That’s certainly true and I don’t think anybody here disputes it, but it’s neither racism nor ignorance to say that the odds are very much against a black man who was not particularly light-skinned (MJ before surgery and whatever the hell is the true story of his skin color changed his appearance) and who had black and obviously negroid hair producing three children who are all light skinned and blonde. It defies Mendel.
Halle Berry, Jasmine Guy, Lenny Kravitz, Eartha Kitt, Maya Rudolph,Sydney Poitier and Lisa Bonet are just a few of many celebrities with one white and one black (or biracial) parent, and none of them are naturally blonde or fairskinned. (The only multiracial celebrity I can think of who was was Peter Ustinov , but then he was only 1/8 black). The odds of Jackson fathering three children who look uniracially white is astronomical.
I take 8 Mile to work every day. The part that borders Detroit is quite seedy. Several strip clubs, and lots of run-down and closed businesses. I don’t know if Eminem really grew up in a trailer park, but there is a large trailer park on the north side of 8 Mile at one point.
Long ago I read the liner notes on an *original * original cast recording of I can Get it for You Wholesale, the Broadway musical that cast an unknown Barbra Streisand in a minor part that eventually launched her to stardom. I remember reading that her bio claimed she was born in Madagascar! Of course it was total BS; she was born across the East River in Brooklyn, NY, USA.
Before I posted I googled around to be sure I was not misremembering. Sure enough, I found this:
…When she appeared on Broadway as Miss Marmelstein in I Can Get It For You Wholesale, her first major part, the Playbill bio stated that she had been born in Madagascar and raised in Rangoon. (Later she changed it to Zanzibar and Aruba.)…
I remember a good quote Glenda Jackson (Double Academy Award winning actress and current MP in the British House of Commons) saying that Reagan was no actor and less of a politican (paraphrasing somewhat, but that was the gist).
I wonder if people like Glenda Jackson are letting their political opinions influence their judgement of Ronald Reagan as an actor. I hated Reagan’s presidency. On the other hand, I’ve seen many of Reagan’s movies, and if he was never a great actor, he was never a bad actor either. Occasionally he was above average in dramas like King’s Row and The Hasty Heart, and in the romantic comedy The Voice of the Turtle.
Not that he doesn’t look fabulous, because he does. And not that I was surprised when I read his birthdate on IMBb, because I was, a little. But he doesn’t look 28. He looks more “mature” (in an attractive and very fabulous way). I can definitely believe that he’s 40. One of those scary, well-preserved 40s, like Tom Cruise and Johnny Depp and so forth.
Frankly, I think if he had simply claimed he was 33 then perhaps no fans would have rooted out his birth certificate. Or not. I don’t know how far these fans will go.
Re: Ronald Reagan. He wasn’t a bad actor. He was certainly adequate. I thought he did perfectly fine in King’s Row as well. To say he was “no actor” was reaching.
IIRC, Black Sabbath was going through their guest vocalist of the week phase (at one point, it seemed like Sabbath consisted of Tony Iommi and whatever bunch of randomly selected musicians he happened to be haning out with on any given evening), . Hell, I remember after Ian Gillan split for the Deep Purple reunion, there was a short article in Hit Parader announcing their new front man, a gorgeous hunk of yum named David Donato. He never actually recorded or performed with the band, and was gone a few minutes after the publicity photo was taken. So it would have been an eays mistake for Jeff to make. OTOH, I actually saw him on one of those talk shows (I think it was the 700 Club), his account of his Salvation Experience went something like…
He was touring with Black Sabbath, and felt the need to go to church, and, when the altar call was given, he went forward to Get Saved, the preacher recognized him and told him to get out of his church. I thought this was unlikely- any Fund’ist preacher worth his salt would consider getting Black Sabbath’s lead singer saved to be a prime catch and great publicity for his church. Anyhoo, he went back to his drugs and rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle for another year or so, then one day when he was having some remodelling done on his house (he had completed his stint with Jesus Christ, Superstar at this point,) and the head of the construction crew, an Italian guy with many scars as he, and most of his crew, were former steet thugs who had Found God, cornered him in the kitchen and said, “You played the role of Jesus Christ. Are you ready to meet the real Jesus Christ?”
So, apparently ol’ Jeff has given inconsistent accounts of how he Got Saved.
Lauren Stratford, on the other hand, seems to be a real piece of work. The alleged Michelle was apparently a highly suggestible woman who fell into the hands of a what members of the False Memory Syndrome Foundation like to call a “therp” who had her remembering all kinds of weird shit that never happened. She eventually divorced her husband and married the therp. Stratford seems not to have benefit of this excuse. She basically saw the then current craze of people supposedly coming out of Satanic cults, finding God, and making it big on the Christian talk show/bookstore circuit and decided to cash in.
I actually read her book Satan’s Underground, and the whole thing rang false from top to bottom. It’s a truly bizarre read. She describes sacrificing an infant (up, down, went the knife) but does not give any details about who the baby had originally belonged to. In the last chapter of the book, she states that the baby was in fact hers, and that she had given birth to and sacrificed two other children. Nowhere in the book does she mention having been pregnant. People who knew her during the alleged Satanic Captivity phase of her life say that she was attending college at the time, and that they had never seen her pregnant.
I think some enterprising sociology, psychology, or religious studies student could have a potential thesis on the subject of these fake ex-Satanists.
I was also deeply bothered by a journalist impersonating a medical person in order to get dirt on Madonna. If that isn’t illegal, it oughta be. And I’ll bet you twenty bucks that it is.
Jeff Fenholt wrote a book about his coversion “Out of Darkness into the Light.” It usually goes for huge bucks on ebay. I found a used copy for $3, and the thing is totally unreadable. Now I have to read the damn thing and find the inaccuracies.
My mom worked for Warner Bros. when Reagan was in Hollywood. She said he was thought to be handsome but insipid. They used to laugh about how he’d wear his military uniform (really a movie costume) all the time, trying to impress the girls.
I found a book in the library once (I thought about stealing it, and I should have) by Liberace - a photo book of the rooms in his house. Oh man, great book. In it, he said that the only reason he never got married was because he had yet to meet a woman as wonderful as his mother. I don’t know, maybe it’s true.
Probably. Us fans don’t like it any more than you do. Most of our web communities have rules against posting personal information about her, even pictures of her children. Just because we’re “fanatics”, doesn’t mean that we condone invading her privacy.
We don’t like being lied to, either, but that doesn’t necessarily interfere with her right to privacy. A simple “we don’t comment on wild speculation”, or “there is no proof of that”, would suffice. No lying necesary.
I’m confused here, Sampiro. MJ never claimed that his two older children had a black mother. Their mom is Debbie Rowe. Who is blond and blue-eyed.
As for the newest kid:
He later added that he thinks she is black. (Which is doubtful considering the alabast-pink little legs we all saw dangled over the balcony).
But to make things interesting, back in January, Debbie Rowe made the news claiming that Jackson wasn’t the kids’ father at all and is seeking full custody…
So, Og knows what’s really going on there! But her certaily never claimed that Debbie Rowe was a black woman. He just said he thinks the one’s mother may have been black.
