Source: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/i...

The dancing itself required no negotiation. Michael would handle everything about that himself. "Nobody else worked with him on it," Ikeda says. "He told the director, he told everybody, how he wanted that stage, what type of lighting he wanted. He told them where to put the spotlight. 'When I put my finger like this ...' He directed them."

Michael often claimed he invented the routine to "Billie Jean" spontaneously, because he had spent so much time rehearsing with his brothers for the show's Motown medley that he neglected everything else. What he did not say was how long he had been thinking about this performance.