Michael Jackson (29 page)

‘Once at a record store in San Francisco, over a thousand kids showed up,’ Michael said in a hushed tone. ‘They pushed forward
and broke a window. A big piece of glass fell on top of this girl. And the girl's throat was
slit.
’ Michael swiftly ran his index finger across his neck.

‘Michael, don't do that. That's gross,’ Randy, said.

Michael ignored his youngest brother and continued with his story. ‘She just got
slit.
And I remember there was blood everywhere. Oh God, so much blood. And she grabbed her throat and was bleeding and everyone
just ignored her. Why? Because
I
was there and they wanted to grab at
me
and get
my
autograph.’ Michael sighed. ‘I wonder whatever happened to that girl.’

‘Probably dead,’ Tito muttered, deadpan.

Fans were as much a curse as a blessing. ‘We got these three guard dogs. One is named Heavy, one is Black Girl, and the other
one don't got no name,’ Michael said. ‘We
have
to have them,’ he insisted. ‘Once, a lady jumped over the gate and into the house and sat down in the den. We came home,
and she looked at us and what did she say?’ He turned to Marlon for help. ‘What'd that lady say?’

‘She said, “I'm here 'cause God sent me,”’ Marlon recalled.

‘God sent her,’ Michael repeated.

Jackie laughed. ‘Yeah, God sent her to sit in The Jackson 5's den and wait for them to get home so she can get their autograph,
and maybe her picture with them, too. She was on a divine mission.’

‘And then once, a whole family managed to get into the estate somehow, and they toured the house,’ Michael continued. ‘Lookin'
at all our stuff. Findin' all our most
private
things. And Janet was here all by herself. It was scary. And sometimes, fans ask weird questions. They don't think you're
real. Once a fan asked me the most embarrassing question and in front of everyone. She said, “Do you go to the bathroom?”
I was so embarrassed.’

In the middle of the interview, good-natured ribbing among the brothers turned nasty when someone brought up the subject of
nicknames.

‘Mike has a nickname,’ Jackie mentioned, his eyes teasing. ‘It's a good one.’

Michael's smiling face turned serious. ‘Don't, Jackie,’ he warned. He looked away.

‘We call him – ’

‘Please, you guys!’ Michael pleaded.

‘Big Nose,’ Jackie finished.

The brothers laughed among themselves. Michael shifted in his chair.

‘Yeah, Big Nose,’ Marlon repeated, grinning. He reached over and punched Michael on his arm, playfully. ‘What's happenin',
Big Nose?’ Michael threw Marlon a scathing look. His mouth parted, but no words came out. He would say little more as long
as his brothers were present.

After the interview, we walked outside to take photographs in the warm California sunlight. Joseph, a hulking six-footer with
a mole on his face, a pencil-thin moustache, and a diamond pinky ring the size of a marble, approached me. ‘You see, I have
a philosophy about raising children,’ he said, engaging me. ‘My father was strict. He was a schoolteacher, and he treated
me like I was one of his students, not like I was his son. I never got any special treatment. I'm glad that happened. I got
a strict raising when I was young, and I've been able to accomplish a lot because of that. And my kids have gotten a strict
raising, and look at what
they've
accomplished. I think children
should
fear their parents. It's good when they fear you. It's good for them, and it's good for the parents too. I did my best with
those boys,’ he said, pointing to them as they posed for pictures.

‘Have they ever disappointed you?’ I asked.

A sober expression crossed his face. ‘Lots of times,’ he answered. ‘Jermaine's with Berry at Motown, instead of with us. He
chose Berry over me. Do you know how that makes me feel? It hurts right here.’ Joseph thumped the left side of his chest with
his fist. ‘I've been disappointed other times too,’ he continued. ‘But I don't think I have ever once let my boys down. If
I did, too bad for them. You do the best you can do, raising kids,’ he said, smiling. ‘It helped that they had something to
look forward to. They always had entertainment, and me to rehearse them. And they also play character-building sports like
football and baseball.

