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Cirque du Soleil 'Michael Jackson ONE' permanent Las Vegas show

Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

I don't know but you have to turn the word of the day in the same day. (Mon)

Official Rules
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Oh man that sucks, well when the show comes on it's at 1:30am central time for me. I got I guess Tuesday's Word of the Day which is "One"... Thanks anyway Qbee :)

Edit- Yea I read the rules now I get it shoot I wish I ask earlier in the day (TUE) all well..
 
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Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Robin Leach ?@Robin_Leach 35m

Katherine Jackson expected to walk Michael Jackson One world premiere red carpet at Mandalay Bay on Saturday with Jackie Marlon and Tito .
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Paris78 said:
Robin Leach ?@Robin_Leach 35m

Katherine Jackson expected to walk Michael Jackson One world premiere red carpet at Mandalay Bay on Saturday with Jackie Marlon and Tito .
Click to expand...

I hope she's bringing the children as well but they're not walking the red carpet. They should see this :)
 
Cirque dips back into Michael Jackson well with 'ONE'


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Cirque du Soleil is putting on a Michael Jackson-themed show. Wait, you already saw that? Guess again — this is a second production from Canada's crowned princes of spectacle dedicated to the King of Pop.
Michael Jackson ONE, now in previews and opening Saturday at Las Vegas' Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino (tickets, $69-$180), comes on the heels of Cirque's wildly lucrative The Immortal World Tour, last year's sixth-highest-grossing touring show with $140.2 million in sales.
So what's the difference between these two Michael circus-fests? The biggest is that Immortalwas a moveable visual feast aimed at arena audiences, and as a result had to make compromises when it came to complex high-flying acts and audio impact. In contrast, ONE promises a more intimate and intricate encounter with the late singer's oeuvre.
"You'll feel much closer to Michael with this show," says Jamie King, the writer/director behind bothImmortal and ONE. "From the costumes and choreography, to his actual voice and images on video, Michael is present. He is our guide."
If anyone can conjure Jackson's spirit, it's devotee King, who danced on Jackson's 1992 Dangerous tour and went on to choreograph for Madonna and Rihanna. But he was keen to avoid a physical representation of Jackson in his new show.
"Having worked with him, I was adamant that no one should play him," says King. Instead, ONE tells the story of "four misfits who are on a journey with Michael as their spiritual guide, and one by one they come upon four of his talismans: a hat, shoes, glasses and that iconic glove. They are transformed and rewarded, and ultimately end up in Neverland."


After 20 years swinging on the Strip, Cirque du Soleil has the Las Vegas residency formula down, with eight shows going. The company also has experience with spotlighting music legends, thanks to LOVE (The Beatles) and Viva Elvis (the Elvis Presley tribute that wrapped last summer). ONE takes its audio cues from those shows, and will feature custom-built seating that incorporates speakers into both headrests and seatbacks.
"We're using original master recordings of Michael's classic songs, and with these seats we're able to let you hear not just his vocals better, but also his backing tracks, which often are overlooked," says Kevin Antunes, another Immortal veteran who isONE's musical director.
"We were respectful to those original mixes that we all know so well, but we also contoured the arrangements to match the action you're seeing," he says. "So whenThriller comes on, you're not just hearing it, you are immersed in that song."
ONE will feature upward of 25 Jackson tunes, most of them classics but some lesser known, such as Stranger in Moscow (off HIStory).
"It goes well with our story line and allows us to take the audience through an environmental change," says Antunes. "Think, cold."
But it's Cirque producers who will be seeing green, says Gary Bongiovanni, editor of concert industry trade journal Pollstar.
"The combination of Cirque and Michael Jackson has proven to be a winning one," with an experienced production company yoking itself to a popular artist resulting in consistently high ticket prices, says Bongiovanni, noting that Immortal averaged $100 a seat. "No one will ever have a chance to see Michael again. So this sort of show is it."
Cirque's double-dipping of the Jackson legacy — all under the watchful gaze of the late performer's estate – is simply good business, says Ian Drew, entertainment director at Us Weekly.
"Where there's money to be made, people will make it, and sad as it is to say, Michael is worth more dead than alive," says Drew, who counts himself a Jackson aficionado. "The audience for his music is undying. But impersonators don't quite embody him fully. The way (Cirque) is going, not showing someone playing him is really the right way for fans."
For director King, a positive fan reaction to his latest Jackson tribute will be merely a bonus: "To be able to carry on Michael's legacy — well, for me, it just doesn't get better than this."


http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...soleil-michael-jackson-one-las-vegas/2457799/
 
After time, tinkering, opening night arrives for 'Michael Jackson One'


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JESSICA EBELHAR/LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL


Cirque du Soleil performers debut part of the "Michael Jackson One" show May 7 at Mandalay Bay. Saturday is the official opening night for new show.




