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American Morning
Interview With 'Vanity Fair' Writer
Aired March 05, 2003 - 08:16 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: It seems Michael Jackson just can't stay out of the headlines. The latest story, an account in "Vanity Fair," says that Jackson hired a voodoo priest to put death curse on Steven Spielberg and David Geffen. Last night on "Larry King Live," Michael's sister, LaToya, who we haven't seen on TV in quite a while, came to her brother's defense.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LARRY KING, HOST: Now, there's a new "Vanity Fair" article out by Maureen Orth, a very good writer who's covered a lot of things for that magazine. She's married to Tim Russert of NBC. And it alleges that Michael hired a voodoo priest -- I don't know if you've heard about this -- to put a deadly curse on David Geffen and Steven Spielberg. The article claims Michael paid $150,000 to a West African Shaman who ritually slaughtered 42 cows in Mali to invoke the curse.
What do you make of this?
LATOYA JACKSON: I know absolutely nothing about that.
KING: Does it shock you?
JACKSON: That does because it doesn't sound like Michael at all. It doesn't sound like him whatsoever. So this is a shock just to hear that.
KING: So you, it would be...
JACKSON: I can't imagine him doing that, Larry.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ZAHN: So what's the real story with Michael Jackson?
Let's ask Maureen Orth, who wrote the article in "Vanity Fair." Does he really wear a prosthetic nose and what about those voodoo curses?
Good morning.
Good to see you.
MAUREEN ORTH, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, "VANITY FAIR": Thank you.
ZAHN: Let's start off with the voodoo curses.
ORTH: Yes?
ZAHN: What was it he was trying to do and who did he see to get it done?
ORTH: Well, he evidently in the summer of 2000, he -- he's always been surrounded by strange sort of people that come to him. And he had a woman from the Middle East come to him and say she could turn millions of dollars into hundreds of millions of dollars if he would just pay hundreds of thousands of dollars. And then she got him involved with these voodoo priests and he had three separate ceremonies that I know about. One, he was cleansed in blood, with sheep's blood. In another one, he had, he paid $150,000 to have 42 cows ritually sacrificed in Africa so he could curse his enemies and be blessed. And two of his enemies were David Geffen and Steven Spielberg.
ZAHN: And why were they so high on his list?
ORTH: I don't know that for certain, but I know that David Geffen did manage him some time in the mid-'90s when his career was taking a dive and he's always wanted to be in the movies and he's had a couple of projects with Steven Spielberg that have never turned out.
But most of the people on the list were people that he worked closely with.
ZAHN: When you say that cows were sacrificed in Africa, where did these ceremonies take place?
ORTH: Well, his...
ZAHN: The first one and the second one.
ORTH: The ceremonies took place in Geneva, in Switzerland, and the cows were, he had, they had to send a money transfer to Africa to get the cows done. And then there were, there was a third ceremony that didn't happen where they had other animals assembled on the French-Swiss border that were also supposed to be killed for another blessing.
ZAHN: Steven Spielberg and David Geffen are alive and well.
ORTH: Right.
ZAHN: Which makes me move on to the question of Mr. Jackson's finances.
ORTH: Yes.
ZAHN: He is a couple hundred million dollars in debt.
ORTH: That's right.
ZAHN: Is that what this was supposed to be all about...
ORTH: I think it probably... ZAHN: Trying to turn $100 bills into whatever he thought he was going to turn them into?
ORTH: Millions of dollars, yes. Exactly. I don't know, he's about $240 million in debt and the loan will come due in a couple of years. And he's pledged his Beatles song book, which he co-owns with Sony Records, his record company, as his asset. And Sony will be able to buy that from him if he isn't able to come up with the money, which he probably, I don't think, will ever be able to come up with that.
ZAHN: So does his desperation for cash help explain these voodoo rights?
ORTH: Well, you could make that conclusion. I don't know that. You'd have to ask Michael that.
ZAHN: Let's move on to the plastic surgery fund. Now, Michael, on television in his latest documentary, admitted to having two procedures and yet just last week we spoke with the head of his security at one point, named Robert Wegner.
And here's what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERT WEGNER, FORMER CHIEF OF SECURITY: I saw his plastic surgeon 15 or 20 times in that three years out there and he would spend two or three hours in the house before he'd leave. And when he was done, Michael would have the mask on. So I knew work had been done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZAHN: What have you learned about the number of plastic surgeries he had?
