By now, you’d think a Michael Jackson biopic would be an easy sell. But somehow, Michael, the long-in-the-works film about the King of Pop, has turned into one of Hollywood’s biggest headaches.
Director Antoine Fuqua and screenwriter John Logan reportedly had to scrap nearly half the movie after a messy rights dispute involving one of Jackson’s former accusers. The result is that only the first half of the film, covering Jackson’s rise to superstardom in the 1980s, is expected to make it to cinemas next April. Everything that came after, including the infamous Neverland years, is gone.
Puck’s Matt Belloni revealed that reshoots wrapped quietly last month, and the final cut now ends just as Jackson hits his global peak. Two full weeks of footage shot at Neverland Ranch has been deleted.
Producer Graham King, who also brought Bohemian Rhapsody to life, isn’t done (per World of Reel). He’s reportedly planning a second film focusing on Jackson’s “King of Pop” era, if the first one performs well enough. No pressure, Jaafar Jackson. The studio’s logic is that if audiences show up, we get part two. If not, all that extra footage becomes another expensive Hollywood ghost story.
The original cut of Michael was nearly four hours long. Lionsgate even considered splitting it into two parts, which was a move clearly inspired by the Wicked release strategy. Those plans vanished after the legal debacle. Now we’re looking at a single, shorter film that only tells half the story.
Paris Jackson, Michael’s 27-year-old daughter, has already made her feelings known. “I had zero per cent involvement,” she said on Instagram (via The Guardian) after actor Colman Domingo (who plays Joe Jackson) claimed otherwise. “Don’t be telling people I was ‘helpful’ on the set of a movie I had zero per cent involvement in lol that is so weird.”
Paris said she read an early draft and called out parts that “didn’t sit right” with her, only to be ignored. “Not my monkeys, not my circus,” she added. “A big section of the film panders to a very specific section of my dad’s fandom that still lives in the fantasy.”
It’s not the first time a Jackson-related project has been accused of sugar-coating history. MJ: The Musical faced similar criticism for sidestepping allegations and focusing on the hits. With Michael being produced alongside the Jackson estate, that criticism seems unlikely to fade.
Still, Lionsgate and Universal are betting big. The trailer drops in November, attached to Wicked: For Good. Whether it finds an audience could decide the fate of the missing footage and the second film.
So yes, the Michael Jackson movie is done. But it’s only half the movie Fuqua set out to make. The other half is locked away, waiting for permission from the only people who can save it — you, the ticket buyers.
RELATED: Michael Jackson Had A Batman Statue Of Himself In The Suit
