Worldwide gross
$978 million (as of July 2, 2026)
Opening weekend
$97 million domestic, biggest music biopic debut ever
Audience score
96% on Rotten Tomatoes (highest-ever for a music biopic)
Critics score
40% on Rotten Tomatoes (38% of 296 reviews positive)
Runtime
2 hours 28 minutes
Director
Antoine Fuqua (Training Day, The Equalizer)
Release date
April 24, 2026 (Lionsgate US, Universal Pictures International)
From Gary, Indiana to the Biggest Stage on Earth
Michael Jackson's story begins in a small house in Gary, Indiana, where Joe Jackson ran the family like a boot camp and a talent factory. The film follows young Michael from those roots to the pinnacle of pop stardom, tracing the arc of the Jackson 5's rise, Michael's emergence as a solo force, and the relentless creative ambition that drove Thriller, Bad, and the Bad World Tour of 1987 to 1989. That is where the film ends: on top of the world, just before everything got complicated. The film is produced in part by the Michael Jackson Estate and written by John Logan (Gladiator, The Aviator, Hugo). Its most deliberate choice is also its most debated one: the decision to end the story before the 1993 child sexual abuse allegations. A clause in Jackson's 1994 settlement with the accuser's family legally barred any depiction of the accuser in any film. When producers realised this, they cut a Neverland Ranch search sequence that had already been filmed, and restructured the ending entire
[icon:STAR] Jaafar Jackson Jaafar Jackson, 29, is the son of Jermaine Jackson and the nephew of the man he plays. He auditioned over two years in a process he describes as "intense but not traditional." He moved into the family's Hayvenhurst estate in California to absorb the world his uncle grew up in. Critics who gave the film a negative review almost unanimously exempted him. One X user wrote: "You won't believe it until you see it. From the moment Jaafar stepped into the scene, I was gone."
[icon:CAMERA] The Cast Colman Domingo plays Joe Jackson with controlled menace. Nia Long is Katherine Jackson, the quiet counterweight to Joe's discipline. Miles Teller plays John Branca, Michael's longtime entertainment lawyer and the architect of his business empire. Larenz Tate is Berry Gordy. Kendrick Sampson plays Quincy Jones across the Off the Wall and Thriller sessions. KeiLyn Durrel Jones plays Bill Bray, Michael's loyal head of security and companion for decades.
"I did not approach this as playing my uncle. I approached it as telling the truth about a person I loved. The music does something to your body. Once you let it in, the rest follows.
"Jaafar Jackson
Critics at 40%, audiences at 96%: who got it right?
Michael is either a sanitised greatest-hits package that protects the Jackson Estate's interests, or the most emotionally overwhelming music biopic audiences have ever seen. The numbers suggest both can be true at the same time. Where do you land?
The film is now the highest-grossing music biopic in cinema history, surpassing Bohemian Rhapsody (2018, $911 million) and Rocketman (2019, $195 million). It is the highest-grossing Lionsgate release of all time, ahead of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire ($865 million). Globally it has performed strongest in Latin America, Japan, Brazil, and Eastern Europe. It recently became the first 2026 release to cross $20 million in Russia. The film is tracking toward a final worldwide total above $1.1 bill