NEW YORK (AP) — A musical about the King of Pop is moonwalking its way to Broadway.
The Michael Jackson Estate and Columbia Live Stage on Tuesday unveiled plans for a stage musical inspired by the life of Michael Jackson. They hope it will be ready for Broadway by 2020.
The story for the still-untitled musical will be written by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage, using Jackson’s vast catalog of songs. Tony Award winner Christopher Wheeldon will direct and choreograph. It was too early to reveal any casting.
The move is the latest stage project to portray pop stars onstage with their best works, a list that includes Donna Summer, Cher, Gloria Estefan, the Go-Gos and Huey Lewis and the News.
As a solo artist and with his brothers, 13-time Grammy winner Jackson sold millions of records and in 1983 became an international icon with the release of “Thriller,” the best-selling album of all time with such hits as “Beat It” and “Billie Jean.” He died in 2009.
Nottage is the writer of “Sweat,” ”Intimate Apparel,” ”By The Way, Meet Vera Stark” and “Ruined.” Wheeldon, a resident choreographer of the New York City Ballet, was the director-choreographer of “An American in Paris” on Broadway.
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Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits