by Donald Bogle
At one point, he had told Lisa Marie—while they were still married—that if she would not have his child that Debbie Rowe would. Later Lisa Marie told Oprah Winfrey that she always believed that that was a retaliatory act by Michael.
Thereafter it was Rowe’s mission to be the mother of his children. It became his mission to let her do so. “I believe there are people who should be parents,” she said at that time, “and he’s one of them. And he is such a fabulous man, and such a good friend, and he’s always been there for me, always, from the day I met him.”
Her first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. During her next pregnancy, when she was six months pregnant, she left her one-bedroom, $840 a month apartment, deposited her dogs with a friend in Van Nuys, and boarded a fourteen-hour flight to Sydney, Australia, where Michael was on his HIStory tour. In Sydney, she was met at the airport and thereafter was promptly ensconced in the $2,750-a-night presidential suite at the Sheraton on the Park. An elated Michael confirmed they were expecting. Ten days later, on November 14, 1996, the two married.
• • •
His nurse makes amazing claim:
I’m having Jacko’s baby
NEW YORK POST
NOVEMBER 3, 1996
What Friends Are For: Debbie Rowe may not be the love of Michael Jackson’s peculiar life—but she’s a good enough pal to bear his child and to marry him
PEOPLE
DECEMBER 2, 1996
On February 13, 1997, Debbie gave birth to Michael Joseph Jackson at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Beverly Hills. The baby henceforth was called Prince, certainly not in honor of the pop star Prince—still not one of Michael’s favorites—but of Michael’s maternal grandfather. Debates will rage forever about the matter of conception, whether it was through artificial insemination or hot lovemaking. Michael and Rowe ignored the talk. By the end of the year, Debbie was pregnant again. On April 3, 1998, Rowe gave birth to a daughter, Paris-Michael Katherine. “Though the rumors are persistent,” the New York Post reported, “Jackson and his wife deny they are making babies the artificial (insemination) way, and insist they enjoy passion and romance.” Elizabeth was the godmother to the children, and though the media didn’t cover her relationship with them, she clearly was happy for Michael. Her relationship with Debbie Rowe was another matter. Before Debbie’s pregnancy, Michael had not introduced Elizabeth to her. His attitude apparently was that if Debbie wanted to meet Elizabeth, she could go do it on her own. Rowe told the story that she called Elizabeth’s office and even left her address. In return, she received a signed photograph from Elizabeth, thanking her for being such a supportive fan. Rowe took it with humor. Still, the story indicated a basic fact: close as Elizabeth and Michael were, they also had very separate lives. Elizabeth had her own family, to whom she was close.
Following the birth of Paris, Rowe’s days with Michael basically came to an end. They “never shared a home,” she later said. “We never shared an apartment.” Soon afterward the couple divorced. “I’m not into changing diapers,” said Rowe as she relinquished custody of Prince and Paris to Michael. Later it was revealed that after she and Michael were divorced, she was permitted only brief visits with her children. Specifically, she was limited to seeing her children for eight hours every forty-five days. “The meetings were held in hotels, under the watchful eye of a stern, overprotective nanny who didn’t want them to finger-paint because she feared they’d get dirty,” reported the New York Post. “The environment was sterile. It wasn’t a quality relationship,” said Rowe at one point.
Questions about Michael’s sexuality never went away. Stories ran rampant that not only was Rowe artificially inseminated but not even with Michael’s semen. At one point former child star Mark Lester was assumed to be the children’s father. Another day it was Arnold Klein.
• • •
In 1997, Elizabeth faced yet another threatening health crisis. When her lifelong migraines and blinding headaches became more frequent and more intense, she underwent tests that determined that she had a benign brain tumor. The surgery for its removal was scheduled. But Elizabeth had already committed to ABC for the broadcast of a celebrity-laden tribute of her sixty-fifth birthday, Happy Birthday Elizabeth . . . A Celebration of Life. The TV special would raise money for AIDS. “Elizabeth told me that her thoughts weren’t very clear and it probably wouldn’t be a good idea for her to do the celebration,” said her friend Carole Bayer Sager. “I asked her to cancel. I told her now is the time to take care of herself.” But whatever second thoughts she had, she decided to tape the television special first and enter the hospital the next day. Michael would be her escort at the event.
