Here’s a fact you may not be aware of: During the making of the 1985 box-office hit Back to the Future, the filmmakers initially shot for six weeks with an actor in the Marty McFly role not named Michael J. Fox. 

This actor was a 23-year-old redhead named Eric Stoltz, who at the time was most known for playing cranially disfigured teenager Rocky Dennis in the film Mask, co-starring Cher and Sam Elliott (and Sam Elliott’s mustache). 

After shooting for six weeks with Stoltz on Back to the Future — and being unhappy with his grounded, intense performance — director Robert Zemeckis made the difficult decision to fire Stoltz, replace him with Fox, and reshoot the bulk of the film. And the rest is cinematic history.

But what if things hadn’t gone down like this? 

In the eight-part narrative podcast series Back to Back to the Future, we explore what would happen if a present-day, down-on-his-luck Eric Stoltz got his hands on a time machine and traveled back to 1985 to try to keep his younger self in Back to the Future — and rewrite Hollywood history. 

Listen to the first episode of Back to Back to the Future, “Bigger Things,” by hitting the PLAY button below.​​