ENTERTAINMENTLea Thompson Was 'Snooty' to Michael J. Fox on the Set of 'Back to the Future'
Lea Thompson admitted she was 'snooty' to Michael J. Fox on the set of 'Back to the Future.'
Lea Thompson wasn't happy with Michael J. Fox replacing her friend Eric Stoltz, 63, in Back to the Future.
“I remember specifically being really snooty because there was a big division between movie stars and TV stars at that point,” the 63-year-old actress, who was Fox's on-screen partner in the 1985 science fiction film, said as she appeared on Steve Kmetko’s podcast "Still Here Hollywood."
“I remember being like, ‘He's just a TV star, and I'm a movie star. I was in Jaws 3D.’ So, I think it took me a while to warm up to him, but he was so funny and so fun to act with," she noted.
“I had done some scenes with Eric already and then had to redo them with Michael, so I could see how they were completely different scenes,” the leading lady of the '80s hit movie added of the switch-up.
Lea Thompson remembered being 'specifically really snooty' toward Michael J. Fox.
The All the Right Moves actress opened up about whether or not she and Fox got along while filming the famous flick.
“Probably not,” she admitted, “because I was friends with Eric Stoltz who had just gotten fired.”
Thompson shared that she had previously worked with Stoltz in the 1984 film The Wild Life and later appeared alongside him again in the 1987 movie Some Kind of Wonderful.
“He was a friend of mine,” she said.
Lea Thompson recalled Eric Stoltz being replaced with Michael J. Fox.
Although the Teen Wolf actor was originally the top pick for the part, director Robert Zemeckis had to go with Stoltz at first since Fox was busy with his NBC show Family Ties.
However, when they started filming in 1984, the filmmakers quickly recognized their mistake and decided to replace Stoltz.
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In Back to the Future, Fox played Marty McFly, a teenager accidentally sent back to 1955 via a time-traveling DeLorean automobile built by his eccentric scientist friend Emmett "Doc" Brown, played by Christopher Lloyd.
For her part, Thompson portrayed the role of Lorraine McFly, Marty's mother.
Michael J. Fox was originally the top pick for the part but the filmmakers had to go with Eric Stoltz at first.
Thompson noted that the decision to bring in Fox somehow boosted her confidence in the success of Back to the Future.
“When we were shooting and they replaced Eric Stoltz with Michael Fox, six weeks in, I was like, ‘Oh, they must like what they're doing because nobody does that. That's very expensive,’” the female lead explained. “So, I had a feeling, but no one knew that it was gonna be what it was.”
Almost 40 years later, Thompson shared that she and Fox are still on good terms, meeting a few times yearly at fan conventions.
“So, I see him in the weirdest situation ever, which is, like, in front of 3,000 people,” she said. “And sometimes we go out to dinner, the group of us. That's really nice to see him.”
Lea Thompson praised Michael J. Fox, who was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1991.
The actress also praised her ex-leading man, who was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1991, for his initiative in raising awareness about the condition and funds for research through the Michael J. Fox Foundation.
