody told me once, uh, courage is not the absence of fear. Courage is fear with feet. I'm scared of trying this thing and I'm going to do it anyway. Right.

Morgan: And learning all the right lessons from it, [00:46:00] because he did, he never made something like that again.

He's embarrassed of it, but he knows why, and that's really important.

Michael: Upward staircase. Yeah, basically. Right, like that's what Famous in Graveyard is all about. Did he climb the upward

Morgan: staircase? And he definitely did, at least creatively.

Michael: Yeah. You know. Uh, alright, so we're both yeses. Alright, I think we're at the final category, the pitch at the Pearly Gates.

Alright,

Morgan: Michael, imagine that you are Wes Craven. You have passed on, and you are now standing before the Pearly Gates. St. Peter, the arbiter of the afterlife, is waiting for you, and it is time to plead your case. What do you say?

Michael: St. Peter, this may be a little bit of an awkward conversation, because on its face, what it looks like I did down there was terrify people. Was scare the heck out of them, scare the heck out of parents, scare the heck [00:47:00] out of Children scare the heck out of, scare the heck out of movie going audiences everywhere.

But underneath that was a real true intention to confront fear. To try and imagine fears that exist inside all of us to give that some sort of representation in a, in a, in a monster and in a monster that lived in your dreams and in the monster that may be lurking outside your house. And while there are things to be scared of, if we are not brave, and if we're not confronting our fears, then we'll never realize who we can be.

And I try to communicate that to audiences through multiple franchises and throughout my creative life. I think that's a contribution to the stream of life. Let me in. Thanks so much again to Mike Hamilton and the folks at Rogue Media Network. If you're interested to check out any of their shows, let me [00:48:00] suggest the podcast Bois, a King of the Hill podcast hosted by Mike Hamilton.

It's a ton of fun. Famous and Gravy listeners, we want to hear from you. We need people to participate in our opening quiz where we reveal the dead celebrity. You can email us at hello at famous and gravy. com. If you're enjoying our show, please tell your friends. You can find us on Twitter, x, Facebook, LinkedIn, and threads.

Our handle is at famous and gravy. We also have a newsletter you can sign up for on our website. Famousengravy. com. Famous and Gravy was created by Amit Kapoor and me, Michael Osborne. This episode was produced by Evan Scherer. Original theme music by Kevin Strang. Thank you so much. See you next time.