Once the closing moments of Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday set up a prospective Freddy vs. Jason film, horror fans were forced to endure a strange ballad for about a decade before the big mashup was finally made a reality. And when it did eventually arrive, it was a bit bittersweet because one particular actor was left out of the mix.
At the time, Robert Englund had been the only man to portray Freddy Krueger on film, so that pretty much guaranteed him a spot in the movie. Jason Voorhees, however, had previously been played by a number of guys, although Kane Hodder had done it four times, thus causing many fans to view him as the definitive actor for that particular character.
Unfortunately, Hodder was completely passed over when it came time to get Freddy vs. Jason off the ground. Instead, the filmmakers went with Ken Kirzinger, who had previously done stunts on Jason Takes Manhattan.
Knowing this could be a sore subject, I thought I’d avoid talking about Freddy vs. Jason when interviewing Hodder this past weekend at Astronomicon. But when we were on a different topic altogether, he threw one of the most interesting pieces of trivia at me imaginable, revealing that he actually was in the flick – just not in the way you’d expect:
“They say I wasn’t in Freddy vs. Jason. The filmmakers didn’t even know it, but I was in that movie. There was a scene where they’re at the insane asylum or whatever, the hospital, and there’s a movie playing on a TV set – and it happens to be Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3.
And there’s a scene of Leatherface doing something, and that’s actually me as Leatherface. I was the stunt double for R.A. Mihailoff for that movie and I was stunt coordinator. And so, they’re trying not to to put me in the movie, and I was still in it and they didn’t even know it.”
So, there you have it: Kane Hodder found his way into the movie in one of the strangest ways possible and the universe didn’t collapse. And with Freddy vs. Jason having been released for almost fifteen years now, it’s far too late for anyone to edit him out of it.
Having now learned this, feel free to ready your pause button whenever having friends over for viewing parties, as you’ll be able to blow their minds with perhaps one of the best bits of trivia to cap off one of the most storied situations in modern horror history.
