A white man is playing Michael Jackson in a TV movie and the internet is angry
White British actor Joseph Fiennes will play the late singer in a one-off UK television comedy. That’s not gone down well with some web users, but others have defended the choice
On February 10, 1993, clad in a dazzling red shirt, black epaulettes and a black armband, Michael Jackson walked across one of the many rooms of his Neverland Ranch in Santa Ynez Valley, California. Striding past what appeared to be an enormous portrait of himself in Elizabethan garb, Jackson was there to meet a guest – Oprah Winfrey – and unburden himself.
Even before allegations surfaced claiming the star had sexually abused children – as they did later that year – it seemed there were a lot of stories circulating about the King of Pop. And, live on national television before an audience of 90 million people, Jackson wanted to set the record straight.
Did he sleep in an oxygen chamber? No, Jackson said. Had he purchased the Elephant Man’s bones? No, Jackson said. (“Where am I going to put some bones?”) And did he want a white kid to play him in a Pepsi commercial?
Jackson sighed. Then he got mad. Or, perhaps, as mad as Michael Jackson got.
“That is so stupid,” he told Oprah. “That’s the most ridiculous, horrifying story I’ve ever heard. It’s crazy.”
