Iconic horror director Wes Craven dies at 76


Writer-director Wes Craven, best known for the blockbuster Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream movies, died Sunday in Los Angeles from brain cancer. He was 76.
His family confirmed Craven's death Sunday evening. Craven started working in academia, then left to pursue a career in Hollywood. His first feature film, Last House on the Left, came out in 1972. Craven came up with the idea for the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, which were released from 1984 to 1989, when he was growing up in the suburbs of Cleveland, The Hollywood Reporter says, and lived next to a cemetery.
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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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