The Simpsons’ Michael Jackson Impersonator Had The Ultimate Ironic Experience Recording With the King of Pop

The one episode of The Simpsons that isn’t available on Disney+ is “Stark Raving Dad,” which guest-starred then music superstar Michael Jackson as some guy who thinks he’s Michael Jackson. 

While the episode was pulled from circulation due to the allegations against Jackson (and the rumors that he used his Simpsons cameo to “groom boys”) there’s no reason that we can’t enjoy the episode’s catchy tune “Happy Birthday, Lisa.” Why? Because it wasn’t actually recorded by Jackson.

While Jackson did his own acting on the show, musician Kipp Lennon provided the singing for the part. The swap was either due to Jackson’s record company preventing him from lending his singing voice to a project made by another company, or because he just didn’t feel like doing it. The reason isn’t totally clear. 

“We were told a bunch of reasons,” Lennon admitted on Nancy Cartwright’s podcast Simpsons Declassified. “I still don’t know what the real reason is.”

Lennon also described one memorably odd behind-the-scenes moment. Prior to the Simpsons gig, Jackson’s reps had hired Lennon multiple times to sub-in for the singer in an anti-drug PSA and in a California Raisins commercial. Yes, apparently Michael Jackson had some help crooning with those anthropomorphic shriveled grapes everyone went wild for in the ‘80s.

When Lennon attended the Simpsons table read, he didn’t know anyone at the show yet. Jackson showed up late, but nobody was actually introduced. “I’m getting these looks at me (from the Simpsons cast)… like, ‘who’s that guy?’” Lennon said on the podcast.

When the script finally called for Lennon to showcase his Jackson impression, everyone applauded afterwards. “It was so trippy,” he revealed, noting that the musician, whom he’d never actually met, “gave me a little smile.”

Weirder still, when it came time to record the episode, the show’s producers asked Lennon’s opinion of what Jackson should sound like while Jackson himself was in the room. “There was one moment where James Brooks said, ‘Okay right here I’m going to need Michael’s character to do like a whoop or – Kipp, what would Michael do?” Lennon told Cartwright.

“Now, he’s standing next to me,” Lennon continued, “and they’re asking me what Michael would do. And nobody laughs. Like the funniest people in the world, and no one’s laughing. Like, ‘Okay, I guess there’s no irony here.’”

So Lennon tried out a Jackson-esque “hee-hee” and everyone cheered. “And then he goes, ‘That’s what I would do. That’s what I would do if I was here,’” the singer revealed. “It was so strange. It was really childlike, almost.”

Hopefully all this will be dramatized in the upcoming and controversial biopic.