The minds behind the ’80s sitcom “Family Ties” didn’t plan on the family’s son becoming the show’s breakout character.
Alex P. Keaton, as played by Michael J. Fox, had other ideas.
The conservative teen became the show’s must-see attraction. And, given Hollywood’s liberal leanings, Alex offered a rare, right-leaning protagonist.
Alex loved President Ronald Reagan, craved a smaller government and gave his hippie parents fits.
Fox became a megastar by playing the Republican teen. And, as fate would have it, the character’s pro-conservative messaging had a powerful impact on a future film screenwriter.
Diederik Hoogstraten of “Young Washington” fame shared why Alex mattered to him with Daily Wire podcaster Andrew Klavan.
Klavan gently pressed Hoogstraten on the challenges of being an openly conservative scribe in Hollywood. The new Hollywood Blacklist is all too real, and it’s punished more than a few artists over the past two decades.
The screenwriter described his parents as “woke before the woke was a word,” he said. “They were ultra progressive in a socialist country.”
Hoogstraten rebelled against that brand of thinking.
“That didn’t line up [with me],” he said. “When I started to come to America, there was a sense like, ‘oh, these people get it. They’re not trying to force their ideas on me. I can be free here. I can think differently.”
They couldn’t stop their son from watching a certain ’80s sitcom.
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“Watching [Michael J. Fox as Alex P. Keaton] on a little black-and-white television back in Holland because my mom wouldn’t allow a color TV. That was capitalism,” he said. “Alex P. Keaton brilliantly with joy showed me, ‘oh you can think about Ronald Reagan and America and the world in a very different way. It felt very clandestine to watch that and to develop my own ideas.”
“When I came to America if felt like coming home, frankly,” he added. “I became a [U.S.] citizen eight years ago.”
That love of country helped him connect with the “Young Washington” project, which he co-wrote with director Jon Erwin and Tom Provost.
“Coming to America felt like a sense of liberation,” he said. “So, going back to the founding of this country and the ideas at the root of it, which I knew only very little about, was such a gift and a privilege because I get to understand it better every day as we keep going on these projects.
Erwin recently announced a sequel to “Young Washington” – “1776.”
The question everyone’s asking… Is there a sequel to Young Washington coming? pic.twitter.com/ji9kMHvtXP
— Wonder Project (@watchonwonder) July 6, 2026
Hoogstraten sees a new Hollywood emerging, one that bypasses the usual gatekeepers and offers a space for artists like Erwin to tell the stories that aren’t being told elsewhere.
“It’s a very narrow lane, but there is a really good lane in Hollywood,” he said. “There’s a growing number of people, including everyone involved with Angel Studios in Utah and Wonder Project in Austin … solid people you want to work with who are not giving up on Hollywood.”
He still feels a prejudice against right-leaning views within the industry. That, he insists, is changing.
“Yes, I love America, and sometimes if I’m at a dinner party in L.A. I’m made to feel shame for that, but when I talk about this movie with anyone in the middle of the country, I realize we’re in the majority still. This is normal,” he said.
Did you watch “Family Ties?” What was your favorite episode?
The post How Alex P. Keaton Changed ‘Young Washington’ Scribe’s Life appeared first on Hollywood in Toto.
