Mia Michaels will return to TV

When Mia Michaels announced that she wouldn’t be returning to this season’s So You Think You Can Dance, America let out a collective gasp of dismay, because how are we going to know what Tim Burton dreams about if Mia Michaels stops choreographing? Last week, though, Mia spoke to The Wall Street Journal and promised that her routines would continue to enchant/haunt us; the Emmy Award winning choreographer has three TV shows in the works.

Mia told the WSJ:

I can’t go into details about it, but there are three separate shows we’re working on, and all three of them are very different. One is a choreography show, one is a doc-reality show of a stage show that will be touring the states and the third one was inspired by a Web site called “Mia Michaels , Please Choreograph My Life” … They’re all mine, I’m creating them, I’m in them, I’m running them.

The WSJ also asked the question that has driven the Twitterati crazy since Mia’s announcement back in October: Why, exactly, did she decide to leave the show in the sixth season? After all, SYTYCD made her a household name.

She said:

It had been five years — and I was there from day one. Basically, I felt like it was time for me to go because I wasn’t growing anymore, in any capacity. I wasn’t able to expand into a director, creator, producer. I had all these other opportunities in front of me.

If you read the white between the black, Mia’s answer seems to confirm suspicions that her departure had something to do with Adam Shankman‘s promotion to permanent judge. Those rumors have been swirling since Mia’s cryptic Tweet back in October, and they picked up speed when she cut a SYTYCD contestant loose during this year’s Vegas round by telling him she was sorry things weren’t going his way, but things hadn’t been going her way lately either.

Then, of course, there was the shaved head that lead people speculate that she either had cancer, or had gone completely mad. (Because what spells crazy like bizarre Tweeting and a sudden shaved head?)

She cleared that up too, saying:

At first, I laughed about it, but then after getting all these crazy emails saying “I’m sending you health and light and love,” I said, OK, I need to stop these rumors quickly because it was not great energy to have out there.

I’m healthy, I’m fine, I’m bald, but it’s my choice. There were a lot of things that I was dealing with at the time, like restructuring my whole business, and I was making lots of very big, bold decisions. For me, it was a necessity to start over and shave my head and let go of a lot of stuff and starting new.

Whenever I “restructure” my life, I usually start by catching up on laundry, but, you know, whatever works.

This season of SYTYCD hasn’t suffered in ratings or quality without Mia Michaels, but the energy is a little different — at least in my living room. Back in the Reign of Mia, we never knew when we might be moved to tears by a zombie wedding or quaking in terror over space mermaid invasion of an elementary school lunchroom. Besides, the contestants don’t cry nearly enough, and what good is reality TV without tears?

I’m excited to see what kind of dance shows Mia Michaels turns out. Do you look forward to her return to TV? More importantly, would you let her choreograph your life?