2009-06-28
Maureen Orth's 5 articles for Vanity Fair on Michael Jackson
0 comments"We're still very primitive, we are animals with the power of choice, not Gods with the power of nature." - Jude Calvert-Toulmin
Having just returned from London after exhibiting my photographs of Sade at sculptor Guy Portelli's Pop Icons exhibition, an exhibition in which Michael Jackson did not appear alongside the subjects John Lennon, Amy Winehouse, Johnny Lee Hooker, Bob Marley or Miles Davis, the only person I now want to talk about with respect to the passing of Jacko, is Maureen Orth. (For regular readers, I'll be posting a report and photos from the Pop Icons exhibition later on this week.)
Maureen Orth
Maureen Orth is an award winning journalist, a Special Correspondent for Vanity Fair Magazine, and the founder of the K12 Wired Foundation which promotes advanced learning in technology and English at The Marina Orth School in Medellin, Colombia. Orth first helped to build the school in the sixties as a Peace Corps volunteer... more about Maureen Orth.
I've been reading Maureen Orth's articles about Michael Jackson in Vanity Fair for years. Just as I always follow the fabulous Dominick Dunne, whose commentary on the OJ trial was always spot on, I feel that Maureen Orth got to the heart of the matter with Jackson years ago. She wrote on the Vanity Fair homepage two days ago:
"In August 1993, I was on the beach in Nantucket when I was told that Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter was trying to reach me: Michael Jackson had just been accused of child molestation by a 13-year-old boy. Thus began an odyssey of 12 years in which I wrote five lengthy articles for the magazine about the trials and tribulations of this music icon whose fame had literally deformed him.
I spoke to hundreds of people who knew Jackson and, in the course of my reporting, found families who had given their sons up to him and paid dearly for it. I found people who had been asked to supply him with drugs. I even found the business manager who told me on-the-record how he had had to wire $150,000 to a voodoo chief in Mali who had 42 cows ritually sacrificed in order to put a curse on David Geffen, Steven Spielberg, and 23 others on Jackson’s enemies list. I sat through two trials and watched his bizarre behavior on the stand when he said he did not recognize his publicist of a decade.
One of the reasons I endured this not-fun circus was that, when I began, I was the mother of a boy roughly the same age as the ones Jackson was so interested in spending the night with. His behavior truly troubled me. Understandably, in the wake of his death, there are those who do not want to hear these sad facts. Yet nothing that Vanity Fair printed was ever challenged legally by Jackson or his associates.
A man who made great music and entertained brilliantly has died. I’ve been told that he had endured an eight-hour rehearsal and was in rare form on the stage the night before his death. I’ve also been told that the lawyers swooped in yesterday to retrieve all the videos that had been made of these rehearsals. I believe the aftermath of his death will probably be as messy as his life was. I loved his music. Offstage, he could not escape his tragic flaw."
Below: Maureen Orth talking about Michael Jackson on msnbc.com:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Maureen Orth's articles for Vanity Fair, direct links:
Nightmare in Neverland - January 1994
The Jackson Jive - September 1995
Losing His Grip - April 2003
Neverland's Lost Boys - March 2004
CSI Neverland - July 2005
People are behaving in the USA as though this is the crucifixion of Jesus, some messianic world changing figure. Will Jackson be remembered as a "controversial figure of history", as is the self-indulgent and cruel Henry VIII 500 years after his death? Henry VIII eradicated whatever suited him, art, architecture, books and wives. He was a cruel despot and I personally wouldn't spit on the fat fuck's grave. But he did change history and he did challenge the power of the church. Jacko was a musician and performer, nothing more, he did not change the world, he was a middle aged man who openly admitted to sleeping with teenage boys and I wouldn't spit on his grave either, no matter how great his music. People should be remembered for acts of great kindness, not for the theft of others' lives, bodies or spirits. Ah, but we're still very primitive, we are animals with the power of choice, not Gods with the power of nature...
LINKS more useful than faffing around on Twitter for hours (although I may tweet the links, ironically!)
K12 Wired Foundation - Maureen Orth's passion - the mission of the K12 Wired Foundation in the United States and the Marina Orth Foundation in Colombia is to provide a superior, modern education specializing in English and information technology and leadership to children who would otherwise be denied this opportunity. We emphasize hands on learning, teacher training and the use of the computer to unleash creative energy so that communities which traditionally did not have much hope of advancing can compete globally.
Dominick Dunne site. Dominick is undergoing treatment for cancer so if you are an admirer of his work I'm sure he would love to hear from you!
After The Party - superb documentary about Dominick Dunne by independent filmmakers Kirsty de Garis and Timothy Jolley.
© Jude Calvert-Toulmin 2009
If you have been involved in a fatal road crash and would like to tell your story for CRASH, a forthcoming non-fiction book, please contact Jude at Fleur De Lys Publishing. 0 commentsWhat next?
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