Moonwalking before Michael Jackson?
Who inspired the King of Pop to make it his signature step?
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Michael Jackson made the moonwalk world-famous during his performance in the 1983 TV special, Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever. But who inspired the King of Pop to make it his signature step? Here’s a glove full of earlier moonwalkers who could have influenced him in one way or another:-
Jeffrey Daniel, a dancer/choreographer who worked with him on the &-;Bad” and &-;Smooth Criminal” videos, claimed in a recent NPR interview that he taught Jackson the move. Daniel moonwalked in on BBC television’s Top of the Pops in 1982 and says he got it from the Electric Boogaloos.-
Tap dancer Bill Bailey, brother of singer Pearl Bailey, was the first to moonwalk on film, which he called &-;backslide,” in the 1943 classic Cabin in the Sky. Bailey can also be seen doing it at the end of a tap routine in 1955.-
French mimes had a similar traditional move for &-;walking in place.” Marcel Marceau’s teacher, Jean-Louis Barrault did it with moving scenery in the 1945 French film Children of Paradise (&-;Les Enfants du paradis”).