2003
On January 3, it was announced that Michael Jackson, in the Guinness World Records book, had achieved the seventh rank among the top English musicians over the past half century. The first rank belonged to Elvis Presley, and the ninth rank was also assigned to the Beatles.
On the sixth day of January, Michael Jackson was introduced by TV Guide and VH1 as one of the history-makers in the music world.
TV Guide and VH1 covered one hundred historical events in the music field in a program. And Michael Jackson’s performance of the song “Billie Jean” at the 25th anniversary of Motown (Motown25) in 1983 was counted among these historical moments that left an extraordinary impact on the pop music scene.
With this performance, Michael took second place in the ranking of music history-makers.
Lisa Bernard, a representative of the editor-in-chief at TV Guide, said about it: ”The interesting point about the 25th anniversary of Motown was that it was supposed to be a look back at Motown’s past and the incredible music it had released over the years. And suddenly Michael and his brothers appear on stage. The Jackson Five. Who is there that doesn’t like this group? And then Michael alone performs the song ‘Billie Jean’ on stage along with all those dance moves. It seemed like he was sliding across the stage. As if the stage were spinning with a series of special effects and Michael was being spun along with it. But in reality, Michael himself was doing all of it. Everyone was screaming. They couldn’t believe what they were seeing. It was truly captivating.“
Michael also secured ninth place in this ranking for the music video “Thriller”.
Mrs. Bernard also said about it: ”When Michael made this video for one of the most popular songs on his album, he brought pop music into a new phase. A bold, artistic phase. Calling ‘Thriller’ a video is misleading. This fourteen-minute short film, which cost more than one million dollars, was made by a prominent team. John Landis was the director, and Rick Baker was the makeup artist for this production. What resulted was a scary short film full of ghosts and the dead rising from their graves, who danced in a group. A short film that reached the highest position. And no one—still even Jackson himself—has been able to reach that position.“
On January 10, 2003, the Los Angeles Times reported that Tommy Mottola, the head of one of Sony’s distribution companies, would be removed from his position.
Senior Japanese executives at Sony informed Tommy Mottola that they had no intention of extending Mottola’s extremely profitable financial terms in his contract, which was set to end in August 2004.
On January 15, 2003, Michael attended the funeral ceremony of Maurice Gibb, a member of the Bee Gees, on the Miami coast.
That same day, his private funeral service was held at noon in a church near the coast.
Five days later, on January 20, 2003, an extraordinary piece of news was released: ”Martin Bashir, who had been allowed to live in Michael’s home (Neverland) with him for eight months, has produced a documentary about Michael. Bashir had exclusive and unprecedented access to Michael in order to make this ninety-minute documentary. This documentary will be broadcast on February 3, 2003, on the TV network ITV1 in the program ‘Tonight with Trevor McDonald’.”
[Michael Jackson - Martin Bashir]
Martin Bashir’s previous subjects had been Princess Diana and Michael Barrymore.
James Goldston, the manager of this program, said: ”This film is an extraordinary look at the life of one of the most famous and controversial figures in the world. We made a film about him during one of the most chaotic periods of Michael’s life. This film is very remarkable. Viewers can’t believe what they see.“
On February 3, 2003, the documentary ‘Living with Michael Jackson’ was broadcast on the English network ITV1. The documentary would later be aired on TV networks around the world.
... and the storm began...
In this documentary, Michael speaks candidly about money, plastic surgery, his childhood, his third child, Prince Michael II, and many other things.
[Living with Michael Jackson documentary]
Instead of portraying Michael fairly, Bashir did everything he could to the extent that he could twist issues in an incorrect way. Although most viewers of this documentary were not drawn to Bashir’s wishes, support for Michael was announced across the world.
Three days later, on February 6, 2003, Michael had said in a statement published in the British media:
”Today I may feel more than ever that I have been betrayed. The person who was given the opportunity to get to know my children, my employees, and me—someone I trusted and told the truth to—was able to misuse my trust and produce this unpleasant and unfair film. Anyone who knows me knows the truth. And that is that in my life, my children come before everything, and I never harm a child.“
Debbie Rowe, Michael’s former wife and the mother of his two children, said in a statement in support of him:
”It breaks my heart that anyone truly believes that Michael could do something that would hurt our children or put them in danger. They (our children) are the most important thing in our lives.
The figures that had been released showed that the television documentary ‘Living with Michael Jackson’ had ten times the viewers of the exclusive interview film with Saddam Hussein, the leader of Iraq—despite the threats of an imminent war in that country.
The network spokesperson said that broadcasting this controversial interview, which had been run by Tony Benn, a member of the UK Labour Party, had increased the network’s audience for the four news programs in the UK from five hundred thousand people to one million seven hundred thousand. But the documentary ‘Living with Michael Jackson’ on ITV1 had fifteen million viewers. In the United States, when the documentary was broadcast on ABC, it had twenty-seven million people watching.
After these events, Michael took reciprocal action...
On February 20, 2003, the TV network Fox aired the segments from Martin Bashir’s controversial interview film with Michael that had been removed. The film, titled ‘Michael Jackson, Part Two: The Interview They Didn’t Show You,’ was captured by Hamid Molaheyi, Michael’s private cameraman.
This program attracted more viewers compared to the first part of the interview.
These deleted segments would later be broadcast on TV networks around the world and would clearly show what the reality was and how Martin Bashir interprets Neverland, Michael’s abilities as a father, and ... And this was in contrast to what the documentary ‘Living with Michael Jackson’ had shown.
It had been stated in a statement:
”This film contains unexpected scenes of Martin Bashir praising Michael’s behavior and his way of treating his children, and his abilities as a father. In these scenes, he says that Michael is a very good father. And that it is a pity that people around the world are willing to criticize Michael.“
Apparently, Martin Bashir was either lying to Michael or misleading the viewers.
In the same statement, it was announced: ”During the interview with Michael, Bashir was aware that he was being filmed.“