Review: MJ, the musical by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
The first album I ever bought was Michael Jackson’s Thriller, on vinyl no less, which was all the more significant because I didn’t even own a record player. Like many who saw the birth of MTV, the advent of the music video for the titular song, a mini-horror film, was momentous to me. Like many at the time, I had stopped following the outrageous exploits of Jackson’s career which had inarguably become more about pomp than circumstance.
While recently watching the Netflix documentary The Greatest Night in Pop, I was reminded of what I assume many of us forgot: even during the maelstrom of negative controversy that absorbed his latter life, Michael Jackson was an incredible songwriter. Jackson and Lionel Richie were tapped to write a song that would bring the world’s attention to the need for African famine relief, and they responded with a notoriously catchy tune that would become world famous. The documentary film shows clips of the famously reclusive Jackson 'swriting process and professional demeanor.
In a broad sense, this is exactly what the jukebox musical MJ the Musical purports to do. It begins with a backstage glimpse of the dance rehearsals preceding Jackson’s 1992 Dangerous World Tour. Its scant plot proceeds with a not too subtle suggestion that Jackson’s naysaying tour manager Rob was symbolic of Jackon’s controlling and abusive father, Joseph Jackson (both roles are played by Devin Bowles). Swiftly there emerges a subplot concerning untrustworthy journalist,Rachel and her cameraman, Alejandro. Arguing with his manager and slowly opening up to Rachel, Jackson has an opportunity to revisit the triumphs and tragedies of his past in the form of singing and dancing.
Therein lies the meat of the performance—hit after hit performed by three different actors, each portraying the superstar at different stages in his life: Little Michael (Josiah Benson), young adult Michael (Erik Hamilton), and the developed MJ (Jamaal Fields-Green). The singing and dancing in this production are nothing short of incredible: pop spectacle in its purest form, inarguably wildly entertaining.
Lynn Nottage wrote the book. Yes, that Lynn Nottage, who has twice won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama (the only woman to have done so) and is known for her critically acclaimed plays Intimate Apparel, Ruined, Sweat, and By the Way, Meet Vera Stark. She appears to have found herself in a situation much like that award-winning Katori Hall, who wrote the book for Tina.Both dynamic artists weren't given a lot to do with the material they are given. It's the equivalent of hiring Oscar Wilde to punch up a knock-knock joke.
Christopher Wheeldon, director and choreographer of MJ the Musical, has plenty of room to flex his considerable talents, which are more often focused on ballet. Among the four Tony wins for this production (out of ten nominations), Wheeldon nabbed Best Choreography along with Rich and Tone Talauega. The other wins were for Best Actor in a Musical, Best Lighting Design of a Musical, and Best Sound Design of a Musical. The excellent lighting and sound design carry though to the touring production. The production deftly transformed Bass Concert Hall successively into an intimate dance space and a stadium concert experience complete with engaging special effects (including Jackon’s famous explosion through the floor of the stage to start the concert scene.
Yet another musical theatre production delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic, MJ The Musical premiered to mostly mixed reviews despite its financial success (it has earned well over $200 million dollars).The show opened in London’s West End in 2024 and was nominated for the Grammy for best musical theater album. The production features almost forty musical numbers and runs over two and half hours. It's all a bit much, like Jackson's life, and at no point does it address the elephant (or more accurately chimpanzee) in the room. The barrage of pop hits is classic misdirection. While the musical biopic Tina focused too intensely on that star's personal life, MJ completely eschews Jackson’s.
Watching the proceedings entreats a question: how is this productiom any different from a Las Vegas tribute show? It's kinetic and exuberantly entertaining. It paints the portrait of Jackson as a tortured artist fighting through a life of ongoing trauma—an abusive and controlling father, challenges of early stardom, familial jealousy, a terrible brush with death on stage when he was nearly immolated by a pyrotechnic, and subsequently a guarded, isolated later life full of loneliness and paparazzi-enforced agoraphobia.
Except for a clever bit during the Thriller scene in which Joe Jackon is presented as a Don-Giovanni-like father figure to Jackson’s Mozart, there is very little art in this portrait of an artist.
MJ, the musical
touring company
October 8th through 13th, 2024
Bass Concert Hall
2350 Robert Dedman Drive
Austin, TX 78712
Run time with intermission: 3 hours
