There must not have been a dry eye in the building when the stars of Back to the Future reunited onstage at New York Comic-Con 2022. For a special Back to the Future panel, Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd, who respectively played time travelers Marty McFly and Emmett "Doc" Brown in three feature films, both appeared to speak with fans. The panel began with the two beloved actors embracing one another onstage with everyone in attendance cheering them on. Footage of the special moment has since been going viral on social media.
Fox and Lloyd proceeded to spend time onstage reminiscing about their time working on Back to the Future together. Per Syfy, that includes the famous story about Fox coming into the production after filming already began with another actor, Eric Stoltz, on board to play Marty McFly. Once Fox's schedule opened up, Stoltz was replaced with filming starting back over from scratch as that's how important it was for the filmmakers to get the actor involved.
"The announcement — at one o'clock in the morning after we were shooting for six weeks — was that the actor playing Marty would no longer be playing Marty, and that tomorrow, we would start shooting with Michael," Lloyd remembered. "I felt that I barely made it through the [first] six weeks and now I was gonna have to do it again?!"
But it made sense once Fox was on set, given their chemistry, as Lloyd added, "The chemistry was there from the first scene we had, it was alive, and it remained that way for three movies. It hasn't gone away, by the way."
Michael J. Fox Says He Looks at Parkinson's as a Gift
With his Parkinson's disease struggles affecting his work, Michael J. Fox has officially retired as an actor. Despite the difficulties he has endured with his health, however, Fox remains grateful for the life he has. He told the crowd at NYCC that he looks at his diagnosis as a "gift," as it has given him new purpose with the work he does in helping others.
"You guys have given me my whole life," Fox said to the fans. "The best thing that happened in my life was this thing. Parkinson's is a gift. I've said to people it's a gift and they say, 'You're nuts.' I say, 'Yeah, but it's the gift that keeps on taking.' But it's a gift and I wouldn't change it for anything ... It's not about what I have, it's about what I've been given."
At the end of the panel, Lloyd channeled Doc Brown by telling the crowd, "Your future is what you make of it, so make it a good one!"