Feb.3 in history

18 Years Ago --- Michael Jackson To Go Live On TV Chicago Sun Times February 03, 1988 Michael Jackson is the first act lined up to perform at the Grammy ceremony March 2. He will sing "Man in the Mirror" in what will be his first live TV performance since a 1983 special about Motown. Jackson is a Grammy contender in four categories this year, which will give him a chance to add to his collection of 11 Grammys. Jackson also is preparing for an extensive tour of the United States and Europe with shows on Feb. 23 and 24 in Kansas City, Mo., where the Jacksons opened their 1984 Victory tour. Jackson, who has been touring in Japan and Australia, will play in 13 cities on the first leg of the U.S. tour, which will end in mid-May. His European tour will open with concerts in Rome on May 23-24. --- --- Jackson To Open Tour In Italy Toronto Star February 03, 1988 (Rome) - Michael Jackson will open a European tour with two concerts in Rome on May 23-24, organizer David Zard announced yesterday. Jackson, whose latest album, Bad, has sold 700,000 copies in Italy, will sing at the 50,000-seat Flaminio Stadium. He will perform a third show in a 45,000-seat soccer stadium in Turin May 29. Tickets, priced from $30 to $45, will be sold at Italian banks. --- 17 Years Ago --- Soviet TV Seizes On A Capital Idea: Western Commercials Star Tribune February 03, 1989 Jane Tarassova predicted Western commercials would have Soviet viewers glued to their sets. Images of Michael Jackson dancing to rock music in a Pepsi commercial flickered across Soviet screens last year, and British Airways, the DHL courier service, Omega Watches and Benetton clothing also have advertised there. Tarassova said to Soviet viewers, the Western TV ad "is beautifully done, it's interesting in some sort of way, it presents a piece of foreign music." --- 16 Years Ago --- Friends Lay Talents At Sammy's Feet Houston Chronicle February 03, 1990 "Sammy was there in the marches, when it was dangerous. He was there with Martin Luther King and with PUSH and CORE and all the rest. That's why a lot of these performers showed up. Because of what he stands for, not just as a performer." Michael Jackson pays tribute to that in the special song he wrote for Davis. "Thanks to you," he sings, "there is a door we all walk through. I am here..." "But there we sit, waiting for Sinatra. And then I hear, 'Hey, Tony, I'm going to miss your rerun tonight on TV.' And it's "Ella! "She's watching my reruns. Hey, then Michael Jackson says, 'Tony, I love your show!" Nobody knew what Jackson was going to do. "The night before the show, he and Buz Kohan, who wrote the script, went in the rehearsal hall and wrote a song," Schlatter said. "They arranged it overnight, and the night of the show was the first time he'd ever sung it. He wanted to sing something that really related to Sammy.' Backstage, everybody was watching everybody else. Fitzgerald wanted to meet Jackson; Cosby wanted to say hi to Hawn; Murphy wanted to see Sinatra... The most nerve-racking moment of them all, though, was when Fitzgerald was to make her big onstage entrance, Schlatter said. "We had to have somebody bring her out, so I said to Eddie Murphy, 'Take Ella onstage.' And he says, 'Man, I can't take her. That's Ella "Fitzgerald."' And Eddie says to Michael Jackson, 'Michael, you take her out.' And Michael says, 'I can't! It's "Ella."' So I said, 'Look, guys, why not take her together? OK?' Ella told 'em she was having so much fun, she was keeping her eyes open.' --- --- 'sammy Davis Jr.' The Washington Post February 03, 1990 ...All these people are dutifully heralded by an announcer. But then, right after remarks from Jesse Jackson ("You've never let us down, and we love you so much," he tells Davis, ringside with his wife), the audience begins to mumble and murmur and then issues a collective gasp. Standing silhouetted in four spotlights is his eminence, Michael Jackson. The announcer doesn't say his name because, well-who else could it be? Jackson sings a song written for the occasion called "You Were There" ("I am here because you were there," it ends, rather self-aggrandizingly). It's a ballad, with no dancing, and yet all Jackson has to do is move his right arm and raise his hand in the air-a hand that has three bandaged fingers, incidentally-and he sets off electric charges. This special is a reminder that not all the really big stars are dead. We still have among us singers who can sing, dancers who can dance, performers who transcend hype with genuine, enviable talent. The rock slobbola culture hasn't taken over completely... --- 14 Years Ago --- Michael Jackson To Launch Foreign Tour In June Chicago Tribune February 03, 1992 Pop superstar Michael Jackson said Monday he would launch his first tour in four years