Leaving Neverland director Dan Reed has criticised the new Michael Jackson biopic and claimed that the musician was “worse than Jeffrey Epstein”. (NME reports)
Reed directed the HBO-produced, two-part documentary back in 2019, which focused on interviews with Wade Robson and James Safechuck, who alleged that they were sexually abused as children by Jackson.
In 2024, Reed slammed the then-upcoming biopic Michael as “startlingly disingenuous”, claiming it discredits Robson and Safechuck’s experiences with the singer.
Now that the film has hit theatres, he’s questioned why the new biopic failed to acknowledge the abuse allegations against Jackson. “It says that people don’t care that he was a child molester. Literally, people just don’t care,” Reed said in a new interview with Hollywood Reporter.
“I think a lot of people just love his music and turn a deaf ear. And short of having actual video evidence of Michael Jackson engaged in sexual intercourse with a seven-year-old child, I don’t know what would be sufficient to change these people’s minds.
“How can you tell an authentic story about Michael Jackson without ever mentioning the fact that he was seriously accused of being a child molester?” he added.
Paris Jackson is making it clear that she has “zero per cent involvement” in the upcoming Michael Jackson biopic.
The forthcoming biopic, titled simply Michael, is currently scheduled to release in April next year. It is directed by Antoine Fuqua, with Michael’s real-life nephew Jaafar Jackson playing the King of Pop. Oscar nominee and Euphoria star Colman Domingo will play Michael’s father Joe Jackson.
Domingo recently spoke with PEOPLE about the film, and mentioned to the outlet that Michael’s children Paris and Prince Jackson were “very much in support” of the film, and they had “chatted briefly” about the project and she was “very helpful”.
Yesterday, Paris Jackson took to social media to publicly decry Domingo’s claims. In a string of now-expired Instagram Stories, she wrote, tagging Domingo: “Don’t be telling people I was “helpful” on the set of a movie I had 0% involvement in lol that is so weird.”
According to a recent Variety report, the film’s third act was initially supposed to explore how Jackson was impacted by multiple allegations of child molestation. However, Jackson’s estate reportedly had to pay around $15million for reshoots after it emerged that the singer’s out-of-court settlement with Jordan Chandler, the first of his accusers, included a clause barring Chandler from being depicted on screen.
Antoine Fuqua, the director of the film, recently addressed the allegations made against Jackson, saying: “When I hear things about us — Black people in particular, especially in a certain position — there’s always pause.”
A New Yorker article noted that the director “was sceptical of some of the accusers’ parents, particularly Chandler’s father, who was recorded threatening to ensure that Jackson was ‘humiliated beyond belief.’”
