ROMAN BANKS HAS memories of attempting to learn the choreography for Michael Jackson’s iconic dancefloor anthem, ‘Thriller’, as a teenager in his loungeroom back in Stone Mountain, Georgia.
“I think it was a solid a month where I would go in our living room and put it on and really try to get the choreography down,” says Banks, who’s basking, like a seal on a rock, at Sydney’s Gordon’s Bay, as he chats to MH late on a Friday afternoon ahead of his 6.30 call-time for tonight’s show. “But I feel like every kid goes through their little MJ phase and they’re like, Yeah, I want to try to do that. I still find that video so captivating, even though I think my favourite video of his is ‘Smooth Criminal’.”
Ten or so years later and Banks has that choreography down pat in his tour de force performance as the King of Pop in ‘MJ: The Musical’, currently playing at Sydney’s Lyric Theatre. The Thriller number is but one of a banger-studded line-up of MJ classics in a crackajack three-hour show that takes a behind-the-scenes look at Jackson’s 1992 Dangerous World Tour.
As you’d expect, embodying one of the greatest performers of all time was a daunting undertaking for the 26-year-old, who also played the titular role 289 times in 28 cities, as part of the Tony-Award-winning US show in 2023-24. “I didn’t think I could do it,” says Banks. “I was just like, Oh, I’m too short. My body’s not the same. I don’t know if I can dance like that, hold those shapes. Who am I to think I can pull this off?”
The key to overcoming those doubts, he says, was “getting out of his own way” and embracing the challenge. “Once I started trusting in the collaborators, who are wonderful teachers and the creative team of the musical, that’s when I was able to just really find my footing,” says Banks. “And then I kind of just got obsessed with the work. It was about, Okay, how good can I get? I want to be the best. I want to take people on a transformative experience, and I want to do everything in my power to preserve and protect the grand legacy that MJ left behind.”
Jackson, who popularised the moonwalk, is generally regarded as one of the greatest dancers to ever do it. For Banks, whose previous credits included Dear Evan Hansen on Broadway and High School Musical: The Musical: The Series on Disney+ and had hitherto focused on singing and acting rather than dancing, learning the choreography in ‘MJ’ was akin to scaling Everest. To put it plainly, Banks didn’t know if his body was suited to the challenge.
“If you look at my body and you look at MJ’s body, he has such long legs and much smaller torso and these extremely long ligaments,” Banks says. “He had famously long fingers, and so he could accentuate these shapes in such a satisfying fashion. And his body lent itself towards those styles of movement and physicality. And I have much, much shorter legs. My legs are nowhere near as skinny. I don’t think I’ve ever had a frame resembling Michael’s. And so just the effort it takes to put those moves on display is a bit different.”
As it turned out, Banks used MJ as a source of inspiration when the calluses on his feet were hurting or his ankles felt like they might give out. “Michael was perfectionist,” he says. “They tell me stories about him working on four-counts of music for two hours and he would have a whole routine left to learn and he’d be like, ‘No, I really want to focus on this’. And so that really just showed me how much focus and dedication it took for him to just be him. So, it inspired me to be like, What’s my excuse if this is my job and if this is the person I’m portraying?”
But while the technical side of the show was certainly a challenge, its physical nature is just as punishing. Banks, who performs up to eight times a week, wears toe, heel and knee pads and burns up to 1200 calories during a show. That kind of output means he needs to be in supreme physical shape and calibrate his nutritional intake in order to peak for his evening shows each day.
Banks typically works out for an hour each morning (see below), then has a large meal around midday, taking his cue from Jackson himself. “One thing I learned while working on the role is that he [Michael] wouldn’t really eat for about five to seven hours before performing just because of the insane amount of cardio that he undertook every day,” says Banks. “And so I find that meal is really helpful. I then just stay hydrated throughout the day and that way, come nighttime, there’s something in my system, and I can kind of burn that fuel throughout the show.”
Banks’ workout is a classic push-pull calisthenics routine that’s light on cardio . . . for a reason. “The show is the best cardio in the world, so I steer pretty clear of cardio just to save my stamina,” he laughs.
Banks had started his gym journey around two years before he started playing MJ and had to adjust his routine in accordance with the demands of the role. “I love working out,” he says. “It was always just about how do I incorporate that in a way that still allows me to do what I need to do every single night? And for a while, I stopped going to the gym altogether and then I was like, Oh, no, I can’t do that, just for my mental health.”
Banks knew the time spent dedicated to himself was crucial to being the man he wanted to be. And once more, he found some of MJ’s wisdom, packaged as it is, in a God-tier earworm, to be invaluable. “The gym is the one place where I feel like everything else turns off and I just get to focus on me for an hour. It really grounds me in myself. The only person you can better in a gym is yourself . . . if you’re looking in the mirror. Obviously you can be corny and talk about the ‘man in the mirror’. If you want to make a change with yourself, that’s where it starts.”
No message could be any clearer.
Roman Banks’ workout routine
DAY 1
WARM UP:
- L Sit (3 x failure)
- Planche Lean (3 x failure)
- Tuck Planche Hold (3 x failure)
SET:
- Wide Push-Ups (3×30) [5 kg]<
- Pike Push-ups (3×6)
- Dips (3×20)
- Skull Crushers (3×12)
DAY 2
- Tucked Front Lever (3xFailure)
- Skin The Cats (3xFailure Sets) *underhand*
- Back Lever (3xFailure) *underhand*
- Chin Ups FRM (3×8)
- Hanging Horizontal Rows (3×12)
- Wide Grip Hammer Pull Ups FRM (3×5)
- Tuck Front Lever Rows (3xFailure).
DAY 3: LEGS /CARDIO
WARM UP:
- Bike (5 min)
- Leg Swings
- Dynamic Stretching
SET:
- Step Ups to Single Leg Deadlift (3×6 PL)
- Cossack to Curtsy Squat (3×4 PL)
- Balance Pad Leg Lifts (3×6) (shoes off)
- Single Leg Calf Raise (3xTF)
- Sprinter Lunge (3×10 PL)
- Dual Deadbugs (3xTF)
CARDIO:
- On/Off Sprints (10 minutes)
- Jump Rope (10 minutes)
DAY 4
WARM UP:
- Planche Lean (3xFailure)
- Assisted Tuck Planche Hold (3xFailure)
SET:
- Archer Push Up (3×15 PA)
- Handstand Push Ups (5×6)
- Bent Arm Flys (3×12)
- Close Grip Ring Push Ups (3×12)
DAY 5
- Straight Bar Pull Up (5×6)
- One Arm Ring Rows (3×10 PA)
- BW Bicep Curls (3×10)+++
- Reverse Curls (3×7)
- [Ab Circuit 3x]
- Single-Leg Knee Raise (10 PL)
- Straight Leg Raises (10)
- Oblique Twist (10)
DAY 6
- Squat Jump (3×20)
- Sprinter Lunge (3×12 PL)
- Bulgarian Split Squat (3×12 PL) [2 KG]+++
- Roman Chair (3×10)
- Hollow Rocks (3xFailure PA)
- 2 Point Planks (3xFailure)
- Dragon Flags (3xFailure)
- Straddle Leg Lifts (3xFailure)
MJ: The Musical is now playing at Sydney Lyric Theatre. Tickets are on sale until August 3. Book here
Related:
