Michael's World

Nobody ever said Michael Jacskson wasn't weird. Tucked away behind the gates of the California ranch he calls "Neverland," the Howard Hughes of pop rarely goes out in public. But his 2,700-acre spread, with its carousel and Ferris wheel, its petting zoo and miniature railroad, is full of enticements for this lonely man's favorite companions-children. And it's a suitably surreal environment for containing the huge contradictions in his own life: he's a 35-year-old boy who won't grow up; a once handsome young guy who's used surgery and cosmetics to make his face look pasty and bizarrely androgynous; a pop icon whose giggly, wispy offstage persona is at odds with the performer who ("Aow! Ooh! Tee-hee-hee") grabs his crotch and sings, Give it when I want it/'Cause I'm on fire/quench my desire. Only his close pal Elizabeth Taylor doesn't think Michael is way out there. "He is the least weird man I've ever known," she told Oprah.

 

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Until last week the eccentricities of the global superstar sounded pretty harmless. Then word leaked out that the Los Angeles Police Department was investigating allegations that Jackson had sexually abused a 13-year-old boy. Whether or not charges will be brought—and the evidence by the end of the week was not conclusive—this is the kind of accusation that leaves a nasty stain, no matter what, and could bring down the biggest pop star in America since Elvis. And, even more than Elvis, Michael's electrifying persona moonwalking across concert stages and dancing through music videos-has made him huge export, famous all over the world, music's Schwarzenegger. "Thriller," with 40 million copies sold, is the biggest-selling record of all time, but even his current release "Dangerous," considered disappointing, has sold 20 million copies. When the scandal broke out last week, Michael was reported to be in negotiations with Sony, his record label, to improve his $65 million megadeal. The incident could seriously hurt that relationship, and is even more likely to damage his multimillion-dollar endorsement deals with such sponsors as Pepsi (box).

For Michael, whose worldwide fans include legions of young children, the allegations also mean an end to innocence. We watched him grow up, an amazing little man-child, strutting across the stage, singing "I Want You Back," with his big brothers in the Jackson Five backing him up. When he went solo, we bought 11 million copies of "Off the Wall," then "Thriller" made him the biggest pop star in history. When Oprah Winfrey interviewed him, 62 million viewers made it the highest-rated TV show in six years. Until now he seemed almost scandal-proof, a fragile pop dweeb who once likened himself to "a hemophiliac who can't afford to be scratched in any way." He lived with his mom until he was 29. Raised a Jehovah's Witness, he never had a reputation for drinking or taking drugs, and his only public "romance" was with Brooke Shields, another former child star who wears her chasteness like a badge. When Oprah asked if he was a virgin, he replied, "I'm a gentleman." When news of the police probe broke, Jackson had just opened the Bangkok leg of his "Dangerous" tour. "I'm confident the...investigation...will demonstrate that there was no wrongdoing on my part," Michael said in a statement: then he canceled that night's concert, claiming illness.

Young defenders: The first friends to rush to Jackson's defense were all too young to vote—and they cast a bright light into intensely private corners of his life. Two boys who said they were his friends claimed the accusations couldn't be true because each had shared his bed without being molested. When Los Angeles Police searched the Neverland ranch for evidence, Brett Barnes, 11, was staying there with his family. "[Michael] is like a best friend," Brett said, "except he's big." Brett told reporters he'd slept with Michael, but said, "He slept on one side and I slept on the other. It was a big bed." Wade Robson, 10, said that he spent the night with the pop star, but they were dressed in pajamas and "just went to sleep." Sometimes there were other kids in bed, too, like a "slumber party" A slumber party of children with a grown-up man may not be criminal but it sure is creepy.

Jackson's friendships with young children were already legendary. Michael used to carry TV's Emmanuel Lewis with him everywhere to award shows, on "dates" with Brooke Shields. More recently, Macaulay Culkin seemed to be his best buddy: "Macaulay spends all his vacations" at Neverland, Michael told Life magazine. (Culkin reportedly was interviewed last week by police but denied that Michael had ever behaved inappropriately.) Other kids have joined Michael on trips to Disney World or Europe. "I love being around [kids]," Jackson wrote in his 1988 memoir, "Moonwalk." "They aren't jaded. They get excited by things we've forgotten to get excited about anymore." The boy who accused Jackson of sexual abuse was treated to $1,500 worth of toys in one day. He was also Michael's guest, along with his mother and half sister, on a trip to the World Music Awards in Monaco last June; on another trip to Las Vegas, he and Michael holed up in the hotel, watching "The Exorcist" in bed. According to a report filed with the Los Angeles County Department of Children's Services, what began as innocent sleep-overs in pajamas led to baths together and eventually fondling and oral sex. "One time he was kissing me and put his tongue in my mouth, and I said, don't do that," said the boy in the report, according to the Los Angeles Times. "[Michael] started crying."

But was Michael the victimizer or the victim? Longtime family acquaintance Joyce McRae-Moore protested, "His vocal projection comes across as frail, fragile, almost feminine. You don't exactly hear testosterone. But that doesn't qualify him for the pedophile Hall of Fame." The Jackson camp jumped into action. Hotshot lawyer Howard Weitzman, hired by Jackson just a week ago, led the offensive: at a press conference at his office, private detective Anthony Pellicano charged that it was all a $20 million extortion plot. Weitzman talked to reporters about another underlying story: the boy was the object of a bitter custody battle. He is the son of a prominent Beverly Hills dentist and screenwriter who co-wrote the current Mel Brooks spoof, "Robin Hood: Men in Tights" (based, said Brooks, on the son's idea). The youth told his dad about the alleged Jackson actions; the father, in court papers, reportedly demanded his ex-wife bar the star from contact with their son. "I have the sense that because Michael was the focus of a lot of the young boy's attention," says Weitzman, spinning a scenario of a jealous absent father, "that there was a tremendous amount of emotion by the father, who attempted to end the relationship."

Meanwhile, the boy's mom, now married to the Rent-A-Wreck car-rental tycoon, won a judgment ordering the father to pay $68,800 in back child support and interest last week. She hadn't suspected any abuse, her lawyer told NEWSWEEK. But her exhusband took the kid to a shrink, who reported the alleged incidents to the child-services department, as required by law. According to Weitzman, the father had tried to set up a $20 million movie-production deal with Jackson and an extortion attempt was made. (The father would not comment to NEWSWEEK; the only interview he granted last week was to The National Enquirer.)