Let’s take it back a minute. Back to 1984. The playwright Aurin Squire suggests if you want to know something about what was going on in America — in Miami — there’s one person you could look to.
Michael Jackson. The King of Pop. He had recently dropped the most theatrical music video in the short history of music videos: “Thriller.”
Squire takes us back to that America. To his place in it, as a kid growing up near Opa-Locka. It’s the spine of his new play, Defacing Michael Jackson. It’s being staged by Miami New Drama at the Colony Theater in Miami Beach through Sunday, April 2.
Squire paints a picture of one street in a Black South Florida neighborhood. Four kids, who all love MJ. A new boy moves onto the block. A white kid. The first white kid most of them had ever met in person.
The block starts to change. Their friendship starts to change. Michael starts to change. And just like America, Miami was changing.
Squire has written for the stage and for TV. You might have seen his work on the CBS show Evil or This is Us on NBC. His recent play Defacing Michael Jackson is a story about hero worship, identity and Miami.
On the March 27 episode of Sundial, Squire tells us how getting roasted on the jitney as a kid made him a writer. And how public roasts and defenses of Michael Jackson's image are connected to his own understanding of community and belonging.
On Sundial’s previous episode, WLRN’s Wilkine Brutus talked to Bea Hines about the power of cultivating your dreams. Hines was the first Black female reporter hired by the Miami Herald in 1970.
Listen to Sundial Monday through Thursday on WLRN, 91.3 FM, live at 1 p.m., rebroadcast at 8 p.m. Missed a show? Find every episode of Sundial on your favorite podcast app, such as Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and Spotify.
Stay in touch with us by emailing us at sundial@wlrnnews.org.
