Vanga said, “It is a very interesting life, you know, Michael Jackson’s life right from his childhood, when he was singing in school, and how he changed his skin color and all that, what he has been through, it’s a great journey, great story. But who will play Michael Jackson? So that’s the question.”

Also Read: Michael trailer ignites nostalgia as Jaafar Jackson steps into Michael Jackson’s shoes. Watch

The dream and the problem

For Sandeep Reddy Vanga, the appeal of Michael Jackson’s story was not hard to explain. As a filmmaker drawn to raw, layered characters, the material would be a natural fit.

But his honest reservation, the casting, is one that has stumped everyone who has thought seriously about this project. Jackson’s physicality, his movement, his voice, his very presence on stage were unlike anyone who came before or after him. “That will be a dream come true. I’m saying that everybody is going to buy the ticket. I mean, like, whoever directs it, I’m going to buy the ticket and watch, because I want to know right. But it becomes tricky,” Vanga said.

What the filmmaker said next was where the interview became genuinely interesting. Because beyond the casting question, he identified the other problem that sits at the centre of any honest attempt to tell Michael Jackson’s story: the sexual abuse allegations that followed the pop icon for the last two decades of his life and have only grown more complicated since his death. “I think that angle becomes tricky and you never know what is the right set and the wrong until something got proved. We really don’t know.”

Michael, directed by Antoine Fuqua and releasing on Friday, is the long-awaited biographical film on the life of Michael Jackson. Jaafar Jackson, the pop star’s nephew, plays the title role, with Colman Domingo and Nia Long cast as his parents Joseph and Katherine Jackson.