MJ (45 page)

At the Turnberry Isle luxury condominiums in Vegas, Phillips gave a presentation about AEG Live. Michael made a desperate play to sell the veteran promoters on movies instead of concerts, showing the AEG executives
Ghosts,
his fantastic 1996 short film in which he plays himself as well as an overweight, balding white man. Phillips listened politely, but he wanted the showman, not the filmmaker. He was experienced dealing with artists; he knew when to push and when to hang back. He waited patiently for MJ to come around.

In late 2008, Phillips’s meetings with Jackson started again. This time, thanks to Barrack’s counsel, Michael didn’t mention
Ghosts
. They inched toward a deal. Phillips predicted Michael could net
$1 million per show, after all his costs. AEG’s lawyers, Kathy Jorrie and Shawn Trell, negotiated
a deal with Tohme and attorneys Dennis Hawk and Peter Lopez—a 90–10 split, which meant Michael took home 90 percent of the net ticket sales and the promoters were left with 10. (That wasn’t counting AEG’s income on beer, popcorn, and parking, plus a share of lucrative ticket service charges, of course.) AEG agreed to give Michael an advance of
$5 million, $3 million of which went to settling his case with the Bahraini sheik, as well as a $15 million line of credit that he would pay back out of his salaries for the O2 shows. From that credit, AEG gave Michael $100,000 a month, or a maximum of $1.2 million, to rent a house, which wound up being in Los Angeles’s tony Holmby Hills—100 N. Carolwood Drive, a two-story mansion near Sunset Boulevard with plenty of privacy for his children, plus security, a nanny, and a chef. That worked for the Jackson family, even if it loaded Michael up with more debt that he’d have to recoup through the concert revenues. MJ prepared to leave Vegas.

E-mails between the AEG executives suggest a nervous optimism. AEG’s Paul Gongaware, another veteran promoter who’d worked with Michael as a
Dangerous
tour manager, sketched out a first-draft look at a worldwide tour, to begin in January 2009 and run through April 2011: thirty shows at London’s O2 Arena, then a total of 186 shows (including fourteen private ones, presumably for corporations) in arenas and stadiums throughout Europe, Australia, and the US. At 2.5 concerts per week, $100 per ticket, he predicted a gross of $275 million. MJ would receive
$132 million; production costs would be $108 million and AEG’s fee as promoter and producer $27 million. “It’s a big number, but this is not a number MJ will want to hear,” Gongaware e-mailed to his colleagues. “He thinks he is so much bigger than that.”

Michael met with AEG officials and Phil Anschutz at the billionaire’s personal villa at the Mansions at MGM Grand in Las Vegas in September 2008. Gongaware had warned his colleagues that MJ would want to talk about starring in movies, not performing 186 shows on a massive worldwide tour. Also, he advised: “I do not recommend wearing suits to the meeting as MJ is distrustful of people in suits.” (Phillips
wore a suit anyhow.) AEG officials liked what they heard, and in November, promoters within the company were making plans to route their other big touring stars, including Britney Spears and Kings of Leon, around what was still a fantasy itinerary for Michael Jackson’s comeback. Phillips arranged for a meeting with Jeffrey Katzenberg, the DreamWorks Animation mogul, to discuss what Michael was really interested in: a 3-D film version of
Thriller
, for which Anschutz had committed $1 million toward a script.
“For you, for sure,” Katzenberg responded to Phillips, “although there is zero chance that it’s something we will end up getting involved with.” During a relaxed hour-and-a-half meeting at Michael’s new rental home in Holmby Hills, Katzenberg methodically talked the singer out of his idea for the film. Phillips was grateful to Katzenberg for changing the subject. “You have a major AEG I.O.U. that can be cashed anytime,” he e-mailed the film mogul after the meeting.

AEG’s people waited through a long holiday vacation for Michael to make his decision on the shows.
“One hopes that MJ will see the light eventually,” accountant Timm Woolley wrote to his colleagues on December 10. Two days before Christmas, the staff passed around an e-mail glibly referring to journalist Ian Halperin’s widely circulated report that Michael had a potentially fatal condition that required an emergency lung transplant.
“He can have my lung later,” executive Dan Beckerman wrote, “if he plays the O2 now.” Finally, in early January, negotiations picked up again.
“MJ is getting very real,” Phillips wrote to colleagues. Gongaware outlined a new schedule of thirty-seven initial O2 shows, from July through early October. Many, internally, feared the worst:
“Do you think he can pull this off?” Beckerman wrote. Phillips responded,
“He has to, or financial disaster awaits”—a reference to Michael’s own potential financial disaster. On January 26, 2009, AEG’s Phillips, Gongaware, and Shawn Trell, as well as Michael’s reps Tohme,
Hawk, and Lopez, met with MJ at his house on Carolwood. They signed a tour contract. They drank champagne. Everybody hugged.

