Nov 19, 2003 4:37 pm US/Central
NEW YORK (AP) In the 10 years since Michael Jackson first stood accused of child molestation, the superstar has managed to eke out two platinum albums, a handful of hits and some highly rated television specials.
Yet his fan base has shrunk, and he's been ridiculed and reviled by the general public for his bizarre appearance and behavior. His new single, "One More Chance," didn't even register on Billboard's Hot 100 chart.
Now his imminent arrest on another molestation allegation could be the nail in the coffin of his career.
"I think Michael Jackson's career is not over -- it's still ongoing --but it's already been severely diminished," said Andy Pemberton, editor in chief of Blender magazine. "He appears from the outside a very disturbed individual."
"He has a huge fan base, especially in New York, and I'm very very curious to see what the audience is going to say," said Jeff Z., program director of New York City's WKTU. But "if the allegations are proven, we would probably take off all of Michael Jackson's songs."
Sean Ross, vice president of music and programming for Edison Media Research, says if Jackson is to recover, "he would have to make a great record, plus he would have to be at a label he was not at odds with, plus, it would probably take some restoring of his personal reputation."
On Tuesday, the same day Jackson's "Number Ones" greatest hits album came out, authorities in Santa Barbara County searched his Neverland ranch in connection with molestation allegations by a single underage accuser. On Wednesday, they announced an arrest warrant had been issued.
It comes a little over a decade after Jackson was forever tainted by allegations that he molested a 13-year-old boy. Jackson denied the accusations, and charges were never filed, but he reached a reported multimillion-dollar settlement with the child.
Yet in truth, his career had already begun to slide by then. His eccentric behavior in the late '80s and early '90s -- from sleeping in a hyperbaric chamber to wanting to buy the Elephant Man's bones -- had already caused fans from his "Thriller" heyday to abandon ship. Along with his continued plastic surgery and his skin tone change from dark to light (due to vitiligo, he says), he was garnering more attention for his freakish persona than his music.
In 1995, he made a comeback attempt with the double-disc set "HIStory." It sold more than two million copies, yet garnered only one major hit, "You Are Not Alone," and was considered a commercial disappointment. In addition, his quickie marriage to Lisa Marie Presley was perceived as a public relations ploy, and his continued friendships with children turned many fans away. Another quickie marriage to his nurse, Deborah Rowe, who bore him two of his three children before they divorced, also befuddled many.
Since then, Jackson has made so many missteps it's hard to keep count. Just over the past 18 months, he's drawn criticism for dangling his baby over a balcony (he apologized), keeping his children masked when they travel outdoors, and his goofy behavior in a courtroom during a lawsuit.
Closeups of his face -- seriously altered from plastic surgery -- draw gasps. Then there was Jackson's racism accusation against then-Sony Music Chief Tommy Mottola.
And in an ABC special earlier this year, Jackson told interviewer Martin Bashir that he was still sleeping in the same bed with children, although he denied there was anything sexual about it.
Still, Jackson has had success in the wake of his troubles that other stars would envy. He's been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice (once as a member of the Jackson Five), received several honorary awards and garnered support from high-profile celebrity friends, many of which feted him during his 30th anniversary concert special, which CBS aired to high ratings in 2001.
Only last month, he was given the Humanitarian Award at the 2003 Radio Awards.
His last album, 2001's "Invincible," sold approximately two million copies, which are considered great numbers for most artists, especially a performer whose career has spanned more than three decades. Jackson's albums, however, are much less profitable because he spends millions of dollars making them.
"One More Chance," the only new song on his "Number Ones" disc, was produced by R. Kelly, whose talent and career are flourishing despite child pornography charges stemming from an alleged encounter with an underage girl. But when "One More Chance" was released to radio last month, it barely got any play on pop stations and only moderate attention from urban radio.
Even WKTU, which Jeff Z. described as a huge supporter of Jackson's music, wasn't playing it. "My audience really hasn't looked for the new single," he said. "We were waiting to see how well it was going to do and what the perception of him out there really was."
With Jackson's arrest and possible trial, that perception might be beyond salvation.
"Everyone gets one chance," said Jeff Z., "and I think Michael has had his one chance."
World was transfixed by Jackson's metamorphosis
BY LINDA SHRIEVES
The Orlando Sentinel
ORLANDO, Fla. - (KRT) - For Michael Jackson - and for a nation that has watched him grow up - what a long, strange trip it's been: From cute front man for the Jackson Five to solo superstar to bizarre celebrity.
On Wednesday, when authorities announced they had issued an arrest warrant charging the 45-year-old singer with multiple counts of child molestation, it was one more episode in an increasingly sordid soap opera.
Jackson is expected to surrender to authorities Thursday.
The charges come at the end of a particularly bad year for Jackson, one in which his financial empire has begun to crumble and the entertainment industry has virtually ignored his new music.
Instead, he's been dogged by the aftershocks of a TV documentary last winter in which he admitted that he slept in a bed with many children and carted his children throughout Europe, wearing masks. In 2002, photos and video showed him dangling his child, Prince Michael II, over a balcony to adoring fans.
Jackson's relationship with children has long been a source of speculation. In 1993, Jackson was accused of molesting a 13-year-old boy. He denied the allegation, but reached a reported multimillion-dollar settlement with the child and his family.