On February 16, the stars, the fans, the media were all on hand for one of the most glamorous and dramatically intense of Elizabeth and Michael’s public appearances. Exiting a limousine, she was resplendent in a green gown, her hair dark and lustrous, her smile dazzling. With the focus on Elizabeth and with Michael serving mainly as her gallant escort, he looked wide-eyed and jubilant with excitement as if it were his first noncontroversial public appearance in, well, a lifetime. For those standing behind the barricades and for those with the cameras and mikes, it was yet another drama in the incredible life of Elizabeth Taylor. Inside the auditorium, such stars as Madonna, John Travolta, Shirley MacLaine, Cher, Carol Burnett, Dennis Hopper, Patti LaBelle, Drew Barrymore, Roseanne Barr, Alec Baldwin, Kathy Bates, Hugh Grant, Arsenio Hall, and Paul Reiser all paid tribute. Michael performed a song he had written for Elizabeth, titled simply “Elizabeth I Love You.” Film clips showed her in classic roles and at the height of her celebrated beauty.
Yet there was a silent, interior drama that evening, and it was all within Elizabeth. For a woman who preferred not to look back, past memories were inevitable. Her father, Francis, had died in 1968. Her mother, Sara, had also died, at age ninety-nine in 1994. Her close friend and publicist Chen Sam had died in 1996, the year before the televised special. Underneath the optimistic facade, most likely there was doubt and apprehension. Despite her physicians’ assurances, she had absolutely no idea what lay ahead. Rarely did those watching her consider the realities she had to live with. Though composed and smiling, she may well have wanted the evening to end.
“I wasn’t ready to face this latest thing,” she later said.
“I haven’t lived a quiet life. I’ve lived dangerously. Sometimes disaster has come at me like a train. There have been times when I’ve almost drunk myself to death. . . . Yet some instinct, some inner force, has always saved me, dragging me back just as the train whooshed past.”
She also commented: “I sometimes give way to panic but not to despair. I never think of giving up. . . . I believe in life and I’ll fight for it.”
Most important, she said: “If the knife slips while I’m on that operating table tomorrow and I never wake up in this world again, I’ll die knowing I’ve had an extraordinary life.”
• • •
Elizabeth’s brain surgery was a success. Within the pages of Life’s cover story on her, she posed with her head shaven and her eyes all the more magnetic. For a time, she kept her head shaven, then let her hair grow in almost completely white, similar to her father’s. But her recuperation took time. Frightening dizzy spells occurred. Medication had to be changed. Quiet as it was kept, she suffered a minor stroke. There was concern about her traveling, especially by air. If any one medical crisis permanently altered Elizabeth Taylor’s life, it was the brain surgery. Frankly, her life would never be the same. Nor would Michael’s.
Chapter 20
* * *
MICHAEL’S LIFE WAS soon to take an irreversible turn. Living extravagantly, he had spent wildly over the years—on antiques, on art objects, on hotel suites. His expenses were staggering. He struggled to hold on to Neverland and eventually took out a $23 million mortgage on the home, He also supported Katherine, and in essence, some of his siblings. But his bank accounts were drained, and with mounting debts, he faced possib
le financial ruin. A battery of lawyers and accountants struggled to keep his lifestyle afloat or at least to prevent collapse. He also would hire a new brigade of attorneys, advisers, and financial investors. Frank DiLeo had been fired in 1989. By 2003, John Branca would be gone. In 1995, he sold Sony a 50 percent stake in the ATV music catalog for $100 million. In 1998, the year of Paris’s birth, he used his share of the catalog as collateral for a $140 million loan from Bank of America. But he continued to spend. In 1999, he paid $1.54 million for David O. Selznick’s Oscar for Outstanding Production (now known as Best Picture) for Gone With the Wind—simply a trifle.
