The name Michael A. Fox was up for grabs, but the actor was reportedly unhappy with the way that sounded, according to Biography. He eventually settled with Michael J. Fox instead. “My middle name is Andrew, but ‘Andrew Fox’ or ‘Andy Fox’ didn’t cut it for me,” the actor wrote in his autobiography, “Lucky Man: A Memoir” (via Snopes). He went on to explain that “Michael A. Fox” was even worse, seeing as not only was his last name a synonym for being attractive, but “it also sounded uncomfortably Canadian.”
So how did the actor settle on Michael J. Fox? Well, the J certainly doesn’t stand for Jello. Yes, that was actually a rumor that circulated, according to Snopes – to the point that it ended up on an online listing of a “Back to the Future” DVD. Instead, Fox explained that he remembered one of his favorite character actors, Michael J. Pollard. “I stuck in the J, which sometimes I tell people stands for either Jenuine or Jenuis, and resubmitted my forms,” he wrote. “So it was Michael J. Fox on the call sheet I picked up at wrap night that summer.”
