Synopsis

Set in a rough Los Angeles neighborhood, the video opens with rival gang members preparing for a violent confrontation. As they move toward an abandoned warehouse, Michael Jackson appears, dressed in a red leather jacket and black pants. Instead of joining the fight, he breaks through the tension with an intricate solo routine. His dancing gradually draws both groups together, transforming the planned knife fight into a synchronized celebration and ending on a message of unity over violence.

Factoids & Trivia

• The video was filmed on Los Angeles' Skid Row, mainly around East 5th Street, in March 1983.

• CBS Records reportedly declined to finance the production, so Jackson paid the approximately $150,000 budget himself.

• To give the street scenes authenticity, the production brought in members of the Crips and Bloods, along with professional dancers and breakdancers. The arrangement was also intended to encourage cooperation between rival groups.

• The warehouse confrontation and synchronized gang choreography deliberately echo the "rumble" scenes from *West Side Story*.

• The large-scale dance sequence helped establish synchronized mass choreography as one of Jackson's defining visual trademarks.

• Several performers in the gang scenes later became familiar screen and dance figures, including Michael DeLorenzo, Stoney Jackson, Tony Fields, and Tracii Guns.

• The bar seen near the beginning had previously appeared on the cover of The Doors' 1970 album *Morrison Hotel*.

• The video received multiple honors, including seven Billboard Video Awards and American Music Awards for Favorite Pop/Rock Video and Favorite Soul Video.