‘Jackie could have been a baseball player if he wanted to, in the majors with the Chicago White Sox. They're all good at sports,
except for Michael who never picked up a bat in his whole life.’ Joseph smiled. It was an unexpected moment of gentleness
from him. ‘Wouldn't know what to do with a baseball bat, I think. We tease him about it, but he doesn't like it. Michael has
always been sensitive,’ he observed.

‘One thing about Michael, though,’ Joseph added, ‘is that ever since he was four, he wanted to be an entertainer. And he always
wanted to be number one. That's why sports upset him, because his brothers can whip him and outdo him at sports and he can't
be number one at it. But in music, Michael
knows
he's number one.

‘And speakin' of Michael, Marlon told me about what happened. You're not gonna write that part about Michael's nickname, are
you?’ he asked. ‘That boy is so sensitive about his nose,’ Joseph added. ‘Do you see anything wrong with his nose? That's
all he ever talks about, his damn nose. He threatened to have it fixed, but what can he do with it? I told him I'd break his
face if he ever had it fixed.’ Joseph's green eyes twinkled. He threw back his head and roared with laughter. ‘You don't fix
something that isn't broken,’ he added. ‘He's got a great nose. It looks like mine.’

Afterwards, Michael returned to the living room for some final thoughts about his life and career. As the photographer and
I watched, he crossed his left leg over his right knee and began absent-mindedly picking at his toenails. ‘When I'm not onstage,
I'm not the same. I'm different,’ he observed. ‘I'm addicted to the stage. When I can't get on to a stage for a long time,
I have fits and get crazy. I start crying, and I act weird and freaked out. No kiddin', I do. I start dancin' 'round the house.’

He began to talk rapidly. ‘It's like a part of me is missin' and I gotta get it back, 'cause if I don't, I won't be complete.
So I gotta dance and I gotta sing, you know? I have this craving. Onstage is the only place I'm comfortable. I'm not comfortable
around…’ he paused, searching for the right word, ‘
normal
people. But when I get out onstage, I open up and I have no problems.’ He seemed flustered, unnerved. ‘Whatever is happening
in my life doesn't matter. I'm up there and cuttin' loose and I say to myself, ‘This is it.
This
is home. This is exactly where I'm supposed to be, where God meant for me to be.’ I am
unlimited
when I'm onstage. I'm number one. But when I'm off the stage,’ he shrugged his shoulders, ‘I'm not really…’ Again, he paused,
trying to find the right word. ‘Happy.’

Earlier in the day, I had conducted an interview with Sidney Lumet, director of
The Wiz.
‘Michael Jackson is the most gifted entertainer to come down the pike since James Dean,’ Lumet told me. ‘He's a brilliant
actor and dancer, probably one of the rarest entertainers I have ever worked with.’

I shared Sidney's observation with Michael. He seemed embarrassed for a moment. Then, he asked, ‘Who's James Dean?’

Later, he began talking about his role as the Scarecrow in
The Wiz.
‘What I like about my character,’ he observed, ‘is his confusion. He knows that he has problems, I guess you could call them.
But he doesn't know why he has them or how he got that way. And he understands that he sees things differently from the way
everyone else does, but he can't put his finger on why. He's not like other people. No one understands him. So he goes through
his whole life with this, uh…’ he paused, ‘confusion.’

Michael looked off into the distance, now seeming lost in his thought process. ‘Everybody thinks he's very special, but, really,
he's very sad. He's so, so sad. Do you understand?’ He fixed his thoughtful gaze on me and asked, again. ‘Do you understand
his sadness?’

When
The Wiz
was released in October 1978, it became a critical failure and a box-office disappointment. The finished film was an overblown
spectacle, one that most people who were involved with would just as soon take off their résumés. Even the commercial release
of ‘Ease On Down the Road’, teaming Michael with Diana Ross – a coupling that seemed destined for the Top Ten, in theory – didn't
even crack the Top Forty. Berry Gordy, who had nothing to do with the actual production of the film and didn't believe Diana
should have been cast in it, has never discussed
The Wiz,
publicly.

