*NSYNC upped the ante with their “Bye Bye Bye” music video.
After seeing the video for 98 Degrees’ 1998 classic “Because of You,” part of which the band filmed on top of the Golden State Bridge, the band knew they needed the same director, Wayne Isham, to help them hit the mark with their 2000 music video.
“When we saw what 98 Degrees did, it challenged us. So when we did ‘Bye Bye Bye,’ we were like, ‘We have to get Wayne involved,'” Chris Kirkpatrick shares in The CW’s new documentary, The ’90s Boy Band Boom.
“We knew Wayne Isham had such an edge about him that he wouldn’t make it about us singing in tank tops and flowing shirts or whatever. He would take that new dirty pop that we were doing, that new edgy stuff and make it even more edgy.”
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Isham recalls being amazed that the five — Kirkpatrick, JC Chasez, Joey Fatone, Justin Timberlake and Lance Bass — were willing to do their own stunts, particularly Kirkpatrick and Fatone, who had to run on top of a train car.
“No stunt men. Doing their own stunts, jumping from car to car,” Isham, 66, recalls.
“It was so crazy. There’s a part where we actually climb down the side and go into the train and I’m like, ‘Cool, it’s going to be easy, let’s just do it.’ And they’re like ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a second, you have to be harnessed up,’ ” Kirkpatrick, 53, says.
Of the video, Isham jokes, “There are fans of mine from the metal years that are going, ‘Hey Wayne, f— you, what are you doing an *NSYNC video for?’ But the guys from Metallica all said it was a good video.”
Choreography was another area where the band knew it was important to stay competitive. For that, they enlisted Darrin Henson to come up with the perfect moves to accompany their new hit.
“Darren showed us this style of dancing that had anger and emotion and … that made it that much harder,” Kirkpatrick says.
Henson, 52, remembers hearing the “funky” song and knowing what it needed.
“I listened to the song. The song is just funky. It’s driving. The dance from beginning to end had to be driving and hitting,” he said.
“Everything had to be war because they were at war for their name, their title, their money. So I had to be at war when I created the dance steps.”
The signature sequence was inspired by Henson’s roots in New York City, both for his spin on the “Black power fist” and incorporation of street gestures to bring together the routine.
“I remember when I taught it to the guys and you go through a series of hours and days. And by the time they had to perform it, it must’ve been 15,000 people in the arena, they went crazy,” Henson recalls.
“And I knew, but I had no idea how big it would become.”
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