"The King As Pop" - From LIFE Magazine (1997)
In the dance studio where he practices his moves, Dad plays career counselor. “This is his first step into the spotlight,” Michael says, only half in jest. As if on cue, Prince grabs for a toy microphone – and promptly shoves it into his mouth. “He’s teething,” explains a nearby nanny. Will he be moonwalking by next year? Dad laughs, slipping into mock-grandmother mode: “As long as he’s healthy, smart and brilliant, he’ll be O.K.”
Pop and the little Prince share meals, afternoon naps and story hour. “I put my voice on tape, reading poems, stories I’ve written,” Michael says. “When I’m out at concerts, [his nurses] play it for him.” One tape offers this: “Not the stars, not the farthest solar systems, not the millions of different species of animals, but the child is the greatest of God’s creations.”
In the nursery the nannies come and go, bottles and squeeze-toys all in tow. Six teddies occupy an antique African cradle, six stuffed animals crowd Prince’s modest crib. Above it hangs a Humpty-Dumpty poster, a Mickey and Minnie mobile and a quilt with Daddy’s image. On ledges and counters stand five forlorn picture frames – each one empty, since so few photos have been taken of the room’s elusive occupant. “You don’t have to buy him much,” notes Michael. “Fans give him toys, signs, banners – everything.” The child’s cache includes a red Junior Roadster from Michael Milken and a genuine Lamb Chop puppet, courtesy of ventriloquist Shari Lewis.
Prince is nicknamed after Michael’s grandfather and great-grandfather. Though, on occasion, Dad prefers Baby Doo-Doo. Or Apple Head, for his plump countenance. (He’s a bruising 22 pounds.) “When he first came out,” Michael recalls, “he had my grandfather’s and brothers’ and La Toya’s shape of head. He has Debbie’s chin.” Michael claims his hectic touring schedule kept him from taking Lamaze classes, but he held wife Debbie Rowe’s hand throughout her 25-hour labor last February 13: “I was screaming and praying at the same time.” Rather than reducing his creative output, Michael believes, fatherhood has energized his inner artist. Michael insists: “I’ve written more songs in my life – albums’ worth – because of him than because of any other inspiration. He’s complete inspiration.” (One recent verse: “People say/I’m not O.K./’cause I love such elementary things. /It’s been my fate/to compensate/for the childhood I’ve never known.”)
You have two nurses, three chefs and a doting dad. You have a petting zoo, two
locomotives and a full-scale amusement park - all in your backyard. And, oh yes, your
godparents are Elizabeth Taylor and Macaulay Culkin. So you've got that going for
you.
On the other hand, your dad wears sequins and a hat when changing your diaper and
has been known to grab his privates in front of thousands. Your mom has to commute
to visit you, sometimes across the globe. And even as a celebrity fetus you got no
respect: Your pop-star pop felt compelled to issue a press release insisting you weren't
the product of artificial insemination.
Welcome to Earth, Prince Michael Joseph Jackson Jr.
The bright-eyed, beaming Prince is genuinely good natured, prone to wide, if
toothless, jack-'o-lantern grins. Tonight, however, he is Mr. Whimper - due to the
merciless popping of flashbulbs. The boy of beige -and-olive cheek, with a hint of spit
curl, sobs for several minutes. His nurses, in white NEVERLAND VALLEY
uniforms, brandish rattles to little avail. The Dad tries, stroking bony fingers
tentatively against his child's face: "If he cries, and then you dance, he'll stop at once."
But Michael's not in a particularly moonwalky mood. "C'mon, look, look. Mmm,"
Michael says, hazarding a hum. "He loves anything rhinestone." So Dad quickly dons
a bangled jacket. But the Prince blubbers on.
His cries sound mama-like, even at nine months. Indeed, his cries seem part reproach.
Everywhere, throughout the 25-room home, Mom is eerily absent. The house, with
games and knicknacks piled in stairwells and nooks, has an edgy abandon, as if a
teenager and his friends have been left in charge and the real parents are about to burst
in - back from vacation - and throw a fit. Even now, after returning from an African
tour Michael is here in Neverland with his boy, yet Debbie is in L.A., 150 miles
southeast. When asked why Mom's away, Michael cryptically attributes it to some
unspecified aspect of - yes - a second pregnancy. He says, in a delighted whisper,
"There's a new one on the way."
Michael, 39, is well aware that his is not exactly a nuclear family. "It's very hard," he
explains, faulting his performance schedule for their long distance marriage. "We
haven't been able to spend time as a family. Not at all." Debbie Rowe, 38, who has
kept her one-bedroom Van Nuys apartment, reportedly told intimates she was
carrying Michael's first child as a "favour to a friend". Since then, she has admitted in
a TV interview: "I don't need to be there...It's not my duty. And (Michael) understands
that. And he understands that I need my independence." Citing Michael's constant
attention to Prince's every need, she said, "I'd have nothing to do."
