Really does prove to me as a fan that by then, he was pretty much done with touring and performing. Normally an MJ show is around 90 minutes to 2 hours long, but after 1997, it really showed that he was really only willing to do short shows around 30 minutes. MJ & Friends was a medley of his hits plus 3 other songs, 30th Anniversary was a big 2 and 1/2 hour concert with Michael himself only being onstage for an hour (30 minutes doing Jacksons with his bros and 30 minutes of him doing his 4 biggest hits+YRMW) with his other hits being performed by other artists, and his final concert at the Apollo was just three songs and that's it....
It's because of this that I personally think that this notion that some MJ fans have of "Oh, if it wasn't for that Conrad Murray, This Is It would have happened without a hitch and it would be his best tour." is kinda too optimistic, especially when you heard about his health struggles and how skinny he was getting during rehearsals in 2009....I really don't think he would have been able to complete all 50 shows.
I agree. I did see TII, multiple times, and although I had many reservations about it I also did fall in love with it. The show looked great. But, no, I'm not convinced that Michael could have completed the 50 show run. I had doubts even when they announced the 10 shows, I really did. I have always loved Michael first and foremost as a dancer, right from J5 days. But I understand that dancers have a short career. Of all the performing artists I think theirs is the shortest.
Michael was already nearly 51 when those shows would have started and he hadn't performed in a while. He wasn't Madonna, working out every single day. And we know the pressure of performing was problematic for him. I mean, the sheer slog of being on tour would be slightly less for TII cos he would have been in one location but that still leaves the actual hard slog of the shows. Michael was very strong, physically and mentally. But he was also, I don't wanna say fragile but he did have health problems, he did react badly to the pressure of touring and performing, it didn't do his physical health any favours. We know he loved being onstage and we know he was totally in command of that stage when he was up there. But I don't know if that means he SHOULD have been up there, at that point.
I think his performances and his dancing in TII are all fine but, of course, we know the story there with the editing and so on. I bonded very strongly with the film so I will always love it (although haven't seen it for 10 years) but I do have a very different understanding of it now after learning a totally different picture because of the AEG trial.
If Michael was still alive I wouldn't care if he never did any more work, never made another public appearance. If he was alive, safe and happy and stayed away from all of it I'd be so happy. If he was alive and just wanted to focus on being a recording artist, that would be fine. He seemed to love writing songs so that would be cool. If he still wanted to perform I'd like to think he would have considered doing smaller, shorter shows, maybe some type of 'unplugged' thing. Just Michael and the piano? Michael, piano and a very small chamber orchestra? Something where he could do the songs he didn't normally do, some of the slower stuff where it would be less exhausting for him physically and vocally. But, like I said, if he didn't want to do any of it anymore, who could complain about that? The man was working since he was a young child. He definitely had earned the right to step away from it all.
I never saw Michael live cos stadium shows are not for me but the first time I saw TII I did think, 'that's a lot for one person to carry'. As he said himself, he was just one person. He was only human. Michael knew how to carry a show like that, he'd done it so many times before. But he was nearly 51, he'd been through so much, the 2000's were, in many ways, harder for him than the 1990's. I'm just not convinced.
I have mixed feelings about all of this. I'm so glad I saw TII and even more glad that I saw it before I knew the background story. I'm glad that there is a record of Michael's behind-the-scenes brilliance because the rehearsal footage that exists from, say, the 1990's is often poor quality and is usually just short fragments. I'm glad that people can see what an epic show he had planned, how much creative input he had, how much in control he was of the whole thing. I do believe he wanted to do the shows so his kids could see what it was all about. And that would have been brilliant. But we know there were other reasons for the shows not to mention the hideous pressure being placed upon him by AEG (as far as I can tell, I don't know the full story, I don't really want to, I don't think I could cope with the full, unvarnished story).
Maybe with a kinder timetable for the shows, maybe if people had taken care of him as they should have, maybe if people actually listened, maybe there might have been a way for (some of) the shows to happen.
Or maybe not.
Because he was only human. And he was just one person.
Between Oct.2008 - May 2009 he was seen more often than in previous years combined, wasn't he?