By 2000, his credit line at Bank of America was up to $200 million. He was also in serious debt to Sony, which had advanced him large sums of money against future earnings of his albums. Though HIStory was commercially successful, by Michael’s standards and those of Sony executives, it was not the success they had hoped for. In time, Michael—to clear the debt—would pay $4 million a month to Sony. In time, Bank of America sold Michael’s loan to the Fortress Investment Group. With his creditors demanding money, he understood that they may also have had their eyes on his half of the ATV catalog, which was worth an estimated $1 billion.
• • •
Still, he often lived as if he didn’t have a financial care in the world.
In early May 2000, Michael traveled with his children; their nanny, Grace Rwaramba; and others to Monaco for the World Music Awards. There Prince Albert presented him with the Male Artist of the Millennium Award. Afterward, he went to London, where he visited his friend, actor Mark Lester, giving rise to stories again that Lester might be the biological father of his children. He was also in London because of Elizabeth.
With her four children, Elizabeth had flown to England, where she was honored by the queen (one Elizabeth honoring another Elizabeth) at Buckingham Palace. Elizabeth had been named a Dame Commander of the British Empire for “her services to acting and charity, recognizing her fundraising for AIDS research.” “This is the greatest honor of my life,” she said. “I didn’t think I was eligible, as I’ve lived in America for such a long time, but I’ve always felt I’ve taken my Britishness with me.” Other ceremonies followed. She was also honored by the British Film Institute with a BFI Fellowship at a dinner at the Dorchester, where she was staying. Two days later, on May 26, a musical tribute to her—called Dame Elizabeth Taylor: A Musical Celebration, with proceeds to go to AIDS research—was scheduled at Royal Albert Hall. The day before, Michael arrived at the Dorchester in a black van with blacked-out windows. Having heard that he’d be checking into the hotel, fans waited for hours outside the Dorchester to catch sight of him. At yet another of the big events in Elizabeth’s life, he was her escort at the musical tribute. As the two sat in a first-tier box near the stage, every eye in the concert hall focused on them. Onstage, such stars as Tony Bennett, Charles Aznavour, Debbie Harry, and Andrea Bocelli performed. As the evening drew to a close, Joan Collins stood onstage and introduced Elizabeth. The crowd rose to its feet at Elizabeth’s arrival. She spoke of the fight to continue to raise AIDS awareness. Then Michael walked onstage to present her with a lavish bouquet of white flowers. He did not perform. Instead, he hugged her and simply stood by her side on her night.
Afterward, Elizabeth and Michael returned to the Dorchester, where they spent time in the hotel’s shopping gallery, doing what else but perusing the jewelry showcases. Then they retired to their separate suites. Around 2:00 a.m. Michael left the hotel to go to Harrods. The department store opened especially for him. There he shopped for presents for Elizabeth. Upon returning to the Dorchester, he threw several written messages from the balcony of his suite to the enthusiastic fans, still gathered outside the hotel. The messages read:
Make sure all fans read this. Let s [sic] have a tabloid burning.
I love you. I miss you all. Let s [sic] destroy all tabloid [sic]. I hate them. Burn them.
Later that day, Michael left the Dorchester.
For Elizabeth, the festivities in London, especially her investiture by the queen, had indeed been glorious in the most personal sense. England remained her “old country.” Yet the celebrations took a toll on her. Though in good spirits, she had looked heavier, puffy, fragile, and not entirely comfortable. In all likelihood, she also realized Michael was not well, either.
• • •
In March 2001, Michael returned to England, where he was set to speak at the University of Oxford. The engagement had been arranged by Michael’s friend Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. Respected, lively, and knowledgeable, Boteach had previously served as a rabbi to Oxford’s students. He had met Michael in the summer of 1999 through a mutual friend, the Israeli illusionist and psychic Uri Geller. Becoming friends with Boteach and his wife and family, he spent two Thanksgivings holidays with them at their home in New Jersey. The Boteach family had visited Michael at Neverland during the summer of 2000. In some respects, Boteach had become a spiritual adviser, helping Michael put his life back in order. Michael also wanted the rabbi to help him in his efforts to improve the lives of children. The two had long conversations. Most significant, Michael agreed to let Boteach tape him in an extensive series of discussions—covering a range of topics about the pop star’s life and career. On the tapes, Michael often appeared genuine, earnest, perhaps a bit anxious to explain himself. Michael believed his love and concern for children was pure and innocent. The tapes might one day be used for a book. Obviously, he still sought to rehabilitate himself in the eyes of the public after the child molestation case. The speech at Oxford was part of those rehabilitation efforts.
