Announcer : Live from Santa Inez, California. Michael Jackson talks to Oprah.
Oprah: Now this is what's shocking to me, that you even drive. What we're doing, everybody, is that we are coming from Michael's house down to this amazing amusement park, which is, oh, about several hundred yards from the house. And this is, it's incredible.Michael: Thank you.
Oprah: And I want to know whether or not you did this for yourself or did you do it for all the children that you entertain here?
Michael: For myself and the children. Every three weeks we - terminally ill children that come to - uh-
Oprah: To the house?
Michael: Yes, yes.
Oprah: Make a wish foundation, Dream Street, Starlight, yes?Michael: Every three weeks - and these are sick children, children with cancer. And I entertain them.
Oprah: Uh-huh.
Michael: And they come here to enjoy themselves.
Oprah: This is unbelievable. What I have to say is, these are, as I was talking to some kids that were here, these are not just grandma rides here. These are some major rides.
Michael: (laughs)
Oprah: I mean the Sea Dragon, the Ferris Wheel, and there's that Zipper over there.
Michael: The Wipeout.
Oprah: Yeah, the Wipeout, and there are Bumper cars here, it's really-
Michael: Thank you. Well, it brings out the child that lives in every- body. I love rides and things like that and I share it with the children.
Oprah: Were you able to do that when you were a kid?Michael: Not really. Sometimes, sometimes, but not often enough.
Oprah: But now you can anytime.
Michael: Every day. It's right in my back yard.
Oprah: How often do you actually come out here and do this?
Michael: Whenever I'm here I come out and I go on the rides.
Oprah: Well, is this a part of you, what we were talking about earlier, the pain of growing up and not being able to experience all the things that kids normally experience and so now you are fulfilling all those fantasies.
Michael: To compensate, yes.
Oprah: Really.
Michael: Yes, it is very true.
Oprah: Do you think you can ever really recapture it though? Does it feel the same? I mean, I don't know.
Michael: (laughs) It's more fun.
Oprah: Really?
Michael: I wouldn't change the past if I could. I'm enjoying myself.
Oprah: And here we are inside the theater. I had one too many sugar babies at the candy counter.
Michael: (laughs)
Oprah: But the candy is here for all the kids. Pinocchio is here, ET is here. Did you - what's fascinating to me about you is that obviously you have this childlike aura about you and I see children with you and they play with you like you are one of them. But, a child did not do this.
Michael: (laughs)
Oprah: A child did not put this together. This is really magnificent.Michael: Well, thank you. I - I love to do things for children and I try to imitate Jesus - and I am not saying I am Jesus, I'm not saying that.
Oprah: Yes, we're clear on that.
Michael: Right, I'm trying to imitate Jesus in the fact that he said to be like children, to love children, to be as pure as children, and to make yourself as innocent and to see the world through eyes of wonderment and the whole magical quality of it all and I love that. And we'll have like a hundred bald headed children, they all have cancer, and they're all running around.
Oprah: Um-huh.
Michael: And they are enjoying themselves and it makes me cry happy tears that I was able to do this for them, you know.
Oprah: Um-huh.
Michael: Makes me so pleased inside.
Oprah: Well, when I came here to, um, about a month ago to shoot a commercial with you for promoting tonight's event, one of the things that really impressed me the most, I hope you guys are getting shots of this. I don't know how you are, if all the cameras are on us, but, oh, we got other cameras - is that there are, built inside the walls here-beds-beds for some of those sick children who come. And what I realized when I saw this is that you have to be a person who really cares about children to build it into your architecture.
Michael: Yes, yes. We have children that come who are - who intravenously - they are very sick, bedridden-
Oprah: They can't sit up.
Michael: Right. They can't sit up and these beds, they are hospital beds, you push a button, you go up or you go down and they are able to watch. We have a magic show, we show the current films, there's cartoons, anything you know, anything so they can escape to that world of magic that they don't have a chance to experience, the world I was deprived of when I was little.
Oprah: Now let me ask you this. You know I believe everything happens in people's lives for a reason. Do you think that had you not missed a lot of, uh, the life and fun and fantasy of childhood that you would be so in touch with children today. Would you relate to them as you do?Michael: I probably would, but not as much. That's why I wouldn't change a thing-
Oprah: Really?
Michael: Because I am happy with the way things are and my caring for young people and everything.
Oprah: Are you really happy now, because you seemed so sad for a long time.
Michael: (laughs) I was sad for years and years and years. But I'm happy, I'm getting there. Yes, I'm very happy.
Oprah: And what has made you happier.
Michael: Being able to give back, you know, and to help other people.
Oprah: Uh-huh.
Michael: Heal the World Foundation which I've formed which helps children in healing in the world. We're doing Heal L. A., which is uh, we have three primary goals in mind: immunization of children, mentoring-a big sister, big brother program, and education in drug abuse. And Jimmy Carter has teamed up with us to do Heal Atlanta and we're going to go from state to state healing-- you know we've gone to Sarajevo, we've done lots of places.
Oprah: I know, I know, we have photographs of you from all over the world where you are with all these children. One of the things I was saying before we went to the last break, before the alarm went off in the house and all that-Michael: Yeah-
Oprah: is that, uh, we were talking about the rumors. One of the strangest ones I heard was that when you're Moonwalking, you're faking it, that you have some mirrors in your socks someplace.
Michael: Oh, boy!
Oprah: And it's not really real.
Michael: No, that's not true.
Oprah: How did you, first of all, you know we've spent so much time trying to dispel the rumors, trying to get the truth out that I haven't had a really opportunity to talk to you about how you conceive your music, how you conceive the dance. Where did the Moonwalk come from?
Michael: Well, the Moonwalk came from these beautiful children, the black kids who live in the ghettos, you know, the inner cities, who are brilliant, that just have that natural talent for dancing any of these new - the running man - any of these dances. They come up with these dances, all I did was enhance the dance.
Oprah: O.K. I want to see you dance.
Michael: Oh, God, no, no.
Oprah: I want to see you dance. I want to see you dance, live.
Michael: No, no. I can show you a step or two, but, I'm a little rusty right now.
Oprah: A little rusty?!
[Michael goes on stage and dances to Dangerous.]Michael: That's the Moonwalk - wait, you need to catch it from the - sideways.
Oprah: You gotta turn sideways?
Michael: Are you from the front?
Oprah: Yeah, we got ya!
Michael: Catch it from the sideways.
Oprah: O.K. Just show me slow motion. Could you show me slow motion?
Michael: O.K., wait, it's like, it's pushing and then there's like a popping type of thing.
[Michael stops dancing and comes down from stage.]
Michael: I'm sorry.
