Don’t get me wrong. The musical “MJ” has misfired on so many levels that I don’t know where to start. “Thriller” is like a scene of “cat”. The segments showing the influence of Michael Jackson’s dance (Nicholas Brothers, Fred Astaire, Bob Fosse) felt sorry for the artistic form of dance because of their very low skill levels. Frustrating, but as expected, the show, directed by ballet choreographer Christopher Wheeldon, was nominated for 10 Tony Awards. It runs for years. Michael Jackson — for all his flaws — is still Michael Jackson.
But there is something in this work that shows something about the dancing body in all of Jackson’s clear anxieties. It made me think: what happened to the body when the boy became a man? How has his dance changed? Was something in his inner landscape exposed to everyone in his dance? Did you really do it? look that?
Beyond the nervous choreography, it’s not always easy to understand how his spirit is reflected in his dance when he’s alive and building a pop canon of music and dance. It wasn’t. Much about him was wrapped in fashion at the moment you can forget his body. (After all, the ever-changing features of his face could not be ignored.) Along the way, there were numerous distractions, including skin, plastic surgery, and allegations of sexual abuse against him.
He was always hiding. His outfit was armor, obscuring even his physicality for all of his body, his internal life, and his extraordinary talent. In a sense, he made it possible for his impersonation to exist by creating and perpetuating Michael Jackson, which anyone can borrow and wear. Like rhinestone gloves. Or moonwalk.
Broadway musicals are doing their best to focus on the perfectionist artist MJ Jackson, as adult Jackson is featured on Playbill. In contrast, Little Michael’s role makes adults look more fragile and stranger. (There is also a third Michael during his age, which makes him less impressed.) You have to notice the dramatic and dramatic changes his dancing body has shown over time. From his childhood as Jackson 5’s younger brother to the final rehearsal of the 1992 Dangerous Tour, you can see the turmoil spill over into his body as the show composes. Dance is an escape route for Little Michael, who suffered from his father. For the old MJ, it’s a way his body screams in ways that words can’t. His voice was high and whispered and never had the same emphasis.
The old MJ of the show is fighting for strict accuracy. The phrase of movement is knotty, pointed and full of angles, but Little Michael is smooth and enviablely relaxed. (Obviously, the dance style changed dramatically in the meantime, but the contrast seems to be both physical and emotional.) Two boys, Little Michael, Walter Russell III, and Christian Wilson Take turns. I can only talk about Wilson in the performance I saw, but his dance drew me attention repeatedly.
As a musical, “MJ” can feel as distant and inaccessible as a music video. Wilson’s presence-a blend of his peace, simplicity and wisdom of his victory-brought it to life. Even during the curtain call, his hips continued to flow inward, perhaps quieter and more inward than when he had a personality, but he never lost a gentle yet powerful groove. did not.
Its unconscious liquidity highlights the stiffness and constraints of the MJ, as Myles Frost played. The accuracy of Frost’s dance is extraordinary. It reveals that the body turns to itself and is hardened — lonely, fragile, and dented. Her tip hat and rounded shoulders didn’t just imitate Jackson’s one of his idols, Bob Fosse. Wasn’t they also a way to hide (and protect) from the world?
Jackson’s music was pop, but his body usage was very hard, and to see the actual Dangerous Tour footage, see anger and speed, anger and attack related to punk, not sound. I was able to. The tones are clipped with confidence, but beyond the gleaming look, you feel pain.Did he do too I want How to move in front of people? can not decide. At the start of the performance in Bucharest He is standing still, His arms appear tense on his side while the camera pans towards the crowd on the brink of hysteria.
It is impossible to know who Jackson really is. “MJ” offers yet another spoofing of men seen on stage and in video. Often, the dancing body reveals a particular truth about a person, but in Jackson’s case, dancing may have been another thing to hide behind, like another outfit. It was a place where he could control his body. He could be himself or the person he wanted to be: strong, powerful and sexy.Maybe a dancing body was A man, or his own fantasy.
I don’t want to respect the almost cartoon-like choreography of “MJ”. But when I saw dance, I started thinking about what it would be like for Jackson and him. It’s not the way he gets out of the box where he finds himself, but the one he’s chained together.
There is another musical, “A Strange Loop,” on Broadway, where the hero’s dancing body is tied to his spirit. Directly. The choreographer Raja Feather Kelly, who was in charge of it, was excluded from the Tony Awards competition.At the same time, “MJ” Wheeldon teeth Nominated for the best choreographer, no mention is made of the two brothers, Rich and Tone Tarauega, who danced with Jackson and created the Jackson movement at the show.
Kelly is a embarrassing abbreviation. His intricate choreography is a sparkling and clear part of what defines Usher, the main character of the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical by Michael R. Jackson. (Yes, the name is strange.)
There are many dance moves in “A Strange Loop”, but there are also more subtle nuances. It’s a choreography of action. Everything a character says or does is processed with gestures or movement phrases, which is not only multi-layered and original, but also completely clever as the gestures go in and out of recognizable dances.
In “Intermission Song”, Usher (Jakel Spivey) is surrounded by this idea. Six performers play worries when they create what he calls the “Big, Black, Strange Ass American Broadway” show. Dance breaks move them. They may hit the same accent, but they act as individuals. Towards the end of the “memory song”, they lift their arms — slowly and intentionally, immobilizing the rest of the body.It’s ballet and as pious as the opening prayer George Balanchine’s “Mozartia” And the choreographic feat built on the elegance and tension born of control.that is their Dancing body. The show wouldn’t be the same without it.
While the dance of “MJ” feels largely like a reproduction of a video, “A Strange Loop” raises the question of what choreography is and what it is. If Kelly’s approach is subtle, there’s a reason. Michael R. Jackson’s expression of Quianes is large and black and exists in both the mind and body. The choreography is intentional. It is part of each character’s fabric. It not only unleashes the possibilities of dancing in musical theaters, but also expands the way you can tell a story.