Theatre 2025: Back to the Future Musical @ Ed Mirvish Theatre

Back to the Future the Musical is based on the iconic 1985 hit movie starring Michael J. Fox as Marty Mcfly, Christopher Lloyd as the mad professor/inventor Dr. Emmett Brown, Lea Thompson as Marty’s mother Lorraine, Crispin Glover as his father George and Tom Wilson as the town bully Biff. Most of the plot is the same in the musical adaptation compared to the movie.  Marty is a cool, skateboarding, guitar-playing 17-year-old living in Hill Valley, California.  He has a girlfriend Jennifer and the dreams of being a professional musician.  He is dragged down by the reputation of his sad-sack family including a meek, spineless push-over for a father, an alcoholic mother, a loser brother who works at McDonalds and a wallflower sister. While visiting his friend Doc Brown, Marty is accidentally transported to 1955 in Brown’s Delorean time machine.  Marty inadvertently interferes with the historical timeline so that his father and mother may no longer fall in love, marry and have children.  Marty needs to rectify the situation before he and his siblings cease to exist.  Doc figures out how to transport Marty back to the future using a lightning strike to generate power in the time machine’s “flux capacitor”.  But first Marty needs to instill enough courage and confidence in a young George to woo Lorraine so that they fall in love.

Some changes from the movie were made when adapting the musical in order to better suit a live stage production and to reflect shifts in social norms. In the movie, Doc is killed by Libyan terrorists from whom he stole the plutonium needed to power the time machine. These days it is less politically correct to randomly portray foreign countries in a villainous manner and the car chase depicted in the movie would have been difficult to recreate.  In the musical, Doc is killed by plutonium poisoning caused by a tear in his protective suit.  Similarly, the movie scene where Biff and his goons careen through town in his car while chasing Marty on his skateboard has been changed to a foot chase through the school and on top of lockers.  Marty’s use of his skateboard in this show is cut down to a minimum.

Other plot changes highlight advancement in technology in the 40 years since Back to the Future first came out in 1985 or add more depth to the story.  The DeLorean is now voice activated and programmed to only respond to Doc’s voice.  This makes it impossible for Marty control the time machine to get help for a dying Doc or to return to the future once he is transported to 1955.  The role of Goldie Wilson who rises from bus boy in a diner in 1955 to mayor of the town in 1985, is greatly expanded in the musical.  Goldie is given the song “Gotta Start Somewhere” which describes his ambitions and drive while trying to help George increase his self-esteem and stand up for himself.

While the musical retains the iconic songs from the movie including Dream Angel, Johnny B. Goode and Power of Love, it obviously adds new songs, many written in 50s and 60s doowop style.  The song “Cake” sung by the 1955 townspeople of Hill Valley is especially ironic as they cluelessly laud the uses of super-leaded gas and fossil fuels, DDT insecticides, filtered cigarettes, and asbestos for housing insulation.  The song’s title refers to the adage “Have your cake and eat it too” while enthusing that it is the woman’s role to bake that cake.  Some of the memorable lines from the movie have been turned into songs including Doc celebrating the success of his time machine by proclaiming “It Works” and Marty worrying that he is “Future Boy” while stuck in the past.  While the Calvin Klein underwear joke from the movie did not become a song, it is reprised in a dialogue scene in the musical.

Some of my favourite songs from the musical explore the inner thoughts, fears and dreams of the characters.  Marty sings “Hello, Is Anyone Home” as he laments about his pathetic family who join in the song.  His father advises that if you don’t try, you can’t fail, his brother brags that his job allows him to say the important line “You want fries with that”, his sister just wants to date and his mother to drink.  My other favourite song “Something About That Boy” is first sung by Lorraine as she gushes about her crush on Marty (not realizing this is her future son) and later by Biff as he seeks revenge for Marty punching him.

The music is fun and the songs do a good job of advancing the plot while the dialogue (and subsequent delivery) come across as a bit corny and over the top.  But the real star of this show is the almost life-sized Delorean time machine and the video special effects used to make it appear to race through time and space.  The car “speeds forward”, spins and even “flies” in the final scene, as shown the movie.  The only flaw in the effects came in the big finale when Marty “drives 88”, connects with the lightning bolt and hurtles back to the future.  Instead of reappearing in the set representing 1985, the car sat in the dark in silence for over a minute.  To kill time while technicians tried to fix whatever was wrong, Doc Brown came running out on stage shouting “It Works” while winking ironically to the audience since obviously something did not work.  Soon after that, the scene was reset and this time it did work.

I enjoyed this musical and thought that for a road show cast, the performers did very well in both singing and acting.  But the actor playing Marty McFly was never going to live up to my memories of the charismatic young Michael J Fox who originated the role and for me, the actor who played Doc Brown was also totally wrong.  I did think that the actors playing George, Lorraine and Biff lived up to my recollections of what these characters should look and sound like.  The actor playing George channeled Jim Carrey in terms of comedic timing, limberness and flexibility and in the final scene, you could have sworn that he had just left the set of “Ace Ventura, Pet Detective”.