ORTH: I don't know about the exact numbers, but I do know I was talking to people that once you have so many surgeries and your skin becomes cauterized and the blood can't come to the skin, it turns black and can fall off. And so I've talked to people who saw that Michael had no tip left to his nose and he has to wear a little piece on the end of it. And if you see him without the device on, he just looks like a mummy with two nostril holes, is what it was described to me.
ZAHN: You talked about this big loan coming due. He also faces the prospect of more lawsuits from the families of young boys who spent time at Neverland Ranch. Come back to the very first sex abuse case that got so much attention. What have you learned about that case?
ORTH: Well, I began working on that in 1993 when the allegations first surfaced. And what happened was that he was at the time 35 or 37 years old and he slept in the same room in the same bed with a 12 and 13-year-old boy for 30 nights in a row and traveled all over the world with him. And certainly the boy was able to draw precisely certain markings on Michael Jackson's genitalia.
In order to avoid arrest, the prosecutors made a deal with him and said come voluntarily and be photographed so we can see whether the boy's telling the truth or not. He didn't want to be photographed. He finally was forced to be photographed and the photographs absolutely matched what the boy drew.
That enabled the lawyer for the boy, who was suing him civilly, to collect over $25 million. At the same time, there were so many threats and harassment of the boy's family, of his lawyer, who had to get guards and of witnesses, and they had gone back a decade, one prosecutor told me, and found at least a boy for every year of the decade previous that was his "special friend."
ZAHN: Wow.
We've got 10 seconds left. I know you've tracked a lot of unusual characters over the years. Where does Michael Jackson fit in?
ORTH: Well, I think he's right up there. You see, it's very important, he wants you to believe that he's not like a real human being, so he doesn't have to be judged. He wants you to think he's some strange creature so he doesn't have to be judged as a middle-aged man who sleeps with little boys.
ZAHN: Well, your latest piece in "Vanity Fair" is fascinating.
Thanks for dropping by to share a little of it with us this morning.
ORTH: Thank you.
ZAHN: Maureen Orth.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired March 5, 2003 - 08:16 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: It seems Michael Jackson just can't stay out of the headlines. The latest story, an account in "Vanity Fair," says that Jackson hired a voodoo priest to put death curse on Steven Spielberg and David Geffen. Last night on "Larry King Live," Michael's sister, LaToya, who we haven't seen on TV in quite a while, came to her brother's defense.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LARRY KING, HOST: Now, there's a new "Vanity Fair" article out by Maureen Orth, a very good writer who's covered a lot of things for that magazine. She's married to Tim Russert of NBC. And it alleges that Michael hired a voodoo priest -- I don't know if you've heard about this -- to put a deadly curse on David Geffen and Steven Spielberg. The article claims Michael paid $150,000 to a West African Shaman who ritually slaughtered 42 cows in Mali to invoke the curse.
What do you make of this?
LATOYA JACKSON: I know absolutely nothing about that.
KING: Does it shock you?
JACKSON: That does because it doesn't sound like Michael at all. It doesn't sound like him whatsoever. So this is a shock just to hear that.
KING: So you, it would be...
JACKSON: I can't imagine him doing that, Larry.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ZAHN: So what's the real story with Michael Jackson?
Let's ask Maureen Orth, who wrote the article in "Vanity Fair." Does he really wear a prosthetic nose and what about those voodoo curses?
Good morning.
Good to see you.
MAUREEN ORTH, SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, "VANITY FAIR": Thank you.
ZAHN: Let's start off with the voodoo curses.
ORTH: Yes?
ZAHN: What was it he was trying to do and who did he see to get it done?
ORTH: Well, he evidently in the summer of 2000, he -- he's always been surrounded by strange sort of people that come to him. And he had a woman from the Middle East come to him and say she could turn millions of dollars into hundreds of millions of dollars if he would just pay hundreds of thousands of dollars. And then she got him involved with these voodoo priests and he had three separate ceremonies that I know about. One, he was cleansed in blood, with sheep's blood. In another one, he had, he paid $150,000 to have 42 cows ritually sacrificed in Africa so he could curse his enemies and be blessed. And two of his enemies were David Geffen and Steven Spielberg.
