Michael Jackson’s son, Prince Jackson, has discussed the friendship between his father and Princess Diana.
The pair reportedly only met in person once, but the moment was said to have had a profund effect on them.
Appearing on Good Morning Britain on Friday 28 October, Prince Jackson told the show’s hosts how, while he never got to meet Diana himself, he heard his father frequently speak about how he “felt connected to her in a way he didn’t really have those connections with other people”.
“This love was communal: he loved how she loved, and how she was trying to be a great mum to her children, how she just wanted to be a good person,” he explained.
“That was all that he was about, he wanted to be a good father and a great person, and I feel like there was so much synergy there, and when he would speak about her it was with so much love but also some sorrow, because he’d lost such a good friend.”
Diana and Jackson’s encounter took place backstage at Wembley Stadium on 16 July 1988, before “Thriller” star performed to thousands of fans.
In an interview with Barbara Walters in 1997, Jackson claimed that he left his hit song “Dirty Diana” out of the show as a mark of respect to the Princess of Wales.
“Are you going to do Dirty Diana?” she apparently asked.
“So I said, ‘No, I took it out of the show because of you.’ She said ‘No! I want you to do it. Do it. Do the song,’” Jackson recalled.
In the same interview, Prince Jackson also discussed his father’s legacy 40 years on from the release of his album, Thriller.
The death of Diana and its aftermath will be portrayed in the forthcoming fifth season of The Crown.
In recent weeks, both Dame Judi Dench and former prime minister Sir John Major have criticised reported storylines in the forthcoming episodes, which will launch on 9 November.
There have been calls for Netflix to add a disclaimer to the start of each episode stating that The Crown is a “fictionalised drama”.
Jonathan Pryce, who plays Prince Philip in the new season, called out his “fellow artistes” this week, saying he was “hugely disappointed” at the attitudes towards the show.
On Thursday 27 October, Prince Harry announced the release date of his highly anticipated memoir, Spare.
