Orange County Register

See ‘R.I.P., chameleon and ruined man’ slide show

Photo: Pakistani girls light candles to pay tribute to Michael Jackson today in Hyderabad, Pakistan. (AP Photo/Pervez Masih)

BARRIER-BREAKER, FOR GOOD AND ILL

Predictably, today’s memorial service in Los Angeles will focus on Michael Jackson, King of Pop, rather than on Michael Jackson, plastic surgery poster boy.

But a more fitting, less superficial memorial would recognize him not only as multi-talented but also as a multi-faceted man of extremes who was simultaneously praiseworthy, disgraceful and pitiable.

Michael Jackson was a pioneering entertainer who exceeded the bounds of what previously seemed possible, yet also a person who broke through barriers of conduct that should never be breached.

He was a man of immense talent and generosity, giving millions to children’s charities, but also unaware of where to place limits on his conduct with children – whether that was dangling his son off a balcony or inviting children into his bed.

The extreme measures he took in his obsession with plastic surgery sprang from the same root as his dazzling performances. He didn’t know where the boundaries are, so he kept working to improve on what he saw, attempting to match his vision of what could be. He refused to recognize limits that the human body sets on what can be transformed.

As he told Oprah in a 1993 interview:

Michael Jackson: I’m never pleased with anything, I’m a perfectionist. It’s part of who I am.

Oprah: And so when you look in the mirror now and see the image that looks back at you are there days when you say I kinda like this, or I like the way my hair. … or I’m kinda cute today…

Michael: …(giggles)… No, I’m never pleased with myself. No, I try not to look in the mirror.

Related links:

• Sad ruins of Michael Jackson: Doctors share the blame
• Latest views on Michael Jackson range from sad to angry
• Crowd gathers for Jackson tribute at Staples Center
• Michael Jackson’s brilliant, eccentric, tragic life

Links to past coverage:

• Did plastic surgery help Michael Jackson’s career?
• Michael Jackson plans more plastic surgery?
• Michael Jackson might have deadly MRSA infection
• Milk-carton mug seeks ‘real’ Michael Jackson
• Is it Nose Job Week? Ask Lisa Kudrow, Debra Messing, Michael Jackson

Slide shows:

• Michael Jackson, R.I.P., chameleon and ruined man
• Crowd gathers for Jackson tribute at Staples Center
• Michael Jackson’s brilliant, eccentric, tragic life

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