500 Million Watched at Once — Michael Jackson

THE FACT

The world premiere of Black or White was broadcast simultaneously in 27 countries — on Fox in the US, BBC in the UK, MTV worldwide, and state channels across Europe, Asia and South America. An estimated 500 million people watched the eleven-minute short film at the exact same moment. It remains the largest simultaneous music-video audience in history.

WHAT MOST DON'T KNOW

Director John Landis (returning from the Thriller shoot eight years earlier) made the film in three months on a $4 million budget. The morphing face sequence at the end — twelve faces of different ethnicities flowing into one another — was one of the first major uses of morphing software outside of Industrial Light & Magic film work; the technology had only been invented for Willow (1988). Bart Simpson cameos in the opening as Michael's neighbour, the only time the character has ever crossed over with a real recording artist. The premiere was an extraordinary commercial event for Sony: the broadcast was followed immediately by a Visa-branded commercial that ran in all 27 countries in localised languages. Nielsen estimated the US audience alone at 64 million homes — at the time the largest non-sport TV event of the year. The morph technology used in the closing minute became the template for nearly every transformation effect in 1990s cinema.

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THE MOMENT

Michael Jackson — Black Or White (Short Film, 1991) — John Landis' second MJ video. Bart Simpson cameos in the first 30 seconds.

SOURCES

Black or White — Wikipedia ↗