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Responding to reports that Jackson's death may have been drug-related, Jermaine said he "would be hurt" if that turned out to be true. "Michael has always been a person who was against anything like that. I'm not saying it's right, because it's not right. But in this business, the pressure, and things that you go through — you never know what people might turn to."He also refuted rumors about Jackson being too weak to perform his 50-date "This Is It" concert series in London. "I do believe and I do know that Mike is very strong, not just mentally but physically," he said. "He's a dancer, he never stopped dancing, he was already ready physically. He passed the physical, he was strong; he was ready."
As for the child-molestation charges that Michael faced during the last part of his career, Jermaine said he never believed the allegations, saying, "I knew he was 1,000 percent innocent."
Before talking about some of his greatest music-video achievements at length, he went on to say that "in my opinion, it has to be completely entertaining and has a linear sense of continuity. I like having a beginning, middle and an ending so that you can follow a story. I am very much involved in complete creating of the piece. It has to be from my soul."
In 1983, Jackson changed everything when he released his John Landis-directed music video for "Thriller," off the album of the same name. "We're never serious on the set, so it's fun working with John 'cause I get to throw water balloons and stink bombs at him," he said. "That's a ritual for me — after we wrap on each video I throw a lot of stuff at everybody. My idea was to make a short film with conversation at the beginning and bookmark it with conversation at the end. Believe it or not, I'm afraid to watch scary movies. I always try to be a pioneer and innovator in whatever I do."
While choreographing the video, Jackson wanted to make sure that dancing zombies would look natural, not cheesy. "It was a delicate thing to work on, 'cause I remember my original approach was, 'How do you make zombies and monsters dance without it being comical?' So I got into the room with Michael Peters and he and I together kind if imagined how these zombies move."
While Washton differed with Pinsky about the correlation between childhood trauma and addiction, he agreed that addiction is more about the person and not the addictive nature of the drugs. "The biggest issue for people who collide with drugs is that some get a corrective relief from the drug for the pain inside them, whether that's from their sense of self or regulating their self-esteem or relationships with important people in their lives," he said. "And they find that the drug takes away that psychic pain, and opiates are more effective than any drug known to man to do that, and that relief from the bodily and emotional pain ... you take enough of a narcotic and you can't feel anything."
Washton, who wrote about "The Addictive Personality," in his 1989 book "Willpower's Not Enough," said another reason Jackson may have fallen into an alleged spiral of prescription drug abuse was a result of the rarified air the pop star lived in. "People like Jackson get far away from the free world and live an insular existence where one is not subject to the limits others deal with and they can often engage in behavior without consequence that others cannot," he said. "People are willing to do their bidding and give them things because of their fame and money, doctors will write them prescriptions. ... It's not hard for them to feel that the laws of the universe apply to everyone but them."
For complete coverage of the life, career and passing of the legendary entertainer, visit "Michael Jackson Remembered."