Along with being one of the late-20th century’s most talented singer/songwriters, Michael Jackson was equally well loved as a dancer. Some of his signature moves and much of his fluidity, however, are deeply indebted to one of the greatest dancers of the middle 20th-century, Fred Astaire. After his death in 2009 at the age of 50, a number of profiles tried to identify the heart of his mystique, and many returned to Michael Jackson, the dancer. The following retrospective from the New Yorker considers whether MJ was an innovator, an attentive student, or a product of music video that he made an art form.
- Joan Acocella, “Walking on the Moon,” New Yorker (July 2009)
In his review of Jackson’s dance style, Acocella describes how Jackson revered Astaire but failed to emulate him in cinematic music videos for “Thriller,” “Billie Jean,” and “Black or White”:
But despite Jackson’s awe of his predecessor, he never learned the two rules that Astaire, as soon as he gained power over the filming, insisted on: (1) don’t interrupt the dance with reaction shots or any other extraneous shots, and (2) favor a full-body shot over a closeup. To Astaire, the dance was primary—his main story—and he had it filmed accordingly. In Jackson’s videos, the dance is tertiary, even quaternary (after the song and the story and the filming). The camera repeatedly cuts away, and, when it comes back, it often limits itself to the upper body. Jackson didn’t value his dancing enough.
In the following two clips, consider what these two masters had in common and how they presented their dance differently. The Astaire video is a “mashup” combining Jackson’s 1987 hit “Smooth Criminal” with clips of Astaire in a 1955 film entitled Daddy Long Legs.
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QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION
- Comparing the two videos, does Jackson indeed borrow his style from Astaire?
- How does recognizing (or not recognizing) this influence change your ideas about why Jackson strove to physically change his image from “a young black boy to old white woman”?
- Most every art form borrows from past masters. How does our constant reliance on the past influence our worldview? Is this a good thing or a bad thing?
- How does a constant striving for “innovation” give purpose or create distraction for our lives?
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