'Why Jacko is not so wacko'
by Uri Geller
The crush inside the vast record store on Oxford Street was scary. I wanted to back out, but the bodyguards behind me had linked elbows. We had to push forwards, through the press of screaming, chanting faces: "My-curl, My-curl, Mycurl!" People were laughing and crying at the same time.
A young man was jostled to the front of the crowd, a mobile phone pressed to his ear. He was yelling: "You won't believe this, Mum! Michael Jackson is right in front of me, I wish you could see him!" And Michael reached out gently, took the phone and whispered: "Hi, who is this? Yes, really, this is me." The chanting hushed as the whole store strained to hear Michael's murmured conversation. I heard him say: "I love you more," and then he handed back the phone and the screaming started again.
Outside, a surge of fans almost knocked an elderly woman off her feet as Michael emerged. There were at least 2,000 people, and for the woman - who was simply a passer-by - this must have been terrifying.
What happened next, you may not believe. I have proof, because my brother-in-law, Shipi, was filming us from the "chase" car, the bodyguard vehicle parked behind Michael's limo.
Michael Jackson, whose 44th birthday it is today, is a big man. In my imagination, before I met him, he was a man-child, but in reality he is nearly six feet tall with hands like a baseball catcher. He reached out to steady the woman, and then half-led, half-carried her to the cars.
The throng was too tight around the limo, so Michael ushered her into the chase car, and Shipi kept filming as Michael, very shyly, very formally, introduced himself.
The woman, who might have been 80, acted with the poise characteristic of her generation and politely demanded to be taken to her friend's house in Wimpole Street. So the biggest-selling black artist in history turned bus boy, and, as they inched through the traffic, Michael told her all about his beloved children, and how badly he missed them.
It's not as though I've known him for ever. Back when the Jackson Five were ruling the charts, and when Michael was storming to the King of Pop's throne, I would have loved to have met him. He just never went to parties.
And when enemies turned on him in the Nineties, I could smell the stench of an Establishment fit-up, because I'd taken a serious kicking from people who used the same foul weapons - slander campaigns, innuendo, trial by media. I thank God the mudslingers haven't aimed the kind of dirt and filth at me that Michael has suffered.
We were introduced by Mohammed Fayed, who is happy to be the man who owns Michael's favourite shop. People ask where Mo gets the millions to finance Fulham FC - they haven't seen Michael go shopping. He cuts a swathe through department stores like a bulldozer in a china shop. And I mean bulldozer: whole counters are wiped clean, especially Star Wars merchandise.
Michael adores Star Wars. For our first meeting, I flew to New York, where he was recording Invincible, his $30 million album, which was finally released last year. I checked into the Waldorf Astoria, where he was staying that week. His bodyguard phoned ahead to let him know I was on my way up, but when I knocked on his door, nobody stirred. It was ajar. I entered nervously, calling out his name. Thousands of photographs, toys and little treasures, all of them gifts from fans, were scattered around a vast suite. Life-size Star Wars cutouts stood guard.
When he walked out of his bedroom, with his hair pulled back and his skin clean of make-up, my heart lurched. I had been unconsciously prepared for facial scars, even deformity, because of the constant drip-drip of lies and slanders. In fact, his face is strong and serene, and his skin is beautiful - shining, almost translucent. He glows with an aura of energy.
His shirt was open, revealing a lithe chest. All the clever words I had rehearsed fell away: I said his name, he said mine and we embraced. I knew at this moment that I had found a lifelong friend.
He asked me to design part of his CD's artwork. Later, we took his children to a private screening of Star Wars Episode I, The Phantom Menace.
Michael was agog in the seat next to me, whispering his favourite lines, then suddenly he sneaked away to the back of the cinema, blissed out in his dolllike dancing, grooving to the soundtrack of Star Wars.
He slips into fragments of song all the time - in the lift, in hotel corridors, in the car. Just as it is a revelation to watch him dancing for fun, it is insanely wonderful to hear that voice swinging a few bars of some soul standard.
Now there is open warfare with his record company, Sony. Industry insiders believe the real issue is not Michael's career but his ownership of the richest back catalogue in the business - the Lennon-McCartney songs. He also believes the Beatles rights are a bagatelle beside his own crown jewels - his kids.
When he flew to England in June for his Exeter speech, he desperately wanted to bring his children. And knew he couldn't. The paparazzi would have ripped him apart to get pictures of those beautiful children. I believe Michael envies what John Lennon did when Sean was born, stepping back from his career and spending four or five years as a full-time parent.
The brutal ambition of his father for the Jackson children is well known. I have never asked Michael about his childhood, but my mother's ancestor, Sigmund Freud, would not have found it difficult to see the connection between a childhood all at sea on heaving emotions, and a father who insists on being a rock for his own children. For such a gently spoken man, Michael is hard as granite when protecting his son and his daughter.
He also changes his hotel room every few days, and I have to remember next time I call to ask for Mr Robinson instead of Mr Brown or Mr Williams. With each switch, he checks all the drawers and cupboards himself.
"Lost your passport?" I joked once.
"I don't want to leave any gifts behind," he told me earnestly. He keeps everything his fans give him. I couldn't credit this at first, but he truly keeps everything, and always has. If you ever gave Michael a drawing, or a letter, or a soft toy, a jewellery case overflowing with diadems or a plastic hat from McDonald's, he has kept it. "I have packets of M&Ms from 30 years ago," he promised me.
"Some day, I'll build a museum for it all."
Last week, I was talking with senior engineers from a space agency about a plan to finance a base on the moon by enrolling some of America's super-rich into a private space race.
The idea was Michael's: "I want to moonwalk," he said one day, and I told him not to be embarrassed about dancing when I was around. "No, see, really. I want to walk on the moon." There is no doubt that this extraordinary man will get exactly what he wants. The man in the moon better expect a visit. And the suits in the music industry can expect more rockets too.
Copyright Uri Geller 2002. Visit Uri at
www.urigeller.com
(nn mi kiedete la traduzione,poiche nn l ho letto nemmeno io,sorry!;))