By MIKE WEATHERFORD
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL


Standing onstage to introduce a May 7 press preview of “Michael Jackson One,” co-directors Jamie King and Welby Altidor kept repeating “June 29,” almost like a mantra to reassure themselves there was still time. But no more. Saturday finally brings the “official” opening night of Cirque du Soleil’s eighth Las Vegas opus, even though the show has been running at full ticket price since May 23.

While most of us old media types agreed to honor the tradition of previews (if all goes to plan, my review will be posted online Sunday), all the red-carpet hoopla may seem after the fact in the social media era of fans posting “spoilers” and informal reviews.

Good thing then, that Altidor said the show was “very much ready” to begin with, and did not require the major surgery “Zumanity” and “Criss Angel: Believe” needed during their preview weeks.

“We really worked hard to try to deliver a show that was close to ready for the soft opening, instead of a soft-opening period where we continued to do a lot of work on the show,” Altidor said this past week.

Though he said it will be up to others to judge, “we’re proud to have perhaps established a new standard in terms of preparedness for an opening.”
Unlike other resident Cirque productions created from scratch, this one had the touring arena show “The Immortal” as a learning curve for what Michael Jackson fans expect from “One.”

And, as Altidor said with an apparently straight face over the phone, “The music was already composed.”
Since May 23, a smaller creative team has polished technical details such as video syncing and choreography. But Altidor hopes that on a less tangible level, Saturday’s audiences will pick up on “the passion you feel from the artist, how they own the stage so they are able to connect with the audience,” now that they are used to a nightly schedule.

Some early birds have dropped “spoilers” about an illusion that brings Jackson into the action. Like all Cirque productions, Altidor said this one won’t stop evolving after Saturday’s party night and may still bring new “creative ways to represent (Jackson’s) image.”

“Would we have loved to use smoke and create a shape of his face with it? Of course,” he said. “But certainly within the time frame that we had, I think we’re really happy with what we managed to accomplish.”
With blistering temperatures, perhaps record highs, predicted for Saturday, staging the opening-night bash outdoors at Mandalay Beach could find many of the guests, who are asked to wear “black or white beach chic,” wading into the water. Cirque will accordingly offer a “shoe check” and issue flip-flops. ...



Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288.


http://www.reviewjournal.com/columns/michael-jackson-one
 
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Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte will host matriarch Katherine Jackson and Michael Jackson’s brothers Jackie, Marlon and Tito at Saturday’s red carpet world premiere of their new show “Michael Jackson One.” It will be an star-studded event at Mandalay Bay, followed by a celebrity poolside party at Mandalay Bay Beach.

Cirque is experiencing such brisk ticket sales through October that once dark days for cast and crew are finalized for the end of year, the company hopes to announce at the premiere remaining 2013 dates and plans for 2014. Even three months before the first preview, $500,000 in tickets were sold.

I joined fans from as far away as Thailand and Japan for the first night of previews May 23. As I reported, the sensational show was so brilliantly produced, it could have been the premiere then. All that’s been necessary over these six weeks has been opening-act tightening, and engineers have fine-tuned surround sound, lighting, video and the genius hologram of Michael dancing with the cast. Maybe they can make the snowfall thicker and last longer to cool us down from the expected 117-degree desert heat?

My interviews with writer-director Jamie King, Michael’s estate lawyer John Branca and Mandalay Bay President Chuck Bowling were posted from our sneak peek in May. Jamie, who also masterminded “Michael Jackson — The Immortal World Tour” currently in Asia, revealed his behind-the-scenes ambitions in this YouTube video.

He also explained the show’s entire concept, its creation and how everything came together on a walking tour with its director of creation, Welby Altidor.

Everybody connected with the show, including creators, producers, the cast and Michael’s estate lawyers, say The King of Pop’s presence is not only felt throughout the splashy production, but also he was the inspiration for the endeavor.