in June to support a charity he is founding to benefit children and the environment. --- --- Jackson Forgets Himself In 'Remember The Time' The Atlanta Constitution February 03, 1992 Steve Dollar says that Michael Jackson's video to the single "Remember the Time" is pure escapism, and the tune itself is R&B professionalism at its most ordinary. --- --- Kitty Kelley Pays Jacksons To Tell All The Salt Lake Tribune February 03, 1992 Tell-all author Kitty Kelley, an outspoken critic of "checkbook journalism," was startled by the news: Her producers had offered several people between $5,000 and $20,000 to appear on her new television talk show. "We pay people?" an incredulous Kelley asked the show's development chief in a three-way phone conversation between her, her production company and a Los Angeles Times reporter. "You have to pay people," said John Goldhammer, senior vice president of program development for MCA-TV. "Oh," said the author of unauthorized biographies on Jackie Onassis, Frank Sinatra, Elizabeth Taylor and Nancy Reagan. "I didn't know that." Their exchange came after The Times learned that three former members of superstar Michael Jackson's entourage had been offered between $5,000 and $20,000 to appear on the pilot production of "The Kitty Kelley Show." All three turned the producers down, but others did not. "Yes, in order to make some of these people come forward, we did have to pay," said Ron Ziskin, executive producer of "The Kitty Kelley Show." "The fact is, when you're looking for exclusivity, especially when you're not talking to the actual person -in this case, Jackson}, you must compensate," he added. Staff members of several talk shows contacted by The Times, including "Donahue" and "Sally Jessy Raphael," said that their guests are not paid. One executive who asked not to be named expressed alarm that payments made for the Kelley show might begin a bidding war for guests. --- --- Advertising: Pepsi Sets Jackson Pact Wall Street Journal February 03, 1992 PepsiCo plans to sign Michael Jackson for a new series of commercials in its overseas markets. The ads will be produced by Omnicom Group's BBDO unit. --- 13 Years Ago --- Super Bowl XXVII Moonwalks To Record Viewing Denver Post February 03, 1993 Super Bowl XXVII on Jan 31, 1993 was the most-watched show in US television history, NBC announced on Feb 2. NBC Sports president Dick Ebersol gave half-time performer Michael Jackson a big part of the credit for the game's record viewership. --- 12 Years Ago --- 'Moonwalking,' Stargazing Out Denver Post February 03, 1994 If pop singer Michael Jackson shows up for a copyright-infringement trial in Denver in Feb 1994, the US District Court and the US Marshals Service will be ready to keep the event from becoming a media circus by limiting access to the courtroom. --- --- Jacksons Plan Gala Benefit At MGM Grand Las Vegas Review Journal February 03, 1994 Move over, Barbra Streisand - the latest $1,000-ticket item in Las Vegas is Michael Jackson. Jackson, in what would be his first performance since he settled a child molestation lawsuit last week, is scheduled to appear with members of his family in a televised charity benefit in the 15,200-seat arena at the MGM Grand Hotel & Theme Park on Feb. 19, a family spokesman said Wednesday... Aside from appearing on the show with sisters Jackie and Janet, brothers Jermaine, Marlon, Randy, Rebbie, and Tito, and parents Katherine and Joseph Jackson, Michael Jackson will present "Life Time Achievement" awards to actress and friend Elizabeth Taylor for her charity work on behalf of AIDS research, and to former Motown Records head Berry Gordy for his "contributions to music,' McLaughlin said. Additional entertainers invited to be on the show are to be announced later this week, he said... --- 10 Years Ago --- Acting-dancing Legend Gene Kelly Dies At 83 News Sentinel February 03, 1996 Gene Kelly, who splashed through puddles with athletic exuberance in "Singin' in the Rain" and kicked up his heels in "On the Town" and "Anchors Aweigh," died Friday. He was 83. A former ditch digger whose choreography grew to be so influential that even Madonna and Michael Jackson consulted him, Kelly died at his home of complications from strokes he had over the last two years, publicist Warren Cowan said. Unlike his older contemporary Fred Astaire, whose black-tie dance steps were elegant and measured, Kelly was a muscular, regular-guy showman whose joyful dancing captured the postwar American mood... --- --- Spike & Mike Go to Rio The Washington Post February 03, 1996 Director Spike Lee will shoot a Michael Jackson video next weekend in the shantytowns of Rio de Janeiro. Lee sought to calm the fears of Brazilian tourist officials, who expressed concern that the filming would damage the city's