Jacko, His Rise and Fall: The Social and Sexual History of Michael Jackson (14 page)

Michael was particularly impressed that Jordan had developed his own
line of sports clothing, called JORDAN in the 1997-98 season. Although they
didn't really fit him, Michael ended up acquiring-by means not knownthree of Jordan's custom-tailored silk shirts monogrammed either with
"Michael" or just "MJ." They were in the colors of pumpkin, magenta, and
midnight blue.

On the way out of his dressing room at the Davis tribute, Michael encountered another survivor of Hollywood's Golden Age: actor Gregory Peck. They
talked pleasantly for a few minutes and seemed to genuinely like each other.
Peck gave Michael his telephone number and asked him to call him some
time. Michael agreed. He'd begun his love affair with stars of Hollywood's
heyday. His passion for the older stars would only intensify as he got older
himself.

Michael ran into Sinatra once again at the Davis funeral on May 18, 1990
at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in the Hollywood Hills. Sinatra was talking to Shirley MacLaine and Dean Martin. "Kid," Sinatra told Michael,
"we're laying to rest the best black male entertainer America has ever seen.
He had more talent in his little finger than all the other small pricks who followed him."

Again, if Michael took this as an insult, he gave no indication. He didn't
have to say anything. He was rescued from a response by the sudden appearance of Janet Leigh. She kissed Martin and Sinatra on the cheeks and turned
to Michael to shake his hand. "I loved you in Psycho," he said to Leigh.

Before she could thank him, Liza Minnelli appeared, linking her arm with
Michael's. "C'mon," she said. "I'll introduce you to Milton Berle if you
haven't met him before. He's got the biggest cock in Hollywood, but don't
take my word for it. Have you met Burt Reynolds? I hear he's got one of the
smallest."

Michael seemed to ignore her remarks, but joined her anyway, mainly to
escape from Sinatra. He looked around. "I wonder if this many people will
attend my own funeral."

Michael's funeral lay far in the future. After winding up their tour in
Japan, the Jackson brothers flew to Australia in the summer of 1973. Once
there they would appear at concerts not only in Sydney and Melbourne, but in
smaller towns such as Adelaide and Brisbane. While in Australia, The
Jacksons also visited the Outback, meeting members of aborigine tribes.
Michael later claimed that "they treated us like brothers."

When they returned to America, Joe continued to plot his break from
Motown, which he thought would free his sons from bondage-at least musically. Then the unexpected happened.

The Gordy and Jackson families became linked through marriage on a
gray, rainy day on December 15, 1973 in Beverly Hills. Hazel Gordy, Berry's
daughter, married Jermaine Jackson at a gaudily expensive wedding at the
Beverly Hills Hotel. "It was more about showing off than love," said a disgruntled member of Motown who was not invited.

The wedding ended up costing Gordy more than a quarter of a million dollars. Both the bride and groom were only nineteen years old. In its next issue, Ebony proclaimed the Gordy/Jackson link "the wedding of the century."
Jermaine chose Marlon as his best man, and Michael was relegated to the role
of an usher, a humiliation for him.

In a pearl white tuxedo with bugle beads trimming his lapels, Jermaine
said his "I do" to Hazel, who wore a white satin gown with a white mink train
"that stretched to Sacramento," one member of the wedding observed. When
pictures were taken, the couple almost got lost against an all-white backdrop
of 7,500 white camellias and white carnations, with nearly a hundred caged
white doves and mounds of artificial snow.

"For a black dude's wedding to a black chick, this was the whitest wedding ever recorded on film," wrote a reporter for Ebony magazine. His words
were censored as sounding "too racist." As if all this ostentation wasn't
enough, the guest appearance of Smokey Robinson was greeted with loud
applause. For the wedding of his friends, he'd written a special ballad for the
occasion. Jermaine hugged Robinson, and Hazel gave him a kiss for his
efforts.

Under heavy pressure from Gordy earlier that morning, Katherine, a
vision in sapphire blue, agreed to drop her impending divorce from Joe to protect the careers of her sons. A vision in mauve and gray, Joe tried to address
Katherine at the wedding, but she pointedly ignored him, even when they
posed together as the "happy" parents of the groom.

Coretta Scott King, a friend of the Gordy family, was seen mingling with
such celebrities as Lola Falana, Billy Dee Williams, Diahann Carroll, and
even the Los Angeles mayor, Tom Bradley.

Mrs. King caused a lot of excitement among The Jacksons, particularly
with Katherine, who admired her greatly. Michael didn't seem impressed, and
Mrs. King may have sensed his alienation.

The widow of the slain civil rights leader, King was overheard talking privately and confidentially to friends. Media had bribed certain staff members
of the hotel to report on any indiscretions being uttered by either the Jacksons
or their guests.

Hazel Joy Gordy marries Jermaine

"Michael is acting very petulant," Mrs. King remarked. "Dare I
say jealous? He told me he was `not
gaining a sister, but losing a brother,
his best friend.' If you ask me, I
think Michael has a crush on
Jermaine. I could swear that Hazel's
future husband doesn't think of
Michael in that way at all. If I didn't
know better, I would say that Michael is behaving like a jilted girl who has lost out to another woman.
Surely my impression is wrong. Tell me I'm wrong!"

When Hazel-"my first born"-was only fifteen, Gordy discovered that
she was in love with Jermaine. Someone on his staff showed him a fan letter
his daughter had written to Jermaine: "I love you, Jermaine. You are my
prince, my dream. I need you, Jermaine. I will love you forever."