AEG then contacted Lloyd’s of London about buying a
$17.5 million insurance policy in case Jackson, who had a history of canceling shows and was not known to be in perfect health, became unreliable. The insurers insisted Michael take a five-hour physical by their own doctor, in New York. Phillips told every reporter Jackson
“passed with flying colors.” But Phillips’s wry, sunny disposition in the press masked a growing private concern about Michael’s health. AEG officials considered it curious that Michael’s handpicked doctor, Conrad Murray, immediately demanded $5 million, something the budget-conscious promoters told him was never going to happen. The promoters preferred a licensed doctor in London, but Michael insisted Murray was non-negotiable:
“This is the machine,” he told them, gesturing to his body. “We have to take care of the machine. This is what I want. I want Dr. Murray.” Only when AEG officials were in a car with Michael himself did Murray back down on his extravagant demand. “Offer him one fifty!” Michael instructed AEG’s Gongaware. The promoter dutifully called Murray and repeated the $150,000-per-month proposal. “No,” Murray responded, “I really couldn’t do that.” Gongaware snapped back, “That offer comes directly from the artist.” Murray abruptly changed his tone: “I’ll take it.”

Waiting for the AEG advances to come in, Michael was still desperate for capital. He made a deal with Darren Julien, owner of a high-end Beverly Hills auction house that had sold items from the estates of Johnny Cash, Jimi Hendrix, and Elvis Presley. Julien asked Michael what he wanted to sell, and the response was
“everything”—two thousand items he’d packed within the 2,700 acres of
Neverland Ranch, from statues to trash cans to cars. The Julien’s catalog showed a diverse cross-section of Michael Jackson’s wealth, erudite artistic tastes, and questionable home-decorating decisions. Glenna Goodacre’s bronze statue of a bound, long-haired American man, his feet sunk into concrete, would start between $150,000 and $250,000; the wrought-iron, gilded front gates of Neverland, emblazoned with a crown, Michael
Jackson’s name, and horse-covered crests, went for $20,000 to $30,000; the rest of the glitzy catalog included
X-Men
,
Simpsons
, and
Star Trek
pinball games and a 1999 Rolls-Royce limousine equipped with a big-screen TV. Costumes, gloves, MTV awards, childhood books—Michael left nothing out. Jay Ruckel, cofounder of La Crasia Gloves, who would design the “Billie Jean” glove for the This Is It tour, had his eye on a 1945 book called
Love of a Glove
that MJ had personally annotated.
“That was the ultimate glove-wearer in modern history,” Ruckel says. “I would do anything to look at that book. It’s probably still in a warehouse somewhere.”

Everything from the auction is probably still in a warehouse somewhere. Julien sent trucks to Neverland and personally visited the grounds some 125 times. His first impression was that a
“creative genius” must have built the place. He also noticed that while the main house was in pristine condition, ripped tarps were spread haphazardly over the bumper cars and grass grew into the bases of the rides. Neverland was in decay. “There was no question in our mind that he would never return to the property,” he said.

Julien packed up the items, meticulously inventoried them at his own expense, then stored them at warehouses. Then Michael told Julien he didn’t want to part with any of these things after all. Julien responded that he’d spent
$2 million in expenses and wanted his commission. Tohme, who’d brokered the auction deal between Jackson and Julien, was in the middle of the dispute. He sent a fixer,
James R. Weller, a veteran ad man who’d worked on election campaigns for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush. He was no help. Instead, Julien accused Weller, in court, of threatening his life.
^I
Michael fired Tohme, and the two stopped speaking. That made AEG executive Phillips’s life more
complicated—generally, the only way he could reach MJ was by calling Tohme. This was a problem, because the big This Is It press conference to announce the long-rumored tour was scheduled to take place at the O2 Arena on March 5, 2009.

AEG executives were concerned, to the point of hostility, about Michael’s behavior and its potential impact on their high-risk O2 plans.
“We cannot be forced into stopping this, which MJ will try to do because he is lazy and constantly changes his mind to fit his immediate wants,” Gongaware wrote. By the time the Jackson family was ready to travel to London for the press conference, Tohme
^II
was back on the team, but his relationship with Michael was tenuous. Then, at Michael’s hotel suite an hour before the scheduled three
P.M.
announcement at the O2 Arena, Tohme met with Phillips.

“We have a little issue,” he said. “Michael got drunk.”

Phillips seethed. Tohme suggested he would return to MJ’s room to sober up his star client. Phillips waited in the hall. Bodyguard Alberto Alvarez was stationed outside. Phillips sent an e-mail to his AEG colleagues that would later be leaked to the press:
“MJ is locked in his room drunk and despondent. Tohme and I are trying to get him sober and get him to the press conference.” His boss at AEG, Tim Leiweke, responded bluntly:
“Are you kidding me?”

