I had noticed the many posters for the Jacko Tribute Concert from bus and tram as I travelled around the city, but had decided that the film This Is It was unlikely to be surpassed by anyone attempting to imitate the inimitable.
The pre-show write-up informed the would-be audience that: The show revives on the stage the legendary Bad Tour….It features Jackson’s four dancers…his two vocalists and four musicians. The similarity between them is breathtaking,” (Expatloop website). In stark contrast, the post-show review (the Hungarian Index website) spoke of a ‘lynch mob atmosphere’ with descriptions of a performance which could only have been tolerated by indulgent parents and benign friends and relatives at a school performance. Far from the audience asking themselves, “Is it absolutely sure that he is not Michael?” (Expatloop) they were (according to Index) whistling in derision, and shouting to have their ticket costs (13,000-20,000 forints) refunded. In fact, the audience had already turned their backs on the dancer on stage (not the one advertised to take MJ’s role) and were watching the far superior moves of an American member of the audience, who had spontaneously decided to give his own unscheduled performance – and who incidentally also looked much more similar to Michael Jackson. Then came an unscheduled interval of fifteen minutes – just enough for security guards to remove the self-styled star of an alternative show that was magnetising the outraged audience.
All in all, this was an amateurish, embarrassing travesty, which once again leaves one wondering why. If – as the organisers claim – the cast was unable to obtain the necessary visas in time for the performance, why not reschedule? Did they really imagine their audience would be fooled by this poor imitation? The days when any ‘western’ performer, no matter how feeble, was welcomed unreservedly for having ventured to this forgotten part of the world, have long (long) gone! As the seething audience left the scene, lawyers were observed handing out their business cards and offering to help them sue the promoters for misrepresentation….
Though I was not present at this concert, it reminded me of a similar experience a few years ago – though one which had a more fortuitous outcome.
In the summer of 2004, I agreed (albeit reluctantly) to accompany a friend who was keen to attend the Liza Minnelli Concert, scheduled to take place in the Kisstadion. On the appointed summer’s evening we set off on the bus, arriving at the small road which leads to the open-air stadium. We were running a bit late and hoped that security checks at the gates would not mean we missed the beginning of the concert – the posters had not made it clear if there was a suppporting band. However, as we started our walk we were astounded to see only one or two other people heading in the same direction. We were equally puzzled that it was practically silent.
At the gates the security personnel took no more than a cursory look at our tickets and waved us in – to a practically empty stadium! We checked our tickets to see if we had misread the time and were in fact early, but no. After some fifteen minutes somewhere towards the top of the enclosure, and seeing few if any people arrive to fill the seats below, we moved to the sector nearest the stage. There we waited….and waited….and waited: well over an hour, during which time the only communication was the puzzled looks of one member of the audience to the next – all fifty or sixty of us - in a stadium whose capacity is fourteen thousand! Finally there came the band’s intro to the glare of lights, and then quite unannounced, on to the stage came…..Bonnie Tyler! A true professional, she could have been singing to a packed stadium – there was not the slightest hint that this was not a scheduled concert to a full house.
Needless to say, on leaving the stadium there were mutterings all around of threatened legal action, especially in view of the fact that there were no posters indicating that Liza Minnelli was not performing. That news had been announced on the radio only, and not all had heard it. Neither had the security guards thought to mention the fact…
But not all were disappointed: during Bonnie Tyler’s show, I observed a steady trickle of unlikely-looking pop fans entering the stadium and taking their seats alongside us all. The security guards had either decided to entice anyone and everyone in the vicinity to swell the pitiful audience, or they had abandoned their posts, leaving the gates open to all-comers. Among them, an elderly couple, the man in slippers, shuffled in; two homeless men I had seen outside on the street; and finally, a Romanian man I had recently come across near Keleti station trying to sell binoculars to passers-by from a large sports bag he was carrying. He made himself comfortable, and then, unzipping his bulging bag, took out one of the many pairs of binoculars and settled back to enjoy his unexpected free evening’s concert.
