Human interest · Burnaby · Looking back
Back to Burnaby: the hometown that kept Michael J. Fox grounded
An old clip brings the Hollywood star back to the people and places that knew him simply as Mike.
To television audiences, he was Alex P. Keaton. To moviegoers, he became Marty McFly. But in an old clip now circulating on Facebook, Michael J. Fox makes room for someone less famous: Mike Fox from Burnaby.
The appeal of the footage is its ordinariness. There are houses, a parked car, a backyard and an interview in a room with curtains and a table lamp. No elaborate setting is needed. The subject is what happens when a young actor goes home—and the people who knew him before the attention still know who he is.
In the excerpt, Fox talks about not allowing his work to create a distance between himself and the people close to him. Later, he jokes about children treating his professional name as one inseparable phrase: Michael J. Fox. There is a useful separation, he suggests, between that public identity and “Mike Fox, you know, from Burnaby.”
It is a small moment, but a recognizably local one. A person can leave for a much bigger stage without wanting home to become a place where everyone treats them like a visitor.
A teacher, a drama club and a chance to try
Fox’s Burnaby connection is more than a celebrity’s passing association with a city. His family settled there after his father retired from the Canadian Armed Forces in 1971, according to the biography published by the Michael J. Fox Foundation.
The City of Burnaby’s tribute traces his start to Edmonds Junior High, where teacher Ross Jones encouraged him to audition for the Canadian television series Leo and Me. He won the role of Jamie. At Burnaby Central, the city recounts, he attended classes during the day and worked in theatre or other shows at night.
Those details give a familiar shape to an extraordinary career: a student with an interest, a teacher who recognized it and an opportunity close enough to try. Before the Hollywood credits, there was a local school community helping a young performer find his footing.
The move south did not bring immediate success. Both the city’s account and his foundation biography describe lean years before Family Ties provided the breakthrough. The foundation describes Back to the Future as the role that brought him worldwide fame in 1985.
The little initial—and the person behind it
There is a practical story behind the name he jokes about in the clip. His foundation’s biography says another Michael Fox was already a member of the Screen Actors Guild. He adopted the “J” in homage to character actor Michael J. Pollard.
That professional distinction became familiar around the world. Yet the old interview turns the name into something more personal: a boundary between a public career and a private sense of self.
A separate CBC Archives feature on Fox’s 1983 appearance on Vancouver Life offers another glimpse of that homecoming. Interviewer and former Leo and Me colleague Jackson Davies jokingly asked how he had reached Hollywood: “What—did you take a bus?” Fox’s answer was simple: “Well, no it was a plane.”
That is a different interview from the supplied Reel, not proof of the Reel’s date or broadcaster. But the exchange has the same charm: someone who knew the young performer can puncture the grandeur of the Hollywood story with an ordinary question.
Burnaby kept a place for him
The relationship also left tangible marks on the city. The Michael J. Fox Theatre opened as part of Burnaby South Secondary in 1993 and was officially named for him in November 1995. In its 2010 tribute, the city credited Fox and his family with contributions of time and funding, including his initial support for an arts scholarship program.
Burnaby granted him Freedom of the Municipality in 2010. That same year, the city says, Riverway Place was renamed Bill Fox Way in honour of his late father, following a charity-auction contribution by Michael.
These are different kinds of recognition from a movie credit. A school theatre, help for students and a road bearing his father’s name connect the public figure to the place where his ambitions first took shape.
A much larger stage, the same hometown connection
The decades since the old footage have brought another major role: advocacy for people living with Parkinson’s disease. Fox established his foundation in 2000, turning his public profile toward research and patient support.
When he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in January 2025, Burnaby issued its own celebration, recognizing both his entertainment career and his Parkinson’s advocacy. This month, the Lasker Foundation named him its 2026 Lasker~Bloomberg Public Service Award winner, citing his work to empower patients’ voices and accelerate research.
Those honours tell the larger story. The little Burnaby clip supplies something an awards list cannot: a glimpse of a young man working out how to be recognizable to millions without becoming unrecognizable at home.
For a moment, the famous middle initial falls away. There is simply Mike Fox from Burnaby—and the reminder that a hometown can be more than the place a person came from. It can be the place that helps them remain themselves.