Saturday’s expected Hollywood and New York stars and VIPS include Spike Lee, Berry Gordy Jr., Neil Patrick Harris, Roberto Cavalli, Gayle King, Adam Shankman, Allison Janney, Dot Jones, Rex Lee, Ian Ziering, Lupe Fiasco, Jon Secada, Veronic DiCaire, D.J. Ashba, Tom Higgenson, Kevin Love, Adrian Peterson, Pamela Anderson and David LaChapelle. That celebrity list will continue to grow from now until Saturday night.

Despite rumors that Michael’s children Prince, Paris and Blanket will be with grandma Katherine, there is no official confirmation — and won’t be right up until the red carpet is opened to media and photographers.

The stars also include the 63 unknown genius talents onstage, above and around the audience performing eye-popping acrobatics and stop-your-heart stunts along with music and dancing to take your breath away.

Reigning above the state-of-the-art visual and audio experience that creates this heartfelt tribute to Michael’s genius, innovations and legacy is the spirit of the superstar himself. The show will make you forget the tragedy of his life unwinding now in a Los Angeles courtroom or past screaming tabloid headlines.

Jamie, Welby and their enthusiastic cast have pushed the envelope to ensure that the memories of Michael are musical ones and not the lurid scandals that plagued his life.

We’ll use Twitter and Instagram video on Saturday afternoon from final preparations backstage and at night for celebrity reports of the premiere. Our full report, photo and video coverage of the show and the glittering pool party afterward will be posted Sunday.

Jamie had the last word: “This is the show Michael would have done himself. This is the show he would have wanted.”

Read more: http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/201...on-one-celebrate-premiere-star/#ixzz2XVp0iDQX
 
Artist in ‘Michael Jackson One’ injured after fall to the stage

By <cite style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">John Katsilometes</cite>
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A sneak peek of Cirque du Soleil's "Michael Jackson One" at Mandalay Bay on Tuesday, May 7, 2013.
Photo: Tom Donoghue/DonoghuePhotography.com
'Michael Jackson One' Sneak Peek at Mandalay Bay


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The cast members in Cirque du Soleil shows perform such otherworldly, superhuman feats of artistry, you sometime forget that these people are, well, people.

Audience members were reminded of the real, human risk in these unreal shows Wednesday night when a performer in “Michael Jackson One” at Mandalay Bay fell to the stage and was taken away in a wheelchair.

Cirque is declining to release the name of the performer, saying they are "not allowed by law" to identify artists injured while on the job. But officials did confirm reports from audience members that an aerial artist in the “Stranger in Moscow” number slipped free of the “slack rope” he uses in the acrobatic act high above his fellow performers and dropped to the stage.
He missed the spongy mat placed below the number and hit headfirst on the hardened stage.
The house lights came up immediately as the performer was prone on the stage, not moving, for several minutes. To allay confusion from the audience, an announcement was made that there would be a delay in the production while the artist was evaluated.
Stagehands surrounded the performer, a gurney and a wheelchair were brought to the stage, and the artist was taken away in the wheelchair. He was conscious, and the show resumed after the incident.
Today, a Cirque spokeswoman said the performer is expected to return to the performance, and the act is still in the show. In an email response regarding he incident, she said: “All the safety procedures were taken in support of the artist to ensure that he was quickly evaluated and taken care of. He was conscious and wheel-chaired off-stage. He was assessed by our medical personnel and was sent to a hospital for evaluation. He is now back home and resting and is suffering from a mild concussion. We are all relieved.”
The incident occurred during one of the final preview shows for the highly anticipated production. The production that replaced "Disney's The Lion King" at Mandalay Bay Theater celebrates it world premiere Saturday night.


Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWiththeDish.

http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/blogs...-michael-jackson-one-sustains-mild-concussio/
 
Making Zombies With 'LED Guts' for Cirque's 'Michael Jackson One'

1:11 PM PDT 6/28/2013 by Ashley Lee


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Isaac Brekken/Getty Images; Getty Images​

Fashion designer Zaldy Goco tells THR about designing timeless, technology-friendly costumes -- with details like Swarovski frogging and black-light pinstripes -- for the Michael Jackson-inspired resident Cirque du Soleil production, premiering June 29 at Mandalay Bay Theatre.

Fashion designer Zaldy Goco first crossed over into music via Gwen Stefani&#8217;s L.A.M.B. label, and has since outfitted Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, Jennifer Lopez, Mick Jagger and more for their international arena tours, each with big screens that showcase every stitch.




