‘Back to the Future’ turns 40 — and the first actor to play Marty McFly was fired: ‘It was devastating’

Forty years ago, moviegoers were almost shouting, “Great Stoltz!”

That’s because “Back to the Future,” the science-fiction classic that hit theaters on July 3, 1985, nearly starred a very different actor than Michael J. Fox. 

The poor guy even shot scenes. 

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The first man to don the orange puffer vest as unwitting teen time traveler Marty McFly was Eric Stoltz, then the star of “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” “The Wild Life” and “The New Kids.” 

But he was ultimately denied the keys to the DeLorean.

“The director fired me,” Stoltz, now 63, said in a 1993 interview with Bob Costas. “He didn’t like my work.”

The stung actor added, “It was devastating to me.”

From the outset, director Robert Zemeckis, who had notched a hit in “Romancing the Stone” with Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner, and producer Steven Spielberg craved Fox for the part. 

The 23-year-old had turned into a huge national TV star playing precocious Alex P. Keaton on the NBC sitcom “Family Ties,” which began in 1982. By 1985, it was No. 2 in the Nielsen ratings.

He was made for Marty.

But when “Ties” creator and showrunner Gary David Goldberg was approached by Spielberg and Zemeckis about Fox doing the film, the TV bigwig was firm.

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“He said, ‘I can’t let him do it,’” Fox recalled in a 2001 interview with the Archive of American Television. 

“And he said, you know, ‘Please don’t tell Michael — not that I want him to think I did something behind his back, but I really had no other choice.’” 

So, the Hollywood duo instead went with another 23-year-old — Stoltz.

But, talented though he was, the actor struggled with the funny Californian for more than a month of production.

“Eric had such an intensity. He saw drama in things. He wasn’t really a comedian, and they needed a comedian,” co-star Lea Thompson said in the book “We Don’t Need Roads: The Making of the Back to the Future Trilogy.” 

“He’s super funny in real life, but he didn’t approach his work like that, and they really needed somebody who had those chops.”

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Fox diplomatically agrees.

“There’s a certain goofiness to [Marty] that I don’t think Eric was really ready to embrace,” he said in 2001.

“I think there was a silliness to the role that they kind of pictured me for.”

Concerned with “Future’s” future, Zemeckis and Spielberg went back to Goldberg, who finally agreed to let his superstar do the project.

Now the bad news had to be broken to Stoltz.

On Jan. 10, 1985, Zemeckis axed his leading man. 

“I was a young actor,” Stoltz recalled to Costas. “It was probably the worst thing that can happen to you in your career.”

In a later interview with George Stephanopolous, the “Forrest Gump” director felt mutually horrible. He also called the sacking “the worst experience of my career.”

“Eric is a brilliant actor,” Zemeckis added. 

“I simply miscast him and I learned a very serious lesson. It’s not worth it. It’s too painful for everybody. What you have to do is cast the movie the right way and feel really right about it.” 

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So, Fox was ready to team up with Christopher Lloyd’s Doc Brown to battle with Biff.

But stepping in just a few months before release wasn’t so simple.

The shift added an estimated $3 to $4 million to the movie’s budget. And Fox had to continue filming “Family Ties” at the same time.

“Within a week, I was doing both jobs,” Fox said. “I would do ‘Family Ties’ in the daytime and I’d do ‘Back to the Future’ at night. And I was working 18, 19, 20 hours.”

He added: “By the time ‘Back to the Future’ came out in the summer of ‘85, there were whole scenes I can’t remember shooting because I was so tired during so much of it.”

The long, hard days paid off.

What was hardly a surefire hit when filming began became a phenomenon, grossing $385 million worldwide, led to two more movies and even inspired a Broadway musical.

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Stoltz’s Hollywood career wasn’t over either.

He received a 1986 Golden Globe nomination for director Peter Bogdanovich’s movie “Mask.”

And he’s appeared in films such as “Pulp Fiction,” “Jerry Maguire” and “The Butterfly Effect,” and on TV series including “Grey’s Anatomy” and “Madam Secretary.” Stoltz is also a prolific television director.

And since that tough experience, Fox and Stoltz have become unlikely pals. 

“It was a wonderful actor — great actor — who since has become a friend of mine and someone I’ve had a good time with, talking about this turn in our lives and how we both ended up in different places,” Fox said during a 2025 ‘Back to the Future’ panel at the Calgary Expo. 

“I’ve learned a lot about acceptance and perseverance from him. He’s a great guy, Eric Stoltz.”