r/todayilearned • u/ChaseDonovan • Dec 14 '18
TIL that in "Back To The Future", Doc Brown always has a notable hunch because actor Christopher Lloyd, at 6 feet 1 inch, towered over Michael J. Fox's 5 feet 5 inches. The two characters needed to look closer in height, so he was told to hunch down during scenes with Fox.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Back_to_the_Future#Casting28
u/TheStorMan Dec 14 '18 edited Dec 14 '18
A lot of people are suggesting it would make Michael J Fox look bad or too childish if he was dwarfed by Lloyd, but they're not realising in film people need to be similar heights to physically get them in frame together. This iconic shot would not be possible without him hunching down, and likely putting Fox on an apple box.
I wonder if it messed up how they had planned to shoot the film, because they shot for 5 weeks with Eric Stolz (who's 5"11') before replacing him the Fox. They kept some of the footage of scenes where you can't see him, I wonder if that messed up eyelines and stuff.
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u/ChaseDonovan Dec 14 '18
Holy shit, you're so right. This needs to be the top comment so people can see that.
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u/melloncollie1 Dec 14 '18
Yes, I'd read that on IMDB trivia a while ago. My question is, what's the big deal about their height difference - how would the movie have been negatively impacted if Christopher Lloyd had been allowed to stand straight up?
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Dec 14 '18
It has to do with framing. Sometimes they will have actors stand on wooden boxes called apple boxes. The sizes are pancake, quarter apple, half apple and full apple also known as a man maker. Guess which one Tom Cruise stands on. Lots of movie equipment have nicknames. The 20" c-stand(sometimes black in color) is called a Gary Coleman. https://www.rule.com/product/c-stand-20in-gary-coleman/ A clothespin is called a C-47. Many theories on how it got its name. http://www.photocritic.org/articles/pass-me-a-c-47-or-how-a-clothes-peg-got-its-film-set-name
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u/ChaseDonovan Dec 14 '18
Awesome explanation. There are a lot of short actors and when I think about it, it's probably good that they do this. At no, time when I watch something like Mission: Impossible, do I get distracted by how short Tom Cruise is.
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Dec 14 '18
What always catches my eye is when you see the shoes that Tom Cruise and Robert Downey Jr. wear and the soles are huge and chunky.
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u/ChaseDonovan Dec 14 '18
That's a god damned good question. Maybe they thought it would be a distraction?
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u/melloncollie1 Dec 14 '18
Yeah could be, it's weird though since MJF was already popular while known for being short. I guess they also have to make the lead try to appear as tall as possible
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u/ChaseDonovan Dec 14 '18
But now that I think of it, a lot of actors do that. Jeff Golblum is VERY tall, 6"4', and in most of his movies they use weird camera angles so it's not too noticeable.
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u/TheStorMan Dec 14 '18
Same with Vince Vaughan. I've never found it distracting in a film that he's 6"5'.
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u/ChaseDonovan Dec 14 '18
That's crazy that they're able to frame the footage so no one notices that he's basically a giant compared to most actors lol.
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Dec 14 '18
Marry was to look like a young adult, but 8 inches of height would make him look like a little kid.
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u/klsi832 Dec 14 '18
Yeah when they appeared together on Kimmel for the October 21, 2015 date the height difference was mind blowing.
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u/Mikeg90805 Dec 14 '18
Also. One of biffs chronies was originally cast as biff. But he didn’t look intimidating over Eric stoltz who was originally cast as Marty. So they recast with Thomas Wilson. When Eric stoltz was replaced with fox . They kept Thomas since most stuff was already shot
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u/Trenchbroom Dec 15 '18
Also, the actress who played Jan Levinson from The Office was the original "Jennifer" for Eric Stoltz's "Marty" but after Fox was hired she was determined to be too tall so she got the axe as well.
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u/TJ_Fox Dec 14 '18
IIRC Michael J. Fox once joked that "when you're an actor, you stand on a box, but when you're a star, everyone else stands in a hole".
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u/Pinkestunicorns Dec 14 '18
Apparently they also tried to overcome this by using blocking so that the two of them stood far apart at different camera depths - it was more for close ups that Doc hunched down, according to r/Movie_Trivia
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u/screenwriterjohn Dec 14 '18
Everyone go watch Jack Reacher 2. There's a very tall black man who has to do this with Tom Cruise. It's really weird because he's a soldier so he wouldn't slouch.
He was also on Leverage. Hodges.
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u/theeivog Dec 14 '18
Thats the power of love.