[cross-posted to GoodReads]
There’s a definite appeal to this kind of in-the-trenches memoir, explaining how a familiar franchise looked to the working stiff involved from the other side. Englund spins yarns about how he ended up in acting (because of the girls), through theatre snobbery, to working character actorhood, to the random chance that sent him to Wes Craven’s office to audition (a bone thrown to him by a casting director after Englund had read for literally every male character in a National Lampoon-style comedy and didn’t get any of them). And suddenly, he was a genre star, making his mark as Willie on V at the same time that A Nightmare on Elm Street was splashing in the pop-cultural pond.
I think Englund knows just how lucky he was to star in a franchise that would allow him to get name-recognition acting roles for as long as he wants them; there’s not a moment of regret about being relegated to the horror-flick “ghetto” that allows him to keep working and making rent. His stories of the ups and downs of a working actor are all laced with gratitude, if not amazement, for all the big and little delights and friendships that came his way.
(This book came out before the Nightmare on Elm Street remake in 2010 — I would have loved to have his reaction included.)