Hazel would not love Jermaine forever, but she did not outgrow what
Gordy called "puppy love" and continued her passion for Jermaine until he
reluctantly agreed to marry her. At the time of his wedding, Jermaine was
"playing the field," having almost any girl he wanted for the night. Some of
his brothers speculated that Jermaine would not let a mere wedding band deny
him the pleasures that came so easily to him every night.

Michael also had professional fears about the future direction of The
Jackson 5. Tito's wife had been rather milquetoasty, never interfering. But
Hazel was known for being strong-willed. She could use her influence as the
daughter of the boss to push Jermaine into a role as the group's lead singer,
thereby relegating Michael to a subservient role.

The sun finally came out, breaking through the overcast sky of southern
California. But it didn't brighten Michael's spirit. He confided to Katherine
and to others that "no good will come of this marriage."

Hazel and Jermaine flew to Europe for a four-week honeymoon, living in
lavish suites and dining at only the most luxe restaurants from Paris to Rome.
They spent the most time in Switzerland. Jermaine flew back to join his brothers, including Michael, on a ten-day tour of Senegal in West Africa. "The boys
were determined to have a close encounter with their roots," wrote one
Senegalese journalist.

And so they did. Michael was especially moved by the native music and
the rhythms. He called it "eye-opening," as he experienced the sight of native
Africans in tribal dress performing with drums, their music filling the air and
mesmerizing him. "I've come back!" he shouted
at the top of his lungs at the airport in Dakar. He
didn't kiss the ground, but burst into tears of joy
instead. In the years ahead, Michael would be
accused of trying to change his skin color to
white. But during those heady days in Senegal,
he "became an African," in the words of the
same Senegalese journalist.

Coretta Scott King

From Dakar, the day after their arrival, the
brothers took a thirty-minute ferry trip to Gore
Island where thousands of slaves were imprisoned during the late 18th century and for nearly half of the 19th century after they'd been captured in the wild. Here these
wretched souls were detained under the most horrid of conditions before shipment to the New World, where they'd become slaves. Many of these hapless
victims died in chains before reaching America. Reportedly, Michael became
so upset at seeing the Maison des Esclaves, the prison for slaves constructed
in 1775, that he vomited.

Michael's romance with Senegal was of short duration. He was appalled
at the living conditions, especially when he visited a hovel in which a family
of nine was crowded. "I've seen where they lived and slept on a dirt floor," he
told reporters. "I've seen bigger doghouses in America." He was also horrified
when he saw what the family had for dinner. The mother had bought three
chicken heads which she boiled in an earthen pot over an open fire for some
broth to feed her brood.

Later that night, Michael suffered an attack of diarrhea so devastating that
he had to be hospitalized. He told his brothers that he "couldn't wait to get
back" to the luxuries of their Encino estate. Their own accommodations in
Senegal were horrid. Their bedrooms were not clean, and they didn't even
have hot water.

"Stevie might want to live here, but count me out!" Michael was referring
to Stevie Wonder, who announced to the press that he was planning to "fly
away" from America and settle in Africa. After this grandstand play, the
announcement of which was printed in newspapers across America, Wonder
decided Africa wasn't that wonderful and canceled his plans to go into exile.

Before leaving Senegal, Michael announced to the press that, "Blacks are
the most talented race on earth. They've got the beat. They've got the rhythm.
Our music comes from Africa, and we musicians, especially in the United
States, owe these tribes an enormous debt of gratitude. We must always
remember that."

After making that lofty pronouncement, Michael was overheard by a
flight attendant telling one of his brothers: "Now let's get the hell out of here!"

Upon their return to the United States, The Jackson 5 recorded "Dancing
Machine," released as a single by Motown in 1974. "Spit out the bubblegum
soul and record a song that America can dance to," Gordy told them.

Michael's voice was more mature-"he no longer sounded like castrati,"
wrote one critic-and the single went double platinum. It shot up to number
two on Billboards charts. Young America could actually dance to Michael's
high-octane "watch her get down, watch her get down." The more mature
sounds coming from Michael's throat ended an ugly rumor that Joe was going
to have his son castrated in the tradition of Italy back in the 1600s.

Rumors of Michael's castration became so widespread that on some occasions when he was mobbed by fans, overzealous girls-and in some cases, gay boys-reached out to grope him to see if his male genitals were still
intact. Or if he'd become transgendered.

"Boy soprano becomes a high-pitched tenor," said a Rolling Stone critic.
"Dancing Machine" was played around the country as much as their former
hit, "Never Can Say Goodbye."

Dancing Machine also became the title of The Jackson 5's latest album,
which also featured such songs as "The Mirrors of My Mind" and "Whatever
You Got, I Want." Producer Hal Davis, not always a winner, assembled the
track for the album Get It Together. He built The Jackson's first disco concept
album around this, and it reached only number sixteen on Billboard's charts.
This album marked the end of The Jackson 5 being called "teenyboppers,"
although they still fitted that age category. Critic Pablo Guzman wrote,
"Through disco, the Jackson brothers found a way to grow with their audience
without puncturing teen fantasy."

On Cher's television series, "Dancing Machine" was heard by much of the
nation, who tuned in to watch Cher and her guest, Michael, perform the number as robots. "Both Cher and Michael had hair that would stretch along the
full length of the California coast," wrote one critic. "Both of them seemed in
dire need of a hairdresser. Cher's pantsuit and a halter top seemed designed by
a demented drag queen. Michael in his midnight black cutaway jacket, accented with silver accessories, seemed like a reject from Harlem's Apollo
Theater."