It probably comes as no surprise that when Michael Jackson was planning his This Is It shows for London's O2 arena, he wanted them to be grandiose. The pop star used his well-documented artistic vision and work ethic to make sure every detail was right.

The people who worked with Jackson on those shows remember how hard he worked to make sure the shows would go off without a hitch.

"We were up 20 hours a day working on this thing, deciphering notes that Michael wanted that he had just given us," music supervisor Michael Bearden told MTV News. "I mean, just hands-on with everything he did. Just very passionate. Professionalism is what he was all about."

Jackson never stopped coming up with ideas for the show. He'd call his collaborators late into the night with new thoughts. Just because Jackson wasn't at the office didn't mean he wasn't working, according to "Michael Jackson's This Is It" director Kenny Ortega. "One time, he called me up, I think it was, like, 3 o'clock in the morning," Ortega recalled. "He said, 'Victoria Falls.' I was like, 'That's in Africa.' What it came to mean was we had these giant 3-D screens that were incorporated into the production. Michael wanted the world on that stage."

Jackson also wanted to see his iconic video for "Thriller" in 3-D night after night during the show's run. It was those big-picture plans that convinced several of the people involved that Jackson wasn't playing around.

"I was called into a meeting with Kenny Ortega, and all of a sudden, I get a sense of buzz in the air," said Robb Wagner, the shows' film and video producer. "And I see people moving and security coming in to check the room, and I found out the artist was Michael Jackson. Right then, I knew this was for real."

Dancer Mischa Hamilton also recalls how jazzed Jackson was about his plans for "Thriller." "Seeing him talk about it and how much it meant to him and how excited [he was] that 'Thriller' was going to scare a million people, it was so cool to see," he said. "I've never seen him so excited. It was like he broke character."

Check out everything we've got on "Michael Jackson's This Is It."