Back to the Future's Delorean Gets a Tuneup Onstage in Fair Park

Back to the Future is both one of the rare films uniformly acknowledged as being perfect and one of the rare franchises that has not been milked to death by endless sequels, reboots and spin-offs. It’s challenging to find any of the quintessential '80s franchises that haven’t spiraled out of control thanks to subsequent installments. In the last decade we've seen attempts to continue the Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Die Hard, The Terminator, Mad Max, Alien, Predator and Top Gun franchises; a recent report that Warner Brothers is developing sequels to both The Goonies and Gremlins suggests that there is truly nothing that is sacred.

All three installments of the original trilogy were directed by Robert Zemeckis, who still owns the rights to the franchise and its characters. Zemeckis has occasionally allowed for the characters to enter other mediums; an animated series ran for two seasons in the early 1990s, a simulation ride became very popular at Universal Studios and both Marty McFly and Doc Brown popped up in the video game LEGO Dimensions. That said, anyone hoping for Back to the Future: Part IV is bound to be disappointed, as Zemeckis has ruled out the possibility of ever persuading Michael J. Fox and Christopher Lloyd to get back in the Delorean.

The insistence that Back to the Future was concluded made it even more of a big deal when it was announced that the franchise was continuing, albeit in a much different medium than some fans may have expected. Original screenwriter Bob Gale and composer Alan Silvestrei reunited to pen Back to the Future, a reinterpretation of the first film that brought Marty’s adventure to life with singing and dancing. After a successful run on stages in the West End and on Broadway, Back to the Future: The Musical is set to debut in Dallas at the Music Hall at Fair Park this spring.

Rumors about a new Back to the Future project have circulated for years, and many expected an official announcement to come in October 2015, the year Marty and Doc travel to in Back to the Future: Part II. All that fans got at the time was a very amusing appearance by Fox and Lloyd on Jimmy Kimmel Live, but plans for a musical interpretation were already in the works. The production was mired in continuous setbacks after the original director left, and the proposed rollout in February 2020 was delayed by the COVID-19 crisis.

These sorts of turbulent productions are familiar to Back to the Future fans; the original 1985 classic was infamously reshot when Zemeckis and executive producer Steven Spielberg agreed that they needed to recast Eric Stoltz, who had already shot for several weeks in the role of Marty McFly. Similarly, Claudia Wells was memorably cast as Marty’s girlfriend Jennifer in the first film, but was replaced with Elizabeth Shue for the subsequent installments in the series. In every case, the behind-the-scenes chaos didn’t seem to affect the reaction; Back to the Future: The Musical received unanimously positive reviews upon its West End premiere, setting the stage for a Broadway rollout in 2023.

Musical adaptations of hit films have a mixed track record; for every smashing success like Beetlejuice or School of Rock, there is a crushing disaster in the vein of Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark or Mrs. Doubtfire. However, Back to the Future had a leg up on its competition because the original film already had a fairly iconic soundtrack. Songs such as “The Power of Love,” “Earth Angel” and “Johnny B. Goode” are all replicated, and the score incorporates many of the original themes Silvestri had created for the original trilogy.

But a musical still requires a certain degree of adaptive changes, and Back to the Future: The Musical did make some revisions to the original text to fit within the parameters of the stage show (and also removed some of the colorful language that may not appeal to a 2025 audience). There’s certainly a limit on how much flying a Delorean can do on stage, but Back the the Future: The Musical managed to utilize an impressive amount of visual trickery to recreate famous scenes such as the clock tower escape. It’s not necessarily a production that could be pulled off by a local community theater group, but a more robust stage like the one at Fair Park allows for a greater degree of technical wizardry.

Back to the Future ends with one of the most famous cliffhangers in film history, which teased that Marty would actually have to go “back to the future” to save his son in the 1989 sequel. Although the notion of a Back to the Future: Part II – The Musical hasn’t been completely ruled out yet, the stage show has found a clever way to tie up the story. Rather than teasing a return to 2015 (which, after all, is no longer “the future”), Back to the Future: The Musical ends with Marty and Doc traveling to the exact date on which attendees are seeing the performance.

Back to the Future: The Musical had been one of the most in-demand shows on Broadway and earned several Tony Award nominations. Given the show’s popularity, its debut at Fair Park marks another major win for the Dallas theater community. Nor is it the only beloved stage show that the location will host in its spring and summer season. Also on the way are performances of established classics like The Lion King and Mamma Mia!

Back to the Future has perhaps remained so beloved because of its exclusivity; there aren’t any underwhelming Disney+ shows that dilute its value, and it hasn’t been subjected to so much merchandising that seeing a Delorean model doesn’t feel like the coolest thing in the world. If Back to the Future: The Musical is truly the last chapter in this beloved franchise, then seeing it live is an opportunity that Dallasites won’t want to pass up.

Back to the Future: The Musical comes to the Music Hall at Fair Park, 909 First Ave., March 18–30. Find tickets on Ticketmaster.