But one set of costumes never made it to the stage. In 2009, Goco worked with Michael Jackson for his This Is It tour -- designs riffing off the memorable pieces from Jackson&#8217;s longtime design team, Michael Bush and Dennis Tompkins.
&#8220;I hadn&#8217;t gone through anything like that before,&#8221; Goco tells The Hollywood Reporter of losing the legend. He joined veteran concert director Jamie King and Jackson&#8217;s longtime choreographer Travis Payne for Cirque du Soleil&#8217;s wildly successful The Immortal World Tour in 2010, and now for Michael Jackson One, an acrobatically ambitious resident production with 26 scenes and 60 performers, which officially premieres on June 29 at Mandalay Bay Theatre in Las Vegas. &#8220;Immortal was an opportunity to complete the project that was left unfinished, in a way, and the new story of One created different opportunities to pull from Michael&#8217;s world and inspiration.&#8221;
Though he&#8217;s in the middle of relaunching his namesake fashion brand, Goco paused to speak with THR about working with the renown Montreal-trained acrobats, reviving Jackson&#8217;s &#8220;special treasures&#8221; and who in music could potentially succeed Jackson&#8217;s fashion-meets-music legacy.
The Hollywood Reporter: Was it challenging for you to design for acrobats?
Zaldy Goco: In my design world, it wasn&#8217;t always just models; I always designed for all different body types for all different types of things. I worked closely with Sarah Sophie Flicker of [New York cabaret collective] Citizens Band. She told me, &#8216;Nothing on the belly or the lower back.&#8217; But working with Cirque&#8217;s varied performers opened up a whole world for me. All of a sudden, you&#8217;re dealing with a contortionist with entirely different needs. Everything is so specific, and that was the fun part &#8211; we&#8217;d try an outfit on and we adapt it by rehearsing until we perfect it, and everything&#8217;s okay.
THR: This is your third Michael Jackson-related show. How was your approach different?
Goco: I can&#8217;t help but approach it from a fashion point of view, where I want to make clothes that I want to wear or people want to wear. That&#8217;s the best compliment I get from people: &#8216;Oh my god, I want that outfit.&#8217; That&#8217;s the appeal I like to build into what most people consider just a stage costume.
STORY: Cirque du Soleil&#8217;s Tribute Show 'Michael Jackson One' Moves Into Las Vegas (Exclusive Photo)
But with One, how do you create something that&#8217;s gonna last ten years? That was the challenge, but it goes back to Michael. He created these iconic looks for iconic videos, and when it gets into &#8216;icon&#8217; stage, it lasts forever. The &#8216;Thriller&#8217; jacket is the &#8216;Thriller&#8217; jacket forever -- you love it or hate it throughout the years, but it still feels great because it touches on a moment. For example, I presented this idea of a mashup of the best of MJ&#8217;s iconic fashion moments: the epaulets mixed with frogging, mixed with the shape of the &#8216;Thriller&#8217; jacket and the &#8216;Dangerous&#8217; belt buckles, but then all in white and silver. It&#8217;s honoring what Michael did -- which is he always wanted fresh ideas and wanted to get things that are new, and not just keep doing the same thing -- but respecting what fans love. You want to please fans, but the big client is Michael. I thought, what would he be into right now, for this show? What do I think Michael would like to see?
THR: Jackson called on multiple designers like Alexander McQueen and John Galliano to potentially design for his This Is It tour. How did you feel when you got that job?
