Michael Jackson yesterday made an official complaint to TV watchdogs over the controversial documentary on his life, and angrily accused interviewer Martin Bashir of ”utterly betraying” him.
The singer’s lawyers complained to the independent television commission and the broadcasting standards commission, claiming he had been ”unfairly treated”.
His legal team also claimed that Living With Michael Jackson, broadcast on ITV1 on Monday night, infringed his privacy — though the usually reclusive star granted unprecedented access to the journalist. The film was seen by more than 15-million Britons on ITV1.
The self-styled King of Pop had hoped to win the kind of public sympathy earned by Bashir’s most famous subject, Diana, Princess of Wales, in her Panorama television proramme interview. But after watching the film and coming under fire from critics, the singer tried to preempt its first American screening on ABC last night by calling it a ”gross distortion” of his life.
The response of the US media to previews of the programme was in contrast to the reception it got from the British press, with many reviewers attacking Bashir and expressing sympathy for Jackson. The New York Times referred to the reporter’s ”callous self-interest masked as sympathy”, and USA Today described his interviewing style as ”unduly intrusive”.
Jackson accused Bashir of broadcasting ”sensationalised innuendo” that could lead viewers to conclude that he abused children. The singer last night complained to the two commissions that regulated British television.
The charities Barnardo’s and the NSPCC yesterday criticised him after he admitted to Bashir that he still let children sleep at his home, sometimes in his bed, despite his 1993 costly out-of-court settlement over abuse allegations — which he denied.
The 44-year-old star said in a videotaped statement yesterday: ”Martin Bashir persuaded me to trust him that his would be an honest and fair portrayal of my life, and told me he was ‘the man that turned Diana’s life around’.
”Today I feel more betrayed than perhaps ever before — that someone, who had got to know my children, my staff and me, whom I let into my heart and told the truth, could then sacrifice the trust I placed in him and produce this terrible and unfair programme.
”Everyone who knows me will know the truth, which is that my children come first in my life and that I would never harm any child.”
Jackson also alleged that he thought Bashir and the network Granada had promised not to show his three children in the show. Granada denies the claim, and points out that Prince Michael I, Paris, and Prince Michael II, were shown with their faces obscured.
”Michael is devastated and feels utterly betrayed by [the film], which he regards as a gross distortion of the truth and a tawdry attempt to misrepresent his life and his abilities as a father,” his spokesman said. ”Michael Jackson has never, and would never, treat a child inappropriately or expose them to any harm.”
He condemned the programme as a ”salacious ratings chaser, designed to celebrate Martin Bashir, which was indifferent to the effect on Michael personally, his family, and his close friends”. Many viewers were disturbed by the way Jackson handled his children and the fact that the youngsters apparently do not see the women who bore them.
Yesterday Debbie Rowe, Jackson’s ex-wife and the mother of his two eldest children, told GMTV that no one could be a better father. ”It breaks my heart that anyone could truly believe Michael would do anything to harm our children, they are the most important thing in his life.”
Jackson also won support from a British mother, Gaynor Morgan, who said that all the good work the American singer had done for children’s charities over many years had been ”forgotten” because of one ”manipulated” interview.
To show her faith in the star she planned to send her own son Alex (10) to stay at Jackson’s Neverland Valley mansion. Morgan said: ”I was very, very impressed with Michael Jackson and thought he came across as a very loving, kind person.”
Jackson’s outburst is unlikely to disturb Granada, which has made millions from selling broadcast rights to overseas television channels; the affair has whipped up extra publicity for the show. A spokesman for Granada said the programme was ”a truthful, open and intimate portrayal of many aspects of Michael Jackson’s extraordinary life”.
Jackson has profited from the controversy. Sales of Thriller shot up by 500% on Tuesday compared with the previous week, and his greatest hits package HIStory rocketed by 1,000% at HMV stores. – Guardian Unlimited Â