For the Love of a Glove, a wacky, weird, irreverent satire, is writer/director Julien Nitzberg’s alternative-reality tale about the once “King of Pop,” and the way in which an alien named Thrihl-Lha is contained in a sparkly glove and trying to overtake all of humanity.
Nitzberg is joined in this wildly comic adventure by globally renowned puppeteer Robin Walsh, and the talented actors who operate her puppets and star in the show. The puppets are life-sized and lush, and the show uses them well along its completely irreverent, zany, yet pointed path as it examines everything about Michael Jackson including his skin whitening, his sexuality, abuse accusations, and his religion – all in a defiantly ribald, non-p.c. way.
Far from an authorized biography, the production is an inventive cult-hit that features 20 puppets that are motion-filled, queer positive and drag-friendly works of art. The puppets are just one part of a talented live cast including lead Eric B. Anthony.
From suggesting a relationship with Donny Osmond was the key to Jackson’s life to a cautionary tale about an aborted romance with Brooke Shields, the wild and crazy humor is just the means to an end: unveiling and dealing with issues ranging from racism and religious hypocrisy to abuse and cultural appropriation.
The inspiration for the musical began twenty years ago, Nitzberg relates. That was when he was “asked to write a Michael Jackson biopic for a cable channel. The production team was trying to figure out how to deal with all the controversy surrounding him. They had no idea how to deal with the allegations of child abuse and so many other controversial things. I had an idea that we could say his glittery glove was an alien who forced him to do all these bad things, causing trouble to ruin his reputation.”
Needless to say, the production execs didn’t buy this approach. “They laughed really hard and said it was the funniest pitch ever, but could I do a normal version?” Nitzberg recalls. “But there was no way personally that I could write a convincing story about Jackson without dealing with these areas of his life and the only way I could make sense of them was through this idea. So, cut to years later, and this idea came back to me as honestly the funniest ever, and I created the musical.”
Making a funny, highly political and satiric musical came naturally for Nitzberg, having written and directed a similarly themed piece, The Beastly Bombing, that played successfully in Los Angeles for over a year.
In For the Love of a Glove, the writer/director explains that there were some subjects that he absolutely wanted to deal with in the production. “One was cultural appropriation, another was racism, and another was being raised in a fundamental Christian Religion. While this is all pretty heavy stuff, you can deal with issues in a lighthearted way without people feeling like they are being lectured. They can learn and feel like they are having fun.”
Dealing with a story about aliens who look like gloves “naturally led to puppets,” Nitzberg says. “Not to mention in the first act, we needed to cover the Jackson Five years, and we certainly were not going to cast five kids in a show that’s honestly pretty filthy. So, it made sense to use puppets to represent the kids.”
He adds “Teaming up with the amazing Robin Walsh was phenomenal. She is a genius, internationally known puppet designer.” Working together, it took close to five months working on different puppet prototypes to find what worked best for the production.
According to Nitzberg, “Something most people don’t know is that working with pupets can be dangerous. In Broadway shows like The Lion King, people get injured because the ppets are so large and heavy. We wanted to design puppets that are comfortable to wear and lighter, which is tough with life-size puppets.”
Describing the rewards of and challenges inherent in the production, Nitzberg says “One of the most rewarding things about working on this project is our cast. They are so funny and so great, and bring so much richness to the show every night. We are always having audience members tell us that their stomachs hurt from laughing so much. The cast gets standing ovations every time.”
While he calls the entire production experience “super fun,” there have been challenges. “When you add puppets, everything is a challenge. Most of our actors didn’t have previous experience working with puppets, so Robin did a two week puppet camp to explain and practice how to work the puppets and the psychology of puppets, the background of this art form, how they fit into theater history and all of that. Having written and directed a musical before, I knew it took a long time to rehearse and plan, but puppets very much expand that.”
The show features eleven actors and twenty puppets, with each puppet exhibition its own character and persona. “They take on a life of their own and start to freak you out,” Nitzberg laughs.
Describing the show itself, he notes that “A lot of people assume its going to be like an SNL sketch, making fun of Jackson, but it’s actually about how a great artist goes astray. One of the biggest parts of it is exploring how being raised as a Jehovah’s Witness with their super restrictive sexuality affected him adversely. We try to understand and explain how becoming the most famous crotch-grabber in the history of the world comes out of that background. For us, the answer is that the glove made him.”
The show opened ran briefly in 2020, was shuttered by the pandemic, relaunched this February, and has had its run extended four times, including for the next two weeks.
For the Love of a Glove runs Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m. June 23/24, and June 30/July 1st at the Carl Sagan-Ann Druyan Theater at the Center For Inquiry West (CFI), at 2535 W. Temple Street, Los Angeles, 90026. A Pride Month Price Drop special offers general admission seating in these final weeks for $30, and front row bean bag seats for $80.
Go see this almost indescribable, insanely incandescent show before it dances off into the future. It’s a real “Thriller.”
- Genie Davis, photos provided by the produciton