How I missed out on writing BTT 4

edited September 2010 in Back to the Future
I was always a pretty good writer. When I got out of college, I was lucky enough to have a friend who was the Vice President of Casting at Universal Studios. He got me a job as a script doctor, and I worked on all kinds of projects throughout the 80's.

I didn't get to participate in the original BTTF, but since my friend was a VP, I would disappear onto the lot for hours to watch the filming. Most people don't know that they completed 10 days of shooting with a different actor playing Marty. It turned out that the Director, Robert Zemeckis, thought the original Marty was too intense and needed someone a little more light-hearted. He picked Michael J. Fox.

After the trilogy ended, there were no plans for a Part 4, but they did begin working on an animated series which turned out to be pretty lame. Even with some of the original voices, there's was no substitute for good writing, and the series bombed pretty quickly.

Since we were young and hungry, several of us decided to write BTTF Part 4. We weren't authorized to do it, but that was our job - to clean up poor screenplays, and to bring new stories to the table for consideration. We figured we could write a great story. And that we did.

In fact, we wrote a ton of really good storylines and scenarios. The two primary ingredients for writing a Back to the Future sequel were pretty simple: good writing and staying true to the characters and their world. Nothing ever came of it though.

When I read that Telltale Games was going to be producing a BTTF online game or maybe a console game, I sent a few emails (and a few LinkedIn mails) to Telltale offering to help. I never heard back.

I wish I would have heard back from someone. How great it would have been to finally get my shot at writing for BTTF.
Sometimes I wish I had a time machine.

Well, maybe Telltale will finally help Uncle Joey make parole. :D

Comments

  • edited August 2010
    Well, Telltale's currently hiring for a number of positions. Did you ever formally apply for a job?

    http://www.telltalegames.com/company/jobs/
  • edited August 2010
    Eric Stoltz was the original Marty. There are pictures floating around on the net.
  • edited August 2010
    And footage of him is supposed to included in the forthcoming anniversary release sets.
  • edited August 2010
    I recall hearing they were planning to explode the Time Train above Roswell in 1947....
  • edited August 2010
    The original script was a LOT different than what actually made it to the screen.

    In the movie, Doc Brown discovered the Flux Capacitor after he fell off the toilet and hit his head.

    In the original script, Doc Brown was a bit of a playboy, and he "got fresh" with one of his female party guests who walloped him with a beer bottle. He then got the idea for the Temporal Field Capacitor (Flux sounds much better).

    I've got tons of pictures that i took...I should post them somewhere.
  • edited August 2010
    you should post them here!
  • edited August 2010
    If he doesn't I don't know I'll believe what he's saying...
  • edited August 2010
    Bob Gale has mentioned quite often in interviews that the script for BTTF was revised quite a bit. BTTF2 was substancially rewritten too (it was originally going to take place in the 1960's).
  • edited August 2010
    I think he was yanking our chains.
  • edited August 2010
    Oh Doodo.........here's the text..... :D

    BROWN is hunched over his workbench, furiously scribbling down notes and plans. Hes
    disheveled — hes been here for a while.

    Browns DOG is sitting near its “bed.” The name on the dog dish is “COPERNICUS.”

    Copernicus suddenly reacts to something...

    MARTY appears at a partially open WINDOW. He opens it the rest of the way and climbs in.

    MARTY
    Doc, listen, you gotta hear me out—

    BROWN
    Get lost kid! Im working!

    MARTY
    I know! And I know what youre doing — youre inventing time travel. It came to you in a vision when you got hit over the head with that beer bottle. And that thing youre drawing is the T.F.C.— the Temporal Field Capacitor!

    Brown is totally astonished.

    BROWN
    My God. How did you know that?

    MARTY
    I told you — Im from the future.

    With that, he walks over to the garage door and raises the overhead door, revealing THE DELOREAN sitting there in the driveway.
  • Sinaz20Sinaz20 Telltale Alumni
    edited August 2010
    Quoted from this:

    http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/bttf4th.pdf

    Don't toy with us, Steve... we have Google, too.

    [EDIT]
    I realized I had never submitted an earlier response-- I am not confirming nor denying your credibility... I'm not aware of any of your emails to us. Do you have a real name that our fans can check up on IMDB?
    [/EDIT]
  • edited August 2010
    I was just pointing out to Doodo that the original script was quite a bit different than the final cut.
  • edited August 2010
    SteveM wrote: »
    I was just pointing out to Doodo that the original script was quite a bit different than the final cut.
    Appreciated...STEVEN MARTIN! :eek:

    THATS RIGHT, WE KNOW!

    Nah, but thanks for sharing. Later.
  • edited September 2010
    Neat thread, so forgive the necro-posting.

    Doc was originally "Professor" Brown, Marty called him "Prof"; Doc lived in the top of the theater Marty crashes into. The Flux Capacitor was a laser array powered by Coke and Marty crawled into a fridge. Oh yeah, and Marty was a video pirate who met the Prof when he hired him to clean his garage and let him play "his great record collection" and drink free beer. And George became a successful boxer.

    Marty's original Toyota was a Supra, too.

    That's what I remember of the original script off the top of my head...
  • edited September 2010
    I really want to say that I believe you, but you arn't appealling to ethos right now. You should share some of those pictures you have of the origanal Marty.
  • edited September 2010
    Also in an early draft (a VERY early one), the DeLorean was a refrigerator. Zemeckis and Gale changed it into a car; they didn't want kids to get stuffed in the fridge to imitate the movie.

    And kids WILL do that crap. My brother drew a door with chalk to get into the ghost world.

    It didn't work. Instead, a satyr came out and took his hat.
  • edited September 2010
    Also in an early draft (a VERY early one), the DeLorean was a refrigerator.

    Not to mention, instead of a lightning strike, the 1.21 Jigowatts was going to be generated by a nuclear test blast.

    Marty would climb into a fridge at a nuclear test site.

    Why does that sound so familiar? ;)
  • edited September 2010
    I just thought about something.

    Since Eric looks ALMOST EXACTLY LIKE Micheal, it would be fun that, in fact, Marty, by changing the past, made his father and mother "conceive" him later, thus the sperm used in the fecondation was different, thus a slightly different child. :O

    Would be epic if it was revisited in any media :p .
  • edited September 2010
    doggans wrote: »
    Not to mention, instead of a lightning strike, the 1.21 Jigowatts was going to be generated by a nuclear test blast.

    Marty would climb into a fridge at a nuclear test site.

    Why does that sound so familiar? ;)

    Man, I'm glad they didn't go for that. That would really have nuked the fridge.
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