Bob Gale
Michael Robert Gale (born May 25, 1951) is an American screenwriter, producer and film director. He is best known for co-writing the science fiction comedy film "Back to the Future" with writing partner Robert Zemeckis, and the screenplays for the film's two sequels. Gale also co-produced all three films and served as associate producer on the subsequent animated TV series. Michael J. Fox noted that "Back to the Future" co-creator Bob Gale is "the gatekeeper" for the franchise. Early life. Gale was born to a Jewish family in University City, Missouri, the son of  Maxine, née Kippel, (died 2010), an art dealer and violinist, and Mark R. Gale (1922–2018), an attorney, World War II veteran, and later a University City councilman. He is the oldest of his two other brothers, Charlie, who wrote the screenplay for "Ernest Scared Stupid", and Randy. Gale received a B.A. in Cinema in 1973 from the University of Southern California, where he wrote fanzine reviews for classmate Mike Glyer's fanzine, and met classmate Zemeckis. As a child, he had a dream of "going to Hollywood and work for Walt Disney", who was his hero. As a teen, he  created his own comic book, "The Green Vomit", using spirit duplication, and also co-founded a popular comic book club in St. Louis. Later, he and his brother Charlie made his own amateur three-film series parody of the Republic Pictures "Commando Cody" serials, using the character name "Commando Cus". The last two of these were made in collaboration with Richard Rosenberg. (Rosenberg had taken over the series with the third, 1973's "Commando Cus vs. Kung Fu Killers", in which Gale made a cameo appearance as the title character without his face-covering helmet, and was working on a  fourth at the time of his death.) Career. Film and stage. As screenwriters, Gale and Zemeckis have collaborated on films including "1941", "I Wanna Hold Your Hand", "Used Cars", and "Trespass", the last set in East St. Louis, Illinois near Gale's home town. Gale and Zemeckis were nominated for an Academy Award for their screenplay for "Back to the Future". In 2002, Gale debuted as a feature-film director with "Interstate 60: Episodes of the Road". He had previously directed and written the 20-minute theatrical release "". He also wrote the novelization for his movie "1941" and helped develop  the arcade game "Tattoo Assassins". On 31 January 2014, it was announced that a stage musical adaptation of the first "Back to the Future" film was in production. Comic books. As a teenager, Bob Gale wrote to Marvel Comics, and a letter to Stan Lee appears in Iron Man #2, published in June 1968. Gale has written for comics, including Marvel Comics' "Ant-Man's Big Christmas" and DC Comics' "Batman". In 2001, Gale had a short run on Marvel Comics' "Daredevil", writing issues #20-25 of Volume 2. Working with artists Phil Winslade and David Ross, they created the  story arc "Playing to the Camera." Writer-painter David Mack contributed covers to the run. In 2008 Gale worked as one of the writers among the rotating writer/artist teams on "The Amazing Spider-Man", which at the time, was published three times a month. His issues included #546, #552-554, #558, #562-564, #600, #647. IDW is publishing a Back to the Future a monthly comics series which is written by Bob Gale. The first issue was released in stores on October 21, 2015, the same date that Marty travels with Doc Brown to the future depicted in the  storyline for Part II. The original subtitle for the comic, "Untold Tales and Alternate Timelines", was used for the trade paperback which contained the first five comics in the series. The series has now gone on to what IDW calls "chapter 2" of the series with "Tales from the Time Train." This is a series of stories detailing where Doc and the Brown family went after time traveling at the end of "Back to the Future Part III".