Mac and Me

Mac and Me (1988)

Eric's new in the neighborhood. Mac's new on the planet.

A Mysterious Alien Creature (MAC) escaping from nefarious NASA agents, is befriended by a young boy in a wheelchair. Together, they try to find MAC's family from whom he has been separated.

Date of release
1988-08-12
TMDB
4.5 / 10 (295)
Runtime
1h 39m
Genres
Family, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Adventure
Director
Stewart Raffill

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Filmed in: Los Angeles
  • Awards: 2 · Nominations: 4. Including: Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Director; Golden Raspberry Award for Worst New Star

Mac and Me is a 1988 American science fiction film directed by Stewart Raffill, and co-written with Steve Feke. Starring Christine Ebersole, Jonathan Ward and Katrina Caspary alongside Lauren Stanley and Jade Calegory, it centers on a "Mysterious Alien Creature" (MAC) who escapes from NASA agents and befriends a boy named Eric Cruise. Together, the two search for Mac's family, from whom he has been separated.

Production

Producer R.J. Louis had previously worked on advertising campaigns with McDonald's and had an association with their charitable arm Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC). He explained that at the time Ronald McDonald was "even more [well-known] than Santa Claus", but that E.T. was close behind and thus felt that the next "generation" needed an E.T. the Extra-terrestrial of their own.

Some have reported that the film was at least partially financed by McDonald's, which Louis denies. However, he did receive funding from Golden State Foods, a food service distributor whose only client was McDonald's. Despite McDonald's specifying that they did not want Ronald McDonald to appear in the film, the character, played by Squire Fridell, nonetheless appeared in a scene set at a McDonald's which featured an extended dance sequence.

Louis noted that he was one of the first to leverage the chain as a platform for promoting films (Disney would later enter into a long-term deal with McDonald's to cross-promote properties including their classic films through in-store campaigns such as Happy Meals, although that relationship ended in May 2006, amid pressure to reduce the promotion of junk food to children).

Despite this, Louis remarked that he was "still the only person in the universe that ever had the exclusive motion picture rights to the McDonald's trademark, their actors, their characters and the whole company."

Stewart Raffill, who had made a number of family films, was brought on as director even before the film had a completed script. He says he was recommended to the producer by James Brolin, with whom Raffill had made 1981's High Risk.

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