Phillips approached the beefy Alvarez at Michael’s door.
“Alberto,” he said, “you’ve got to let me in. This is not good. This is a crisis situation.” Alvarez could see in Phillips’s face that this would not be a good time to keep him out, so the bodyguard stepped aside. Three thousand fans and 350 news crews were waiting at the O2.

Phillips found Michael sitting on the couch, wearing a robe and pants. He saw a bottle of what he assumed was booze on the floor. Jackson
opened up. He said he worried nobody would want to see him anymore. Phillips did his best to soothe him, speaking of all the fans who’d camped out overnight at the O2 for a chance to glimpse the King of Pop.

Finally, Michael emerged, in black slacks, boots, and a white V-neck T-shirt. Phillips sent another widely quoted e-mail to his colleagues:
“I screamed at him so loud the walls were shaking.” He described MJ as “an emotionally paralyzed mess riddled with self-loathing and doubt now that it is show time.” The ever-spinning Phillips claimed in court that he’d exaggerated in his e-mail, and had yelled at the King of Pop in a motivating, coachlike way.

The crew took a van to the O2 arena.
“And when he went through that curtain,” Phillips remembered, “there was Michael Jackson.” Standing behind a podium marked
MICHAEL JACKSON
, wearing aviator shades, he blew kisses, flashed fists and peace signs, and began with “I love you so much.”

The crowd chanted, “This is it!” and MJ cracked a smile. “These will be my final show performances, in London,” he said. “When I say ‘This is it,’ it really means ‘This is it.’ ” It was the first time many had seen him in years. His nose looked sculpted, his hair dyed, and his chin cleft deeper than ever. Before he turned to leave, he abruptly returned to the podium, as if magnetized there, smiling, preening, gesturing.

To prepare for the This Is It shows, Michael kept telling his people: “Bigger.” It was a familiar theme in his life. He’d said it about
Dangerous
-tour special effects, and he’d said it about the
HIStory
album. And it was how he felt about his homes—he tried to buy a forty-thousand-square-foot LA mansion for $93 million, until Phillips gently reminded him of his debt. Even the name “This Is It,” like
Thriller
or
Bad
, suggested a grandiosity to which Michael always aspired.
“When I’m on that stage,” he told promoters, “this is the place in the world to be.” He wanted special effects that had never been done before.
“That’s what motivated him,” Phillips said. His costume people created a
silver spacesuit with huge blue shiny diamonds and elaborate square robot shoulder pads,
plus
mirrored shoes and sunglasses containing three million individual Swarovski crystals. Jay Ruckel, the La Crasia glove designer, was enlisted to stitch together a one-handed “Billie Jean” glove containing
6,600 crystals. Bruce Jones, a visual effects supervisor who’d worked on three
Star Trek
TV series, met with Michael to discuss a series of short 3-D interactive films on a
130-by-30-foot LED-screen backdrop. Michael wanted butterflies coming out of a rainforest during “Earth Song” in such a vivid way that fans could reach out and touch them. “He had these great ideas, but they were all over the map,” recalls Jones, who spent sixteen-hour days aspiring to MJ’s vision. “I tried to place them into more of a linear format.” Michael asked for a live monkey scrambling down a tree, but Jones’s staff convinced him the show’s $6 million visual-effects budget couldn’t accommodate monkey food and training.

Michael picked Kenny Ortega, who’d worked with him on the
Dangerous
and
HIStory
tours, as the producer. (The star
paid 95 percent of Ortega’s salary.)
“MJ and I are already so in sync,” Ortega wrote to Gongaware in mid-March. For musical director, Ortega found Michael Bearden, a keyboardist from Chicago’s South Side who had worked with Madonna, Sting, and Whitney Houston. (MJ had called his first choice, old Jacksons friend Greg Phillinganes, to ask if he was interested, and the keyboardist responded, “Of
course
I’m interested.” But AEG stepped in and “prevented it from happening,” Phillinganes says—which annoyed Michael.
^III
) Travis Payne, Michael’s longtime choreographer who knew his steps so well that he often performed as a body double, also returned. Other familiar faces were brought in—drummer Jonathan “Sugarfoot” Moffett, Bashiri Johnson, a percussionist who’d played with Michael during the thirtieth-anniversary concerts in 2001, and Stacy Walker, a dancer and choreographer who’d worked on
Dangerous
and
HIStory
.
“He was thinner than I remembered seeing him,” Walker recalls. “Certainly
his energy wasn’t the same. Maybe his moves weren’t quite as sharp or dynamic.” This made sense, she figured—Michael Jackson may have been frozen in time as a twenty-five-year-old defying physics, but now he was fifty, a dancer with a new kind of grace.