Trivia

On the VHS release, the music video for Dokken's "Dream Warriors" appeared after the credits. The video contains many scenes from the movie and ends when the band vanquishes Freddy, causing him to wake up from his "nightmare," and ask, "Who were those guys?" (despite them telling him the whole song that they're the dream warriors.")

The Freddy glove that was stolen from the set of this film was found in another movie: it was hanging on the wall of the work shed in Evil Dead II (1987), released the same year. It was part of a continued banter between directors Wes Craven and Sam Raimi. See The Hills Have Eyes (1977), The Evil Dead (1981), A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), and Evil Dead II (1987) for more.

Ken Sagoes stated in an interview he really didn't want to audition for the role of Kincaid, but his agent talked him into going. On the day of the audition, he walked in heavy rain to catch a bus to the location. He showed up completely drenched and had to sit and wait for a few hours, due to the auditions running late. When it was his turn, Director Chuck Russell told him, "Do whatever you want to do." Sagoes was so frustrated and mad about the whole ordeal that he yelled "FUCK YOU!," and then proceeded to scream and cuss out Russell. Russell immediately hired him.

(At around 29 mins) When the clay puppet's face turns into Freddy's, special effects man Doug Beswick used stop-motion animation. Filming began with a clay Freddy face that was made plainer in each frame. The result was then run backward, and that is what appears in the final cut of the film.

Wes Craven's original premise of the film involved Freddy invading the real world and haunting the actors and crew responsible for the "A Nightmare on Elm Street" films. This idea was inspired by Return to Horror High (1987), which was another meta-horror movie at the time. However, it was rejected by the studio for being too ambitious, though Craven was later able to use it for New Nightmare (1994).