The pre-show write-up informed the would-be audience that: The show revives on the stage the legendary Bad Tour….It features Jackson’s four dancers…his two vocalists and four musicians. The similarity between them is breathtaking,” (Expatloop website). In stark contrast, the post-show review (the Hungarian Index website) spoke of a ‘lynch mob atmosphere’ with descriptions of a performance which could only have been tolerated by indulgent parents and benign friends and relatives at a school performance. Far from the audience asking themselves, “Is it absolutely sure that he is not Michael?” (Expatloop) they were (according to Index) whistling in derision, and shouting to have their ticket costs (13,000-20,000 forints) refunded. In fact, the audience had already turned their backs on the dancer on stage (not the one advertised to take MJ’s role) and were watching the far superior moves of an American member of the audience, who had spontaneously decided to give his own unscheduled performance – and who incidentally also looked much more similar to Michael Jackson. Then came an unscheduled interval of fifteen minutes – just enough for security guards to remove the self-styled star of an alternative show that was magnetising the outraged audience.
All in all, this was an amateurish, embarrassing travesty, which once again leaves one wondering why. If – as the organisers claim – the cast was unable to obtain the necessary visas in time for the performance, why not reschedule? Did they really imagine their audience would be fooled by this poor imitation? The days when any ‘western’ performer, no matter how feeble, was welcomed unreservedly for having ventured to this forgotten part of the world, have long (long) gone! As the seething audience left the scene, lawyers were observed handing out their business cards and offering to help them sue the promoters for misrepresentation….
Though I was not present at this concert, it reminded me of a similar experience a few years ago – though one which had a more fortuitous outcome.
In the summer of 2004, I agreed (albeit reluctantly) to accompany a friend who was keen to attend the Liza Minnelli Concert, scheduled to take place in the Kisstadion. On the appointed summer’s evening we set off on the bus, arriving at the small road which leads to the open-air stadium. We were running a bit late and hoped that security checks at the gates would not mean we missed the beginning of the concert – the posters had not made it clear if there was a suppporting band. However, as we started our walk we were astounded to see only one or two other people heading in the same direction. We were equally puzzled that it was practically silent.
At the gates the security personnel took no more than a cursory look at our tickets and waved us in – to a practically empty stadium! We checked our tickets to see if we had misread the time and were in fact early, but no. After some fifteen minutes somewhere towards the top of the enclosure, and seeing few if any people arrive to fill the seats below, we moved to the sector nearest the stage. There we waited….and waited….and waited: well over an hour, during which time the only communication was the puzzled looks of one member of the audience to the next – all fifty or sixty of us - in a stadium whose capacity is fourteen thousand! Finally there came the band’s intro to the glare of lights, and then quite unannounced, on to the stage came…..Bonnie Tyler! A true professional, she could have been singing to a packed stadium – there was not the slightest hint that this was not a scheduled concert to a full house.
Needless to say, on leaving the stadium there were mutterings all around of threatened legal action, especially in view of the fact that there were no posters indicating that Liza Minnelli was not performing. That news had been announced on the radio only, and not all had heard it. Neither had the security guards thought to mention the fact…
But not all were disappointed: during Bonnie Tyler’s show, I observed a steady trickle of unlikely-looking pop fans entering the stadium and taking their seats alongside us all. The security guards had either decided to entice anyone and everyone in the vicinity to swell the pitiful audience, or they had abandoned their posts, leaving the gates open to all-comers. Among them, an elderly couple, the man in slippers, shuffled in; two homeless men I had seen outside on the street; and finally, a Romanian man I had recently come across near Keleti station trying to sell binoculars to passers-by from a large sports bag he was carrying. He made himself comfortable, and then, unzipping his bulging bag, took out one of the many pairs of binoculars and settled back to enjoy his unexpected free evening’s concert.
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