Heather Langenkamp

Heather Langenkamp
Langenkamp at a celebrity autograph collector's convention in Burbank, California, 2008
Born	Heather Elizabeth Langenkamp (1964-07-17) July 17, 1964 Tulsa, Oklahoma, U.S.
Other names	Heather Langenkamp-Anderson
Occupation	Actress Composer Make-up artist Director Producer
Years active	1983–present
Spouse(s)	Alan Pasqua (1984-1987) David LeRoy Anderson (1989-present)

Heather Elizabeth Langenkamp (born July 17, 1964) is an American film and television actress. She is best known for her role as Nancy Thompson from the A Nightmare on Elm Street films. She served as executive producer and narrator to the documentary Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy.

She also played Marie Lubbock on the sitcom Just the Ten of Us and has had numerous television guest appearances.

Early life

Langenkamp was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her mother, Mary Alice (née Myers), is an artist, and her father, Robert Dobie Langenkamp, is a petroleum attorney who served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Energy in both the Carter Administration (where he was largely responsible for realizing the Strategic Petroleum Reserve) and the Clinton Administration (where he was largely responsible for privatizing Naval Petroleum Reserve No. 1), and as Director of the National Energy & Environmental Law & Policy Institute of the University of Tulsa College of Law. Langenkamp attended Holland Hall School in Tulsa. She graduated from The National Cathedral School for Girls in Washington, D.C.

A Nightmare on Elm Street

While she was studying at Stanford University, Wes Craven cast her as teen heroine Nancy Thompson in A Nightmare on Elm Street, the first film in the series as he wanted someone very 'non-Hollywood' to play Nancy. He believed that Langenkamp met this quality. For the part she beat out more than 200 actresses. The film, follows the story of a group of teenagers who are killed in their dreams one-by-one by a supernatural serial killer. The film was a slasher film.

The film introduced the iconic villain Freddy Krueger, played by Robert Englund. Johnny Depp, in his feature film debut, played Nancy Thompson's boyfriend, Glen Lantz. Veteran film actor John Saxon played Nancy's father, police lieutenant Donald Thompson. The film was both a critical and commercial success, earning a total of $25 million at the American box office. In 1985, she received the Best Actress Award at the Avoriaz Film Festival for this role. She also became one of the original scream queens.

She continued her role as Nancy in A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987), in which she co-starred alongside Patricia Arquette and Laurence Fishburne, and Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994), in which she played herself, and through events in the narrative, she is compelled to reprise her role as Nancy Thompson. John Saxon and Robert Englund also returned with Langenkamp in Dream Warriors and New Nightmare.

Other film work

Langenkamp's first acting venture was in her late teens: a small part in Francis Ford Coppola's The Outsiders (1983), filmed to a large extent in her hometown of Tulsa. She then starred in Nickel Mountain (1984).

In 1989, she had a cameo role as a victim in Wes Craven's Shocker. She recently performed a leading role in the film, The Butterfly Room, directed by Jonathan Zarantanello, now in post production. The film also stars Barbara Steele who plays her mother.

Langenkamp and her husband, David Leroy Anderson, own and operate AFX Studio, a Special F/X Make-Up firm that is credited with the special make-up for such films as Dawn of the Dead, The Cabin in the Woods, Cinderella Man, Dogtown and Z-Boys, Frost/Nixon, Bruce Almighty, Evan Almighty, Dragonfly and Angels and Demons. She also starred in, executive produced, and narrated the 2010 documentary Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy, which was directed by Daniel Farrands and Andrew Kasch.

Langenkamp is directing a biographical documentary entitled I Am Nancy.

Television career

In between starring roles, she played Marie Lubbock on the television series Just the Ten of Us, a spin-off of the popular situation comedy Growing Pains (on which Langenkamp guest-starred), from 1988 to 1990. That same year, she and her castmates were nominated for a Young Artist Award for Best Young Actor/Actress Ensemble in a Television Comedy, Drama Series or Special. She has also made numerous other guest appearances on television.

Personal life

Langenkamp is a businesswoman, who acts part-time. She and her husband own AFX Studio, a Special F/X Make-Up Studio in Los Angeles. Years ago, she created and ran The Malibu Gum Factory, now closed, which sold chewing gum packaged with trading cards depicting local surfers.

Many elements of the plot for Wes Craven's New Nightmare are based on an incident in which Langenkamp was stalked by a fan.

Filmography

Actress

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1983	The Outsiders		Scenes Deleted
1984	Nickel Mountain	Callie Wells
	A Nightmare on Elm Street	Nancy Thompson
	Passions	Beth	TV movies
1985	Suburban Beat	Hope Sherman
1986	CBS Schoolbreak Special	Erica	Episode: "Have You Tried Talking to Patty?"
	ABC Afterschool Specials	Paula Finkle	Episode: "Can a Guy Say No?"
	Heart of the City	Cathy	TV movie
1987	A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors	Nancy Thompson
	Hotel	Monica	Episode: "Desperate Moves"
	The New Adventures of Beans Baxter	Tracy	Episode: "Beans Ges to Camp"
1988	Just the Ten of Us	Marie Lubbock	47 episodes (1988–1990)
	Growing Pains	Marie	Episode: "How the West Was Won: Part 1" Episode: "How the West Was Won: Part 2"
1989	Shocker	Victim
1990	Growing Pains	Amy Boutilier	Episode: "Let's Go to Europe: Part 1" Episode: "Let's Go to Europe: Part 2" Episode: "Let's Go to Europe: Part 3"
1994	Tonya & Nancy: The Inside Story	Nancy Kerrigan	TV movie
	Wes Craven's New Nightmare	Herself	Portraying her real self with fictional storyline
1995	The Demolitionist	Christy Carruthers
1997	Perversions of Science	Lou Ann Solomon	Episode: "Ultimate Weapon"
1999	Partners	Suzanne	Episode: "Always..."
	Fugitive Mind	Suzanne Hicks	Video
2000	18 Wheels of Justice	Waitress	Episode: "Genesis"
2002	JAG	Janet Thompson	Episode: "Odd Man Out"
2007	The Bet	Heather Langenkamp
2010	The Butterfly Room	Dorothy	Post Production
2013	Star Trek Into Darkness	Moto

Production Crew

Year	Title	Notes
2004	Dawn of the Dead
2011	The Cabin in the Woods

Make-up Artist

Year	Title
2007	Evan Almighty

Self

Year	Title
1988	Circus of the Stars#13
1994	Wes Craven's New Nightmare
1999	Welcome to the Primetime
2004	Super Secret Movie Rules: Slashers
	The 100 Scariest Movie Moments
	E! True Hollywood Story
2005	The Perfect Scary Movie
2006	The House That Freddy Built
	Never Sleep Again: The Making of 'A Nightmare on Elm Street'
2010	Never Sleep Again: The Elm Street Legacy
	I Am Nancy

External links

• Heather Langenkamp at the Internet Movie Database
• Heather Langenkamp at the TCM Movie Database
• Heather Langenkamp at AllRovi
• Heather Langenkamp on Myspace
• http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Heather_Langenkamp