Wes Craven Stepped In Front Of The Camera For Scream's Funniest Easter Egg

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A lot of casual fans missed it, but the first "Scream" film featured a surprise appearance from the director himself, Wes Craven. In the scene where Principal Himbry (Henry Winkler) is alone at the high school and starting to suspect he might be the killer's next victim, he gets spooked out by the appearance of the school's harmless janitor. Himbry apologizes, moves on, and the janitor is never seen or heard from again.

Most viewers understood the biggest reference in the scene, which is that the janitor's dressed up in an outfit very similar to Freddy Krueger's, but fewer noticed that the janitor's actor was Craven himself. I, for one, was too busy thinking, "Wait, is Principal Himbry played by the Fonz?" to notice either of those two winks to the audience on first viewing. 

What made Craven's surprise appearance in a Krueger outfit extra amusing was that Craven himself was the guy who came up with the iconic villain. Craven wrote and directed the first "A Nightmare on Elm Street." The next five movies had different directors (with Craven contributing to the third film's screenplay) before Craven returned to the franchise with 1994's "Wes Craven's New Nightmare," a non-canonical Freddy Krueger story. 

Craven only directing the first "A Nightmare on Elm Street" film adds an extra layer of meta humor not just to the janitor scene but to the movie's opening. There, Casey (Drew Barrymore) is flirting with her soon-to-be killer over scary movies. Ghostface says he liked "A Nightmare on Elm Street" because it was scary, and Casey responds, "The first one was, the rest sucked." It's a fun meta moment of Wes Craven flexing. He wrote and directed the most renowned entry in the "Elm Street" franchise, and he knew it. 

To put such a line at the very beginning of his film felt like Craven telling his viewers, "Remember when I created an original horror movie so good it spawned a massive franchise? Want to see me do it again?"

Although Craven's cameo in "Scream" is the one everyone remembers, he also pops up in a few of the sequels. In "Scream 2," he shows up as a doctor in the background during the scene where Derek's in the hospital. In "Scream 3," he shows up as an apparent tourist in the background during that cameo from Jay and Silent Bob. It's especially easy to miss this cameo because there are two far weirder cameos standing right in front of him:

There was supposed to be another Craven cameo in "Scream 4," but the scene was cut from the theatrical release. The clip of him was made available in the Scream 4 DVD, however, and it showed him in the background during a scene where Dewey, Jud,y and the rest of the Woodsboro police are studying the aftermath of the opening kill. It's a shame the scene was deleted; not only would it have helped to establish a more serious tone going into the movie, but it would've helped "Scream 4" feel like more of a proper entry in the franchise. There are some "Scream" purists out there who only respect the first three movies (the original trilogy), and an on-screen appearance from Craven might've helped add some extra legitimacy to "Scream 4."

Craven passed away in 2015, so not only did he not cameo in the fifth "Scream" film, but he'll never appear in one again. (Well, unless the franchise starts sleazily dabbling with CGI resurrections, which we wouldn't put past it at this point.) Still, we'll always have those first three "Scream" cameos to look back on. That first cameo, especially, was cool enough to keep us satisfied.