Goco: I flew out to meet him within four days of him getting my designs. I found myself in a room with him and Travis [Payne], just sitting on the couch talking. What was great was that he had a lot of ideas and you could talk to him about anything, and we quickly realized our shared love of Swarovski crystal and opulence and everything. I went away, designed more things and sent more swatches over, we&#8217;d have fittings and he&#8217;d get really excited like a kid. I brought him the light-up &#8220;Billie Jean&#8221; pants fresh from Phillips Technology in the Netherlands, and I put them on him when we did our last fitting. It was just silence -- that weird, uncomfortable silence where you&#8217;re like, what is he thinking? Then he said, &#8220;It&#8217;s everything I always wanted.&#8221; He was just so stunned &#8211; they did do some LED before, but the technology wasn&#8217;t as advanced yet. He just could not stop talking about it -- how impressed he was, how much he wanted to push it even further into the future. It was great to see him so excited about a product. It&#8217;s always great when you get to work with an artist that&#8217;s collaborative and wants to be involved. There are some that are just, &#8220;Yeah, it&#8217;s great, wonderful.&#8221; You&#8217;re a superstar, don&#8217;t you want to get involved in this even deeper?
STORY: Michael Jackson's Eldest Son to Testify in Wrongful Death Trial
THR: Why do you think Michael Jackson had so many major fashion moments throughout his musical career?
Goco: Almost everything he did &#8211; that&#8217;s the &#8220;Thriller&#8221; jacket, the &#8220;Billie Jean&#8221; look, the &#8220;Dirty Diana&#8221; look, the glove, the sock, the arm brace &#8211; everything he did was thought out. It was just fashion for him, and it&#8217;s lasting. I don&#8217;t think anyone&#8217;s really done that before, and still not. Very few people have been able to be an icon that&#8217;s created iconic looks that relate to their music. David Bowie has,Madonna did it with the [Jean Paul] Gaultier cone bra, but who else? There aren&#8217;t many you can think of. Even though [Lady] Gaga, everything is always, &#8220;Wow, look at her,&#8221; but it doesn&#8217;t have the same &#8220;living forever&#8221; feel yet. Tons of great looks, legendary, but will we remember that asthat look? I&#8217;m not sure. Beyonce, does she have a look? Gorgeous, stunning and amazing, but nothing that&#8217;s a fashion contribution that you will really, really remember. That&#8217;s what&#8217;s so special about Michael &#8211; it&#8217;s music, art, fashion, culture. He entered that world, all at the same time, and everyone responds to it.
THR: What are some of your favorite outfits from Michael Jackson One?
Goco: &#8220;Thriller&#8221; ghouls -- outrageous. When you see them, they&#8217;ve got LED guts spilling out of their bodies -- completely covered, head-to-toe with no skin showing at all. It&#8217;s really scary, frightening! I love them. And the &#8220;Smooth Criminals,&#8221; the Japanese acrobats -- I love those outfits and I love those guys! It&#8217;s one of the most exciting numbers. They&#8217;re such sharp, energetic perfectionists and the way they can perform in these big coats. At first, I never wanted to do any black light on any outfits, but somehow we came up with this way of doing it in white &#8211; normally, you just have all these other neon colors. That was an exciting advancement in that area, and then it goes back into these blue and white striped suits! I love the MJ girls in &#8220;The Way You Make Me Feel,&#8221; and the white outfits they normally wear turn into Technicolor. A quite simple shift, but the color was enough to make it feel special.
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I also love the Muse &#8211; gold, crystals, and big gold boots. I love her outfit because her being the Muse, it&#8217;s a technique that I used on a jacket for Michael for This Is It. It was supposed to be his finale look for &#8220;Man in the Mirror.&#8221; It&#8217;s a technique that mimics frogging, but almost like frogging walls, stuffed full of Swarovski crystals, packed in there so it&#8217;s like two inches thick. I remember when I showed that to Michael, he said, &#8220;This is like my secret treasure!&#8221; I don&#8217;t like to pull too much from the past, but I just thought that since she&#8217;s the closest thing to Michael, I&#8217;m gonna give her that inspiration from This Is It, since we never really got to see it. I love that.