already precarious reputation. "We're not going to travel for 12 hours to Rio to show poverty when we could show the ghettos of New York," Lee said in an interview with the Brazilian daily O Globo. The city is trying to promote tourism and hopes to host the 2004 Summer Olympics. "I have every right to try to protect our image. Where is the line between art and sensationalism?" asked Ronaldo Cezar Coelho, Rio's secretary for industry, commerce and tourism. Lee and Jackson will be shooting scenes for a video of the song "They Don't Care About Us" in the northeastern Brazilian city of Salvador before going to Rio. "Showing the world the problems of shantytowns -- people living in shacks, uncovered sewage -- can only help pressure the government into doing something decent for us," a shantytown resident told O Globo. --- 9 Years Ago --- Miscellaneous Pantagraph February 03, 1997 ...People magazine says Feb. 27 is the official due date for Michael Jackson Jr. A source close to the pop star and wife Debbie Rowe says tests show that the baby is a boy and the parents-to-be have chosen that name... --- 6 Years Ago --- Third World Books Was Cultural Beacon For Almost 32 Years Toronto Star February 03, 2000 ...Many viewed Third World Books as part of the soul of Toronto's black community, particularly during the turbulent late '60s and into the '70s, when it put Toronto on the map as one of the places to come for the best in black intellectual thought. Producer Quincy Jones came by when he was doing research for the groundbreaking mini- series Roots; Michael Jackson visited, too. It was the spot where young radicals and older conservatives went toe-to-toe over the issues of the day. Students, educators and all those seeking information about Africans and their descendants, flung across the diaspora, found what they were looking for at Johnston's labour of love... --- 4 Years Ago --- Texas Ban On Big Cats Brings Tigers Out of Hiding... Knight Ridder Tribune News February 03, 2002 The tigers sleep and roar and pace in cages among the pines and oaks. They live there, up past the Bodacious Barbecue Restaurant at the Interstate 20 exit, past the Whispering Pines RV Park, deep down an East Texas country road. A majestic white Bengal tiger with crystal-blue eyes lives at the Tiger Creek Wildlife Refuge near Tyler. So do two tigers formerly owned by entertainer [B}Michael Jackson[/B]. An orange-and-black Marine World mascot has retired there... Accolon and Sierra were bred at a roadside zoo near San Antonio. More precisely, they were inbred. When Accolon and Sierra were cubs, they were sent to pop star Michael Jackson. Thriller and Zablu became the tigers' new names. Jackson hired a tiger trainer who apparently did a good job of caring for the two until he got into a car accident and fell into a coma. Jackson's staff contacted Tiger Creek Wildlife Refuge two years ago, saying they had no way to continue to care for the cats. The pair now lives at the refuge, where Jackson made a $4,000 donation -- enough to build one cage, Werner says. Accolon has severe hip dysphasia, probably the result of inbreeding, Block says. Someday he may lose the ability to use his hind legs... --- --- Liza Minnelli and Michael Jackson Sunday Times February 03, 2002 According to The Stage newspaper, the singer Michael Jackson is to present Liza Minnelli's long-awaited return to the stage at London's Albert Hall on April 2. Though the show is to be produced and directed by Minnelli's fiance, David Gest, it is backed by Jackson - who is to be best man at the couple's wedding in March. --- 1 Years Ago --- Ex-wife Praised Jackson's Parenting In 2001 Knight Ridder Tribune Service February 03, 2005 Michael Jackson's ex-wife is fighting the pop king for custody of their two kids, but when she gave up her parental rights in 2001 she praised him as "a brilliant father" and said it was in the tots' "best interest" to be with him. On Oct. 17, 2001, Debbie Rowe told a judge she hadn't seen the children, Prince Michael and Paris, in at least a year and wanted to bow out of their lives for good, according to court papers obtained by The New York Daily News. "These are his children. I had the children for him to become a father. Not for me to become a mother. You earn the title of parent. I have done absolutely nothing to earn that title," Rowe said at a private hearing witnessed only by a judge and lawyers for her and Jackson... "Michael is a wonderful man... a brilliant father. As their mother, it is (in) the best interest for the children" to be with Jackson, she said. Rowe said she had stopped visiting the children about a year earlier. "When I was seeing them every 45 days, it felt like an intrusion on their life and they're going to have enough intrusions as it is," she said... ---