Back to the Future (franchise) Back to the Future (franchise) The "Back to the Future" franchise is an American science fiction–adventure comedy film series written and directed by Robert Zemeckis, produced by Bob Gale and Neil Canton for Steven Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment, and distributed by Universal Pictures. The franchise follows the adventures of a high school student, Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox), and an eccentric scientist, Dr. Emmett L. Brown (Christopher Lloyd), as they use a DeLorean time machine to time travel to different periods in the history of Hill Valley, California. The first film was the highest-grossing film of 1985 and became an international
Back to the Future show's success. With co-star Meredith Baxter on maternity leave, he refused to allow Fox time off to work on a film. "Back to the Future" was originally scheduled for a May 1985 release and it was late 1984 when it was learned that Fox would be unable to star in the film. Zemeckis' next two choices were C. Thomas Howell and Eric Stoltz. Stoltz impressed the producers enough with his earlier portrayal of Roy L. Dennis in "Mask" (which had yet to be released) that they selected him to play Marty McFly. Because of the difficult casting process, the start