From Cirque du Soleil, a Michael Jackson-Themed Touring Show
By BEN SISARIO
1:05 p.m. | Updated
Cirque du Soleil and the estate of Michael Jackson announced plans on Wednesday for the first of two planned Jackson-themed shows, “The Immortal World Tour,” to open in Montreal next fall. Described in a statement as taking place “in a fantastical realm where we discover Michael’s inspirational Giving Tree — the wellspring of his creativity,” the show is to combine Jackson’s music and choreography with the signature acrobatics of Cirque du Soleil.
The director of the show is Jamie King, 38, a choreographer and stage director whose résumé includes recent tours by Britney Spears, Madonna, Avril Lavigne and Celine Dion, and who was a dancer in Jackson’s 1992 tour for his album “Dangerous.”
A tour of 27 cities will begin at the Bell Center in Montreal on Oct. 2, 2011, and run at the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas from Dec. 3 to 11, before continuing on the road through June 2012. The show is to play at Madison Square Garden on April 3, 2012, and organizers say that more tour dates will be added. Tickets for all shows go on sale Saturday through cirquedusoleil.com and michaeljackson.com.
Mr. King spoke with Ben Sisario on Wednesday. These are excerpts from their conversation.
Q.The show is described as taking place in the realm of Michael Jackson’s “Giving Tree.” What does that mean?
A.Early on I was invited to go to Neverland, and in my research I talked to people who worked there while Michael was living there.
I decided, along with the estate and the family and Cirque, to make Neverland my environment for the show. Within Neverland Michael had all of these gigantic oak trees, and one in particular he called the Giving Tree. But it’s really just a metaphor for being inside Michael’s world, inside his mind.
Q.And what sorts of things do we discover inside his mind?
A.Everything Michael: Michael’s love of fairy tale, his love of magic and theatricality, his love of music, his love of animals, his love of showmanship. This is the place where he wrote many albums, many songs; he wrote poetry there. This was his peace, his serenity. The show is that world blown up bigger than life.
Q.You’re known for Britney Spears’s Circus tour, and other big concert tours with Madonna and Christina Aguilera. Can people expect this to be anything like a Britney Spears concert?
A.The only similarity is that we’re doing a rock ’n’ roll show. It’s a hybrid. It’s Cirque du Soleil meets Michael Jackson, the biggest pop-rock show of all time. So you get the theatricality and the spectacle and the esoteric environments that Cirque provides, along with this wonderful rock ’n’ roll world that Michael is really known for. He put on best rock ’n’ roll shows of all time.
Q.When you were approached by Cirque and the estate, what did they tell you they wanted for the show?
A.We collectively wanted same thing. From the beginning our intention was to make sure that the essence, the spirit, of Michael Jackson lived on in this show. What that means specifically is that his music is the soundtrack, and that his performance and choreography lives in the show. So everything you can think of that is Michael Jackson will be given to you in this show, with some surprises, of course.
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/...show/?ref=music
