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Stage: The Dancing Feet Of Michael Jackson
By ANNA KISSELGOFF
Published: March 6, 1988
THERE is no way to separate Michael Jackson the singer from Michael Jackson the dancer, as his new show proves again.
Mr. Jackson dances his way through every song, whether he is proclaiming how ''bad'' he is or urging all to look in the mirror and mend their ways. Viewed specifically as a dancer, he is tops, and his mixed messages are superbly served by a single dance style that goes in any emotional direction he desires.
Scrub away the the veneer of street dances in the performance he gave Thursday night at Madison Square Garden, look past the occasional suggestive gesture and rotating pelvis, marvel at the backward gliding moonwalk and the isolated body parts - seemingly set into motion on their own - and you see a virtuoso dancer who uses movement for its own sake.
Yes, Michael Jackson is an avant-garde dancer, and his dances could be called abstract. Like Merce Cunningham, he shows us that movement has a value of its own and that what we read into it is provided by the theatrical context around it.
Unlike the pop stars of the past, Mr. Jackson does not rely on prosaic body language. He speaks to his public mostly with nonspecific dances. To express approval, the audience responds with ''Woof woof.''
Notice how many times Mr. Jackson takes your breath away with his rapid-fire flat-footed turns, his staccato gestures, his burst of movement from any part of the body and you will see that the steps and sequences are often repeated. But their rhythms and phrasing are changed along with the studded jackets; the words shower the same dances with a torrent of varying emotion while laser beams light up the imagined sky.
A professional dance watcher could not help but relate the integration of technology into Mr. Jackson's current ''Bad'' album tour to similar mixed-media experiments that blanketed the dance avant-garde in the 1960's. Here, as there, the show was an exercise in perception. Here as there you could see the singers and musicians live and also on giant video screens as a cameraman prowled along onstage after the performers.
As a dancer, Mr.Jackson is an aerial. Not for him the ritualistic love of the earth that attracted pioneer modern dancers. The moonwalk that he made famous is an apt metaphor for his dance style. How does he do it? As a technician, he is a great illusionist, a genuine mime. His ability to keep one leg straight as he glides while the other bends and seems to walk requires perfect timing.
Precision is the name of the game in the several ensemble numbers he dances with a mean-looking group of four men, beginning with the opening ''Starting Something.'' Their hairstyles range from Minimalist (re-routed punk) to Maximalist (tousled mane), but there is nothing but total unison in their well-rehearsed ending-on-a-dime finales.
When a fan suddenly materialized onstage and pranced toward Mr. Jackson, the star's response seemed so choreographed that it looked like part of the show.
Can anyone, then, dance like Michael Jackson? Only if you can rise up on your toes without toe shoes, stay there, and keep up what is basically a nonstop two-hour solo. |
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