The Michael J. Fox Movie That Led To The Discovery Of A Missing Famous Painting

For audiences of a certain age, Michael J. Fox will always be synonymous with his iconic '80s roles like Marty McFly in the "Back to the Future" trilogy or Alex P. Keaton on "Family Ties." However, in the 1990s and early 2000s, the beloved actor, determined to keep his legacy going amid Michael J. Fox's well-documented health issues, endeared himself to a whole new generation of fans thanks to his voice roles in movies like "Stuart Little." And while you probably know that Fox voiced the eponymous heroic mouse, what you may not know is that the release of the adorable family film actually led to the discovery, and later recovery, of a famous, long-lost painting.

In 1999's "Stuart Little," the wealthy Frederick (Hugh Laurie) and Eleanor Little (Geena Davis) adopt Fox's Stuart, a white mouse, as a brother for their biological son, George Little (Jonathan Lipnicki, who looks completely different today). In the Littles' home, above the fireplace, hangs the painting "Sleeping Lady with Black Vase," which was created by Hungarian avant-garde artist Róbert Berény in the late 1920s, and had been missing for almost as long. Little did anyone on the "Stuart Little" set realize, the painting was not a copy, but, in fact, the real deal — and it would soon be worth far more what the film's set designer had originally paid for the artwork.

In 2009, Hungarian art historian Gergely Barki spotted the painting while watching "Stuart Little" on TV with his daughter. "I knew this painting from a black-and-white photograph," Barki said (via The Guardian). "I couldn't believe my eyes. I thought I was daydreaming." Once he was absolutely certain, the art historian embarked on a quest to track it down.

Róbert Berény's "Sleeping Lady with Black Vase" was reportedly last seen in Hungary in 1928, when it was sold to a collector. It's been speculated that the buyer fled the country either before or during World War II, which resulted in the painting going missing for years. Somehow, it eventually found its way to southern California, with art collector Michael Hempstead telling The Guardian that he paid about $40 for it at a charity auction in San Diego in the mid-1990s. "Somebody had just donated it, probably with a lot of other items," Hempstead recalled. The collector later sold the painting to an antiques shop in Pasadena for roughly $400 to $600, with a set designer shopping on behalf of Sony (which produced "Stuart Little") subsequently buying it for $500.

In fact, an entire decade before Gergely Barki noticed the painting while catching the movie on TV, Hampstead spotted it while watching "Stuart Little" in the theater. He even briefly considered trying to see if he could buy it back, but is ultimately just glad to have played a role in its rediscovery. As for Barki, after reaching out to everyone he could think of, the art historian learned that the aforementioned set designer had actually bought the painting from Sony and hung it in her home. During his own interview with The Guardian, in 2015, Barki explained that when he met the set designer to verify its authenticity, she had no idea how valuable the artwork really was. According to the outlet, she later sold the painting to another art collector for an undisclosed amount. They then subsequently auctioned it off for €229,500 (about $267,000 today) in late 2014.