Bob Gale

Bob Gale's trophy case is smaller than his influence. The awards he has won are fewer than the franchise's stature might suggest, and that gap is itself the story: Back to the Future was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and a Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation, and the trilogy collected Saturn Awards as a body of work. What Gale has instead is something harder to quantify. He is the co-creator of a film that has stayed in circulation for four decades, and he holds the gatekeeper role that Michael J. Fox named for him. Recognition for Gale tends to arrive as respect from the people who make and study movies, not as statuettes.