The public is no longer fascinated with Jackson's music; it's his behavior that captures people's attention.
"In Michael Jackson's case, his celebrity status of the past decade has been the carnival sideshow," says Gary Hoppenstand, a professor of American studies at Michigan State University. "People perceive him as a freak."
This month, when he released "One More Chance," a song written and produced with hit-making producer R. Kelly, "radio shrugged its shoulders," said Chuck Taylor, senior editor at Billboard magazine.
For music industry observers, watching an amazing musician turn into a spectacle has been painful.
"I'm inclined to give him a lot of slack," says Glenn Gass, a music professor and rock historian at Indiana University. "Short of Elvis, I don't think there's anyone who's had to go through what he's had to go through," Gass said in reference to Jackson's lifelong celebrity. "I think it's hard for us to imagine what kind of hyper-reality he lives in."
Born in Gary, Ind., in 1958, Michael didn't have a "normal" childhood. By age 6 he was performing with his brothers, and he was 11 when the Jackson 5 signed with Motown Records and recorded Diana Ross Presents the Jackson 5.
His career turned white-hot in the 1980s, after the release of his solo album "Off The Wall." He followed up with the 1982 album "Thriller," which won seven Grammys and sold more than 46 million copies - and remains the best-selling album of all time. But after he released "Bad" in 1987, his personal life began grabbing headlines.
There were reports that he slept in a hyperbaric chamber, that he tried to buy the Elephant Man's bones, and that his best friend was his pet chimpanzee, Bubbles.
With more media attention, Jackson withdrew to his ranch, Neverland, appropriately named for the place where Peter Pan never had to grow up. And though he counts as friends celebrities such as Liz Taylor and Liza Minnelli, many of his friends are children.
Jackson likely surrounded himself with children because they couldn't exploit him the way adults would, says Steven Berglas, a Los Angeles psychiatrist who has written books about the stress of success.
"What you see among lots of famous people, like Howard Hughes and Michael Jackson, is that they get entourages to surround them," says Steven Berglas, a Los Angeles psychiatrist who has written books about the stress of success.
Jackson's entourage consists mainly of bodyguards and children.
His increasing reclusiveness seemed to coincide with dramatic physical changes.
With each album release, the nation watched as Jackson slowly transformed from a cute African-American young man to a pointy-nosed, pointy-chinned, light-skinned man. Some observers suggest the changes started in 1984, when his hair caught on fire during filming of a Pepsi commercial. His burns required surgery, and rumors of more plastic surgery began to circulate.
Earlier this year, when Dr. Pamela Lipkin, a New York plastic surgeon, studied photographs of Jackson over the years, she noticed his face changing at about age 23, when he had apparently had his first nose job.
By 1987, she told ABC News, Jackson's lips were thinner, his eyebrows were higher, suggesting a forehead lift, and he had a cleft in his chin that wasn't present before.
In 1993, he told Oprah Winfrey that he had undergone only two rhinoplasties and that his skin color was changing because he had vitiligo, a disease that causes the skin to lose its pigment in blotches.
Even today, many in the medical community are unconvinced.
"I'm not going to argue with his dermatologist," says Dr. Vail Reese, a San Francisco dermatologist who operates a Web site called skinema.com, "but rarely do people have vitiligo that spreads and covers nearly all of their skin."
Instead, Reese suspects Jackson may suffer from "body dysmorphic disorder," a psychological condition in which patients "have a vision of beauty in their minds that they try to pursue with plastic surgery and other treatments."
Coming months after he settled the earlier child-abuse case, his 1994 marriage to Lisa Marie Presley struck many Americans as a public-relations move. When the duo locked lips on the MTV Video Awards, the calculated kiss was considered a publicity stunt. Their divorce in 1996 only intensified the speculation.
Jackson is an enigma to many fellow celebrities.
In this week's Time magazine, Russell Crowe tells of phone calls in which Jackson "used to put on these funny voices and then giggle, `Oh, Russell, it's Michael.'"
At a dinner at Katharine Hepburn's home, she struggled to find a topic of conversation to engage Jackson, says author Scott Berg in his biography "Kate Remembered."
Yet Hepburn was amazed by Jackson.
"He's an absolutely extraordinary creature," she told Berg. "He's worked his entire life, entertaining professionally since he was 3, and he's never lived a single moment. I mean not a moment, in the real world."
The real world is catching up to Michael Jackson: CBS officials announced they are postponing the TV special, "Michael Jackson Number Ones," which was scheduled to air Nov. 26 at 10 p.m.
With criminal charges filed against Jackson, he may no longer be able to retreat to Neverland.
Notes Gass, the music professor: "I think it's really sad that he feels more comfortable with children or animals or freaks of nature than with adults. It's almost as if he stopped growing at 13."
The man in the mirror may have some serious psychological issues.
"Let me say this," says Dr. Keith Valone, a clinical psychologist in Pasadena, Calif. "I think Michael Jackson would be a very interesting patient to have."
I'm with you, Heck... and it has nothing to do with the charges that were brought against him then. He just isn't what he was in the 80's, in my own opinion.
I'm with you, Heck... and it has nothing to do with the charges that were brought against him then. He just isn't what he was in the 80's, in my own opinion.