http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/making-zombies-led-guts-cirques-575859

 

June 28, 2013 7:43 pm
The way Michael Jackson made us feel

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By Peter Aspden


Four years after Michael Jackson&#8217;s death, Cirque du Soleil is celebrating his showmanship with an ambitious new tribute


How will the future judge the golden era of popular music that began in the middle of the 1950s and dribbled to a close sometime in the late 1980s? Changes in the making and marketing of music, and the way we listen to it, are having momentous effects on the industry. What will be left for posterity? Vinyl, the medium that transmitted most of pop&#8217;s most glorious moments, is already an ancient artefact, collected by zealots, hipsters and, presumably, the British Museum. Compact discs are already on their way out.

The video clip is an outdated promotional tool. How will we remember the stars of pop? Talent shows? Tribute bands? Obscure retro radio channels?

Mozart is still celebrated because his music continues to be played by orchestra members who devote their lives to mastering his compositions. His genius is freeze-packed to last: modern orchestras do not look or sound dramatically different from those of his lifetime. Audiences are respectful of the ritual of attending concerts. They are reverential towards a period of musical innovation that will never go out of fashion; it is a touchstone for our deepest cultural aspirations.



But pop doesn&#8217;t have a hope of matching that kind of longevity. It has whored itself to corporate greed, and to the desperate desires of its practitioners to achieve instant fame and wealth. Who, over the age of 11, can actually remember last year&#8217;s X Factor winner?

Perhaps it is only right that an art form that was designed to deliver evanescent pleasure should end like this: a bright comet that is already fast receding. But it is a shame. Pop music did become an art form. And it should be remembered, not least for the sake of its few true stars.

Perhaps there is another way. Tonight sees the premiere, in Las Vegas, of a new Cirque du Soleil show, the latest of eight theatrical productions by the company that has embedded itself in the Nevadan city. Michael Jackson One is a tribute to the singer who died four summers ago, remembered in too many quarters for a ruinous decline rather than the excellence that marked his very best work.

The show seeks to redress that imbalance. Like Spike Lee&#8217;s recent documentary on the making of the Bad album, it refuses to dwell on the dark side of Michael Jackson. This is not a biography, skewed or otherwise. This is a celebration. And it is breathtakingly effective.



Cirque du Soleil&#8217;s uneasy fusion of circus skills and artistic ambition leaves many people cold, notwithstanding the company&#8217;s worldwide popularity. At best, it provides fresh impetus for a form of entertainment that seemed moribund a couple of decades ago. At worst, the attempted symbiosis of freakishly talented performers and psychobabble global village idealism is pretentious.


The first signs that there was a more fruitful way ahead for the troupe was with its Vegas production of The Beatles Love , a show which unexpectedly gained the approval and active co-operation of the surviving members of the group. Their instincts were solid: the musical, which has been running for eight years at the Mirage hotel, is a clever and well-conceived homage to some of the greatest pop songs ever written.

Like Love, One is designed to stay in one place, requiring the theatre at the Mandalay Bay resort to be adapted around the show, rather than the other way around.

Technologically, it has raised the bar to a new level. Each of the theatre&#8217;s 1,800 seats has three speakers. The stage has 66 winches with speeds of up to 12 feet per second. There are 587 lighting fixtures, and 295 custom LED fixtures built into the set pieces. The mise-en-scène is staggering in scale: 26 projectors, 11 TV monitors, a 40-ft wide LED wall made up of eight separate columns.


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©Eyevine


It could so easily have been a mess. Where there is this kind of towering aspiration, hubris perpetually lurks backstage. But One, which I saw in a preview earlier this month, is a triumph. In remaining faithful to Jackson&#8217;s love of showmanship and fantasy, and remaining undistracted by the shambles that his public persona turned into, the show is respectful to his art, the only thing that ever really mattered.

One grips by the throat from its very first song, &#8220;Beat It&#8221;. A plot, of sorts, is expounded: a group of four young people attempt to break into a show and get sucked into a fantastical &#8220;vortex&#8221; peopled by fabulously costumed characters: paparazzi in Darth Vader-esque outfits, with electronic ticker tape running across their chests, confronted by a white-suited dance corps which does battle with them. Huge screens surrounding the stage show original footage of Jackson in action, while acrobats swing from the back of the hall on to the stage.

The choreography, supervised by Jamie King, who is known for his work with Madonna and Rihanna and who danced with Jackson on the Dangerous world tour (1992-93), is both faithful to Jackson&#8217;s innovations and playfully improvises on them. There is no strict imitation here, but plenty of homage. The direction is supercharged and lightning-fast. After five minutes of the show, you decide you have to see it again, if only to discover what you missed first time around. You simply cannot keep up.

Each minute is filled with little coups de théâtre. A pair of boots appears in mid-air, and they start to moonwalk on their own; in &#8220;Smooth Criminal&#8221;, the dance corps replicates the famous forward &#8220;lean&#8221; from the song&#8217;s original video; a television screen in the sky features the young Jackson singing &#8220;I&#8217;ll Be There&#8221;, an affecting moment amid the mayhem.

After its breathless opening, the part of the show that some will find irksome: &#8220;They Don&#8217;t Care About Us&#8221; and &#8220;Earth Song&#8221; are not among Jackson&#8217;s finest moments, and they feel overwrought and heavy-handed here.