ZAHN: And why were they so high on his list?
ORTH: I don't know that for certain, but I know that David Geffen did manage him some time in the mid-'90s when his career was taking a dive and he's always wanted to be in the movies and he's had a couple of projects with Steven Spielberg that have never turned out.
But most of the people on the list were people that he worked closely with.
ZAHN: When you say that cows were sacrificed in Africa, where did these ceremonies take place?
ORTH: Well, his...
ZAHN: The first one and the second one.
ORTH: The ceremonies took place in Geneva, in Switzerland, and the cows were, he had, they had to send a money transfer to Africa to get the cows done. And then there were, there was a third ceremony that didn't happen where they had other animals assembled on the French-Swiss border that were also supposed to be killed for another blessing.
ZAHN: Steven Spielberg and David Geffen are alive and well.
ORTH: Right.
ZAHN: Which makes me move on to the question of Mr. Jackson's finances.
ORTH: Yes.
ZAHN: He is a couple hundred million dollars in debt.
ORTH: That's right.
ZAHN: Is that what this was supposed to be all about...
ORTH: I think it probably... ZAHN: Trying to turn $100 bills into whatever he thought he was going to turn them into?
ORTH: Millions of dollars, yes. Exactly. I don't know, he's about $240 million in debt and the loan will come due in a couple of years. And he's pledged his Beatles song book, which he co-owns with Sony Records, his record company, as his asset. And Sony will be able to buy that from him if he isn't able to come up with the money, which he probably, I don't think, will ever be able to come up with that.
ZAHN: So does his desperation for cash help explain these voodoo rights?
ORTH: Well, you could make that conclusion. I don't know that. You'd have to ask Michael that.
ZAHN: Let's move on to the plastic surgery fund. Now, Michael, on television in his latest documentary, admitted to having two procedures and yet just last week we spoke with the head of his security at one point, named Robert Wegner.
And here's what he had to say.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ROBERT WEGNER, FORMER CHIEF OF SECURITY: I saw his plastic surgeon 15 or 20 times in that three years out there and he would spend two or three hours in the house before he'd leave. And when he was done, Michael would have the mask on. So I knew work had been done.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ZAHN: What have you learned about the number of plastic surgeries he had?
ORTH: I don't know about the exact numbers, but I do know I was talking to people that once you have so many surgeries and your skin becomes cauterized and the blood can't come to the skin, it turns black and can fall off. And so I've talked to people who saw that Michael had no tip left to his nose and he has to wear a little piece on the end of it. And if you see him without the device on, he just looks like a mummy with two nostril holes, is what it was described to me.
ZAHN: You talked about this big loan coming due. He also faces the prospect of more lawsuits from the families of young boys who spent time at Neverland Ranch. Come back to the very first sex abuse case that got so much attention. What have you learned about that case?
ORTH: Well, I began working on that in 1993 when the allegations first surfaced. And what happened was that he was at the time 35 or 37 years old and he slept in the same room in the same bed with a 12 and 13-year-old boy for 30 nights in a row and traveled all over the world with him. And certainly the boy was able to draw precisely certain markings on Michael Jackson's genitalia.
In order to avoid arrest, the prosecutors made a deal with him and said come voluntarily and be photographed so we can see whether the boy's telling the truth or not. He didn't want to be photographed. He finally was forced to be photographed and the photographs absolutely matched what the boy drew.
That enabled the lawyer for the boy, who was suing him civilly, to collect over $25 million. At the same time, there were so many threats and harassment of the boy's family, of his lawyer, who had to get guards and of witnesses, and they had gone back a decade, one prosecutor told me, and found at least a boy for every year of the decade previous that was his "special friend."
ZAHN: Wow.
We've got 10 seconds left. I know you've tracked a lot of unusual characters over the years. Where does Michael Jackson fit in?
ORTH: Well, I think he's right up there. You see, it's very important, he wants you to believe that he's not like a real human being, so he doesn't have to be judged. He wants you to think he's some strange creature so he doesn't have to be judged as a middle-aged man who sleeps with little boys.
ZAHN: Well, your latest piece in "Vanity Fair" is fascinating.
Thanks for dropping by to share a little of it with us this morning.
ORTH: Thank you.
ZAHN: Maureen Orth.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
