Even in death, the King of Pop was still able to fill a stadium, reroute traffic, shut down a city core and elicit worldwide emotion.
Michael Jackson’s family, close friends and 11,000 fans from around the world — including some Canadians — crowded into L.A.’s downtown Staples Center on Tuesday for a star-packed public memorial to the singer. Meanwhile, thousands of Jackson fans — lacking tickets to the indoor event — packed downtown streets in testament to the superstar’s “black or white” message of world unity.
“He’s not really gone,” music legend Smokey Robinson said during the memorial. “He is going to live forever and ever and ever. I’m glad I got to live in an era to see . . . the greatest entertainer of all times.”
R&B star Usher, who said he owes everything he is to Jackson, stood beside the casket during the memorial and was overcome with emotion as he performed a song called Gone Too Soon, written by Robinson. After he finished the song, he hugged Jackson’s family members.
The masses gathered outside were overcome by similar emotions. Amid barking vendors and a phalanx of international TV reporters, smiling fans exuded the same unmistakable sentiment: glad to just to be part of it all.
Each fan seemed to celebrate Jackson’s memory by sporting one of the several iconic images made famous by the singer — Japanese girls wearing surgical masks, a German man in black hat and white socks, young boys sporting black hats and bow ties. Helicopters criss-crossed the warm summer sky as hundreds of police officers — on bikes, on foot, in cars and on horseback — were on hand to cope with fans not lucky enough to get inside.
One man who preferred to be on the outside looking in was 56-year-old Bill Nealy of Los Angeles.
“I went to the Friday tribute for Michael and I heard people talking Japanese, Korean, German — and that’s why I came today,” he said. “Think of all the languages.
“To me, that’s the tribute to Michael . . . I was lifted up by all these people from all over the world.”
The African-American Nealy, who grew up near Waco, Texas, said Jackson and the Jackson 5 changed his life, proving by example that racial barriers could be broken.
Those who spoke at the service said they were inspired by Jackson, who died at age 50 on June 25.
Singer and actor Queen Latifah shared a poem and recalled dancing to Jackson’s music when she was young. “We never felt distant, we felt like he was right there,” she told the crowd. “He made you believe in yourself.”
Towards the end of the ceremony, Jackson’s 11-year-old daughter Paris spoke to the crowd, a first public appearance by one of Jackson’s three children, who have lived away from the public eye.
“Ever since I was born, Daddy has been the best father you can ever imagine,” she said, crying and holding on to her aunt, Janet Jackson. “And I just wanted to say I love him so much.”
Jackson’s glittering, gold-trimmed casket was placed at the front of the stage covered in red flowers and wreaths.
The crowd outside began forming at daybreak, and began building an orderly sidewalk festival.
A select few, drawn at random earlier in a ticket lottery, flashed gold wristbands to a throng of black-clad police officers, elbowing through a gauntlet of envious fans, on their way inside the Staples Center.
Ticket holders predominantly wore black — black shawls and jackets, pork pie hats, black shoes.
One man arrived fittingly under a black umbrella similar to the one made famous by the pop singer during his court appearances. Fans sporting wristbands revealed they were from places as diverse as Texas, Scotland and Germany.
Photographs, CDs, buttons and T-shirts were being sold by vendors shoulder-to-shoulder on the sidewalks. One vendor sold silver gloves from a box she carried.
She claimed to have sold 150 gloves in two hours.
Geraldine Hughes sold copies of her book, Redemption, about Jackson’s court battles. “I was on the inside of the accuser’s camp,” she said referring to criminal allegations made against Jackson more than a decade ago. “I watched how he was set up. This book tells how they did it.”
The luck of lottery draw left many fans — including many Canadians — high and dry.
Former Ottawa Rough Rider cheerleader Tammy Laverty has carved out a niche for herself in Los Angeles singing both the Canadian and American national anthems at the Staples Center.
“I would not have ended up on that stage at Staples Center if it wasn’t for Michael Jackson,” she said after the memorial. “The first show I ever did was Thriller in Ottawa at the High School of Commerce. I grew up loving Michael Jackson.”
When her hero died, Laverty felt compelled to show how much the artist meant to her. She drove to his Neverland Ranch on Friday and, before that, had visited his star in Hollywood.
“I was very disappointed, but then many people were disappointed that they couldn’t attend,” she said, adding that she and a half-dozen other Canadian fans met at the Staples Center following the memorial.
Almost everybody seemed to want to savour the historic event.
An ambulance attendant circling the arena snapped photos of the crowds with his cellphone. Riot police were on hand but were seen laughing with their fellow officers, riot helmets in hand. At least one man was grabbed by four police officers and escorted away from the crowd for allegedly selling fake wristbands.
Several LAPD officers approached vendors about their merchandise, and some were told to leave the area. But most simply stayed in the crowd to be part of history.
Those who waited without any hope they would see the show got a show of their own — a heart-shaped smoke-ring the size of a city block created by a pilot in the skies over the Staples Center.
“We can’t help but love you forever Michael,” said Stevie Wonder, as he played a tribute song on the piano. Jackson’s children and family members watched from the audience, some wearing sparkly white gloves, a Jackson trademark.
Lionel Richie also performed a song in tribute, as a montage of Jackson’s life and career played on a massive television screen.
Towards the end of the celebration, celebrities joined family members on stage to sing some of Jackson’s hits, including the famous song We are the World.
An Edmonton couple who attended the memorial is still reeling emotionally from the experience.
“It was absolutely amazing, it really was,” a giddy Derek McCurdy said Tuesday by phone from L.A. while he and wife Lori filed out of the Staples Center. “It was surprisingly moving, too. Much more of a memorial than I expected it to be. I was expecting more of a rock concert atmosphere.”
“I’m honoured to be able to be with the crowd that’s here to celebrate his life,” Lori McCurdy said. “We got to witness history.”
One of the highlights, the couple said, was the Jackson family’s rendition of We Are The World, which brought the crowd to its feet. “It sounds incredibly cheesy, I know, but it really wasn’t,” Derek said.
“Everyone got up, we were all swaying with the music,” Lori added. “Everyone knows that song.”
With files from Vancouver Sun and Edmonton Journal
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