Johnny Depp is producing a new musical about the life of Michael Jackson – as told from the point of view of his glove.
The musical will be based on the play For the Love of Glove: An Unauthorised Musical Fable About the Life of Michael Jackson, as Told by His Glove, which has been written by Julien Nitzberg.
The play is described as “a fresh, revisionist look at the strange forces that shaped Jackson and the scandals that bedevilled him.” The musical will debut in LA next January.
Nitzberg reportedly told Page Six that a major television network in the US had asked him to write a film about Jackson but that they later pulled out following allegations of child abuse against Jackson which emerged earlier this year.
Of his Jackson play, Nitzberg said: “A major TV network wanted me to write a [Jackson] movie…but the question came up [about] how to deal with the child-abuse allegations.
“[So] I said, how’s this? Everything MJ has been accused of has actually been caused by his glove, which is actually an alien from outer space [and] feeds on virgin boy blood. They laughed and said, ‘can you do the normal version?’
“It was morally kind of repugnant to me to do,” Nitzberg, who has worked with Depp’s production company previously, added. “I turned down a really big paycheck.” Though he then decided to explore the idea for the stage.”
Recently, it was reported that Bohemian Rhapsody producer Graham King has secured the rights to make a film about Michael Jackson’s life.
That’s according to Deadline, which reports that sources have confirmed that King has been given the green light by the late singer’s estate.
King, who owns the production company GK Films, has reportedly retained three-time Oscar-nominated writer John Logan to write the script. Deadline’s Mike Fleming Jr added that the movie isn’t “intended to be a sanitised rendering of Jackson’s life.”
The biopic is said to span the pop star’s entire life from child star in the Jackson 5 to his death in June 2009. It’s said that the film will also address Jackson’s defence against allegations of child sexual abuse: allegations of which were made in HBO’s 2019 Leaving Neverland documentary and which the Jackson family estate have always strenuously denied.
Additionally, Deadline is told that Logan, nominated in the past for Academy Awards for The Aviator (2004), Hugo (2011) and Gladiator (2000), will shape the script with King before setting it at a studio.