Michael's choice of partners, confidants and playmates has never been conventional.
He has long sought the company of other former child stars, like Taylor and Culkin,
or star's children, such as first wife Lisa Marie Presley, whom he divorced last year.
He has befriended young boys and girls. (Charges of child molestation in 1993, never
proven, were dropped after he reached a multimillion-dollar-out-of-court settlement
with the family of the 13-year-old accuser.) "Celebrities have to deal with this," is all
he will say on the subject, adding dismissively, "I'm not the first who's gone through
it. It's horrible." Debbie has remarked of the accusations: "I wouldn't leave our child
there...if I even suspected any of them were true."
Despite the time they spend apart, Michael has found a kindred soul in Debbie. A free
spirit who fancies Harleys and animals (one tabloid reported that she arranged for
chemotherapy for one of her dogs), she met Michael at his dermatologist's, where she
was a medical assistant, during his treatment for a skin condition. After they became
friends, Debbie twice offered to bear his child. And once his divorce from Lisa Marie
was finalized, Michael surprised her by accepting. They were married in a secret
Australian ceremony last November. They do spend time together, of course, often
watching cartoons or big-screen projections of Three Stooges shorts. "We laugh, hold
the baby," Michael says. "She's come out on the tour a lot."
But there is one subject to which Michael repeatedly returns during four hours of
conversation and picture-taking: Lisa Marie Presley.
Michael's voice quickens, even quavers, when he speaks of Lisa Marie. How she
enjoys the baby. How they are still close after an amicable divorce. How they
frolicked overseas the month before. He seems to pine for her. "Lisa Marie was just
with me in Africa," Michael says. "We (went to) IMAX theaters, simulated-ride
safaris, dinner. We went parasailing. It was wonderful." Even Debbie has
acknowledged that Michael is still smitten. "He cares about her very much, but it
didn't work out and he was devastated," she has said. "He loved her very much. Still
does."
When asked if Lisa Marie has ever expressed second thoughts about not having been
the one to bear his son, Michael insists, "She regrets it. She said so." Would she still
consider having a kid with him? "She'd like to, yes," he says putting a mischievous
finger to his lips. "Shh."
Michael turns the conversation to what makes him happiest nowadays: "The baby,
writing music and making movies." He's planning a film version of J.M Barrie's Peter
Pan fable, having been mislead, he says, by Steven Speilberg, who he believes
reneged on an offer to cast Michael in Hook six years ago. "I worked on the script,
writing songs, for six months," says Michael. "And they let me down. I was so heart
broken. Steven Speilberg admitted later it was a mistake. I was torn. He put me
through a lot. We're friends now, though." What Michael dreads most, he says, is
continuing a life on the road. "I love to entertain," he admits,"but I don't like the
system of touring. You're jet-lagged. You're sleepy on stage. I don't know where I am
half the time. I may not tour again. Ever."
Besides, for now, Michael has his glove full with this bundle of Jackson. Especially
with bedtime beckoning. His T-shirt mottled with faint baby-food stains, he cradles
Prince in the crook of his arm, placing a lavender pacifier in his mouth. The baby
drifts into his own little Neverland. After several minutes, Michael hands the child to
a nanny and slips away to his own bedroom - a floor below and a wing away.
To enter Michael's bedroom, one has to pass under the interlocked fingers of two lifesized
figurines on pedestals - a Boy Scout and a little girl wearing a British bobby's
hat, the pair arching a London Bridge above the door. Inside, toys, gadgets and books
sprout in every alcove. Michael's latest Grammy gleams on the fireplace mantel. Peter
Pan paraphernalia adorns three walls; arcade-scale consoles, including Nintendo 64,
dominate a recessed cranny. "I can beat all of them," he says with pride.
At first, it is his red and gold throne that stands out amid the clutter. But then one's
eyes zero in on Michael Jackson's bed. On it's green brocaded pillows. On the twin
stereo speakers mounted near the headboard. On the stark but simple painting of
Jesus, in a plain frame, the Sacred Heart blood-red, the eyes penetrating.
And there, on one night stand, rests a framed photograph of Lisa Marie. Not a recent
snapshot. Or even a formal portrait. But a picture apparently cut out of a magazine,
placed as a child would place it, cock-eyed, in a frame meant to hold a photo twice it's
size. A picture of Elvis and his little girl, then only five years old. "This is the age,"
Michael says, "when I first met Lisa Marie. When her father first came to my
concerts. I've known her ever since."
But when Michael lies in his bed, the last thing he sees before he falls asleep is
Prince's spare crib, sitting next to an old Peter Pan diorama. It is empty tonight but for
the clutch of stuffed animals inside. Still, it's there - ready for those nights when
Prince needs his dad.
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