With Halloween just around the corner, Blockbuster.co.uk asked if I wouldn't mind contributing a month of blogs, so here I am, Robert Englund, at your service. As a child I loved horror movies, but as an adult I became a bit of a snob about them. Then I met Wes Craven and we made a Nightmare on Elm Street together. He taught me to appreciate horror as an adult, and cast me in the role I'm best known for, Freddy Krueger. The bastard son of a hundred maniacs, and all that. That's Freddy, not Wes.

I always talk about the movies that touched me as a child, films like Forbidden Planet, King Kong and Bride of Frankenstein. But I had a revelation about a month ago, and that's what I'd like to share with you today. When I was small I had a Jewish godfather. He was the top salesman for Simon and Schuster, the big book publisher, and he had an entire room in his big old ranch house full of coffee table books. One of them, my favourite, was Life's Picture History of the Movies, the original first edition. I remember an image in it from Daughters of Dracula, and I remember a great shot of Frankenstein, but what I remember most is spending a lot of time reading about Lon Chaney, the man of a thousand faces.

Chaney was the groundbreaking silent movie star of Phantom of the Opera and The Hunchback of Notre Dame. There were a series of pictures in the book of all the different make-ups he'd done. He did all his own, and they fascinated me. I couldn't have been more than eight years old. I hadn't thought about that in years, but then it came rushing back quite recently, and it occurred to me that maybe that was the seed that grew into my career. I wonder if somehow reading that book led me subconsciously in that direction. Towards Wes, and horror, and outrageous make-ups. I've certainly done a thousand by now.

A lot of people ask me why I have such an affinity for horror, and I'll tell you. It might sound a little selfish, but it's the truth. The greatest thing about horror is that it made me internationally famous. Between a science fiction tv show I did called V, and playing Freddy in A Nightmare on Elm Street, that was the one-two punch that made my name. They opened so many doors for me around the world, they're a big part of why I love horror and fantasy so much. Obviously that's not the only reason, and I'll be happy to elaborate on that in the coming weeks.

A lot of people making horror movies right now are just doing it to make money. They don't really love it in their soul, not like Tim Sullivan, who I made 2001 Maniacs with. That's my latest film, one I'm extremely proud of, and one I reckon you should add to your list the moment you're done with this first blog of mine. It's a homage to Two Thousand Maniacs, directed in 1964 by the Godfather of Gore, Herschell Gordon Lewis. Tim loves this stuff so much, from the blood and the guts to the humour and the T 'n' A. He just wanted to make a fun, retro, little drive-in movie, and boy did he succeed.

See you next week then, and every week this month, for lots more horror-themed fun.