A few weeks before he came to England, Michael had called Boteach, informing him that he had broken his foot while practicing a dance number. He was in pain. Upon arriving in England, Michael was accompanied by a physician as well as the adult Frank Cascio, who was now managing some of Michael’s affairs and was known as Frank Tyson. Michael was on crutches, and his foot was in a cast.
At Oxford, Michael, despite the injury, gave a very moving talk about love between parents and children—and the power of forgiving one another. He spoke of his own father, and the time when he realized he must forgive Joe for past behavior. Most touchingly, he remembered the occasion when—at a little carnival—Joe had lifted him and put him on a pony. For Michael it was an expression of his father’s love, a time when his father was gentle and caring with him. It was an impassioned speech, actually written by Boteach, that ended with the audience giving Michael a standing ovation.
In line with the message of the Oxford speech, shortly before Michael spoke, Boteach had urged Michael to call his father and say that he loved him. Using his cell phone, Michael reached Joe in Las Vegas and indeed did precisely that.
During the Oxford visit, Boteach became concerned about Michael’s well-being. Boteach noticed that Michael and his physician “would go together into his [Michael’s] room and emerge, about a half-hour later, with Michael looking glassy-eyed.”
The day following the speech, Michael—still in England—was best man at Uri Geller’s wedding, at which Rabbi Boteach officiated. Michael had arrived three hours late for the wedding. Otherwise, all seemed fine. But later, when Boteach was about to take his flight back to the States, he received a call from Michael, who was slurring his words. Boteach felt he was on something very strong. Thinking about other incidents, he recalled that Michael often had injuries, often complained of pain and seemed in need of medication. Sometimes he was woozy. On one occasion, his head drooped while at the home of a friend of Boteach’s. Because Michael often seemed spacey, the idea that some of this behavior was the result of possible medication or drugs had been ignored. In the months to come, Boteach observed Michael more closely, and he believed indeed that the superstar was on drugs. His conclusion was no different from Lisa Marie Presley’s. Nor was it different from Elizabeth’s observations when she had persuaded Michael to go into rehab. In all likelihood, Elizabeth detected Michael’s possible drug usa
ge again when at the tribute to her in London in May.
Katherine and Joe expressed their concern, too, when they invited Boteach to their Encino home to discuss Michael’s drug problem.
• • •
Still the consummate showman with a maddening desire now to revitalize his career and reline his dwindling coffers, he pulled together a major event: a two-part thirtieth-anniversary concert at New York’s Madison Square Garden, to be produced by his friend David Gest, set for September 7 and September 10, 2001, and scheduled to air later on CBS. It was also a way to promote his first—and long delayed—album in seven years, Invincible, due to be released on October 30. But before the actual concerts, behind-the-scenes problems flared up. Joe and Katherine again pushed for his brothers to be part of the celebration, but that wasn’t the only hassle for Michael. Set to address the audience, at Michael’s request, was his friend Marlon Brando, who reportedly asked for $1 million to be present. Though Michael had asked Elizabeth to be his date, she declined. There didn’t seem to be any way to convince her to appear.
But Michael was determined to persuade her to come. Said Cascio: “He never had to buy Elizabeth’s friendship or lobby for her presence at public events but when the spirit didn’t move her, Michael had a little trick up his sleeve, and it wasn’t rocket science. All it took was . . . you guessed it . . . diamonds. When Michael wanted Elizabeth to join him for an award show, or in this case, his thirtieth anniversary special, she was there for him contingent upon receipt of a diamond.”
What Cascio probably did not realize, nor even did Michael, was that she was in such poor health that it was ever harder to make public appearances. Since her trip to London for her investiture as a Dame Commander, she remained weak and fragile. In June, she had flown to Philadelphia to accept the Marian Anderson Award—named after the great African American contralto who had broken down racial barriers from the 1930s through the 1950s—for her work with AIDS. But now a flight from Los Angeles to New York would be difficult for her.