Only at this point does moralism threaten to derail the show. Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, the Belgian-Moroccan choreographer whose contemporary dance pieces have a worldwide following, also worked on One. &#8220;Cirque du Soleil have had some incredible successes, but they wanted some new blood from outside,&#8221; he told me over coffee in Sadler&#8217;s Wells in London earlier this week. &#8220;They were not always so philosophical in their approach. They said we want the good guys here and the bad guys there, and I was saying, you know, the bad guys are not always bad.&#8221;


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©GettyThe famous forward lean during &#8216;Smooth Criminal&#8217;

But it is a rare clumsy moment. The pace picks up again. For a Cirque show, the acrobatics are restrained, reluctant to intrude too much on the party. Jackson&#8217;s moves are not circus acts: the company&#8217;s performers have had to change their style from rubbery to raunchy. It works to telling effect on &#8220;Dirty Diana&#8221; and &#8220;The Way You Make Me Feel&#8221;.


For &#8220;Billie Jean&#8221;, we see a substantial part of the original video on the back-projected screens. &#8220;Michael created classic images that are embedded in our hearts and heads,&#8221; said Welby Altidor, the show&#8217;s director of creation, on the phone from Montreal. &#8220;And you can never be better than those classic images. We wanted to acknowledge the memories that are out there. It was a balancing act.&#8221;
&#8220;Thriller&#8221; is stupendous, featuring the show&#8217;s greatest &#8220;circus&#8221; moment as a dancer springs between two trampolines, and &#8220;Man in the Mirror&#8221; trumps the evening&#8217;s entertainment with a personal appearance, thanks to another astounding technological sleight of hand, of Jackson himself. It is at the same time ghostly, moving, funny and a little bit weird.
Altidor said he wanted the audience to feel &#8220;enveloped&#8221; by the show. The &#8220;immersion&#8221; factor has become a cliché of contemporary entertainment, but Onemarks out fresh ground. It shows us, perhaps for the first time, how the legacy of great pop music will establish itself: not through vapid imitations on primetime TV shows, or muckraking biographies, or late-night vinyl junkie sessions in dank basements.


To watch One and Love in 20, or 50, or 100 years&#8217; time will be the nearest we can get to understanding the greatness of a period that is already receding in our rear-view mirrors. Pop music, the cultural historians of the future will say, really did have that visceral, effervescent appeal. It invented new things, and made you happy to be alive, not unlike Mozart. This is how it should be remembered. Big and bold and blowing your mind.


&#8216;Michael Jackson One&#8217;, Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/e57b85e2-df13-11e2-881f-00144feab7de.html#ixzz2XYPmwsEQ




 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Ugh anyone know the last "Word of the Day" on Extra tv (FRI)??
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

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Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Just went on the website to look at and order merchandise and they only ship to the US and Canada. That really sucks, the merch is incredible.
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

So the premiere is today right ?
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

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Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

Speechless_UK said:
I am looking to book tickets today for my visit to Vegas and I was wondering for all the lucky people who have seen it already - where did you sit? How was the view etc.
I can't really afford two tickets in the main section so was wondering if the sides / back sections would be ok? Anyone else who could help with reviews for seating etc - please post links.
Thanks in advance! :)
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Hope it's not too late but I found this info on yelp. HOpe it helps .



As for the seating area. I sat in row 19 of section 102. It was the last row. Great seats right in the middle. I'd suggest getting seats towards the back of 102 or the First row of sections 202, 203 or 204. The show is all around you. The dancers at times pass behind me and dance along the walkways. I had people dangling right above my head. Their is action going on to the far right and far left of the stage. Even at the beginning of the show, the 4 teenagers that star in the show are mingling with people in the seats. So, if you are thinking of getting seats, go back a little further.

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You can feel Michael during the entire show. It's breathtaking, overwhelming at times and tastefully done. The theater is beautiful and would recommend sitting on section 203 row AA to see everything from a perfect spot - just watch out for the zombies! I've seen Love and thought that was an amazing show, I love Michael so this was such a treat. Previews were great, can't wait to see this show again later this year. Smooth Criminal, Man in the Mirror, Thriller and Beat It were my top favorites. But the whole show was entertaining and something to take in. Love you MJ! Cirque did him justice :)
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

I hope Prince and Blanket are there for something positive about their dad. They need it and I hope they like it if they are there. I think it's nice Spike Lee is there. I hope it gets a good turn out.
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

I have seen Blanket wear Michael's immortal t shirt many times, he seems love the show very much. I hope Michael's children will see this.
 
Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

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Re: Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson ONE" permanent Las Vega show

They look great, Nice to see them enjoying themselves. I hope they love and enjoy the show :)
 
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