‘It was a big dream that got away,’ said producer Rob Cohen, in retrospect. ‘A brilliant idea gone wrong. The knowledge that
two years of my life, twenty-three million dollars of Universal's money, thousands of man hours of labour, and all of the
hopes and dreams of everyone involved went into a movie that didn't stand a chance makes me sick.’

Despite its failure, the making of
The Wiz
marked a personal victory for Michael Jackson. Identifying himself with the role of the Scarecrow gave him the opportunity
to look within and discover a new sense of strength and self-confidence. ‘Working in the movie showed me what makes kings
of the world and what makes giants,’ he said. ‘It showed me how I can believe in myself in a way I never could before.’ He
also expanded his professional horizons and, in the process, won the respect of fellow workers, and even some critics who
had panned the movie.

Still, Michael could not ignore the fact that
The Wiz
was a failure at the box office. He was shattered by it; he had never suffered such a high-profile failure. ‘Did I make a
mistake?’ he asked Rob Cohen a few weeks after the movie was released. ‘Maybe I shouldn't have done the film? Maybe I should
have listened to my family. What will it mean to my career?’

‘Look, you followed your instincts,’ Rob told him. ‘We all did. Don't second-guess yourself now. We have nothing to be ashamed
of. We did the best job we could.’

‘But – ’

‘But nothing,’ Rob said. ‘Go on with your life and career. Be a star. You've only just begun.’

Joseph also supported Michael during this disappointing time. When one of the brothers said something disparaging about the
movie, Joseph gave him a sharp punch on the shoulder. ‘Ouch! Joseph,’ said the brother. ‘That hurt.’

‘Ouch, my ass,’ Joseph countered. ‘You don't criticize your brother. At least he tried. How many movies have
you
made, big shot?’

At the end of 1978, Joseph Jackson severed his ties with Richard Arons. In Richard's wake, Joseph recruited Ron Weisner and
Freddy DeMann as managers. Both were experienced in the entertainment field, Weisner as a business manager and DeMann as a
promoter. Joseph felt that he needed the assistance of these men, both white, in order to insure that CBS would promote The
Jacksons as the company did its white artists. He believed that the company considered his sons a ‘black act’ and was, therefore,
restricting the way it promoted and marketed them. Joseph's concern is a common, and often justified, complaint of black acts
signed to record companies, like CBS, which are manned predominantly by white executives. Like Joseph, many black managers
maintain that white executives don't know how to market black entertainment ‘across the board’, meaning to white record buyers,
as well as to black. Of course, Richard Arons is also white, so it was clear that Joseph felt the new managers were more experienced
as well, and had more clout in the music business.

Joseph's strategy worked in America.
Destiny
sold over a million copies and reached number eleven on
Billboard's
album chart, not bad for a group that hadn't had a major record in some time.

Destiny
didn't do as well in the UK, however. It took six months for it to be released there, and the highest it hit was number thirty-three.
But it was now accepted that the Jacksons had sporadic sales in the UK; there was little anyone could do about it. They simply
weren't as hot in England as in the States. That was fine with Joseph; the focus at this time was on US sales anyway, not
European.

However, Michael was still unhappy. Despite what his brothers tried to promote, he knew in his heart that he and they were
not fully responsible for the success of
Destiny.
CBS had whipped up quite a publicity frenzy about how terrific the brothers were as producers, yet it was not true. They
hadn't actually produced that album on their own; Michael hated living the lie. He was too old for such nonsense, he felt.
Gone were the days when it was acceptable to promote such untruths.

Michael had never been dismayed about his life and career as he was when he finished the 1979 Destiny tour. While on the road,
he had lost his voice making it necessary for Marlon to sing his higher-register parts while Michael just moved his mouth.
He found the process humiliating. Eventually, two weeks of performances had to just be cancelled because of Michael's throat
problems.