Original subtitles

[crowd cheering]

- This is it, and see you in July.

Downloaded from YTS.MX

[crowd cheering and applauding]

Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX

[dramatic music]

[quiet, somber music]

- [Narrator] Michael Jackson is the undisputed king of pop.

A lifetime of innovation and reinvention

set him apart from the crowd as one of the greatest artists

and performers who ever lived.

But on June 25th, 2009 at the age of 50

Michael Jackson would be dead.

- [Dispatch] Fire paramedic 33,

what is the address of your emergency?

- [Caller] Yes sir, I need an ambulance

as soon as possible, sir.

- [Dispatch] OK sir, what's your address?

- [Caller] It's 100 North Carolwood Drive,

Los Angeles California, 90077.

- [Dispatch] You said Carolwood?

- [Caller] Carolwood Drive, yes.

- [Narrator] At the time of his death,

Michael Jackson was on a toxic combination

or prescription drugs, enough to send anyone crashing down.

But how did the most famous man on the world

descend into what that judge called medicine madness?

- What's fascinating and tragic about the way

that Michael Jackson died was the sheer volume

of prescription medication that Conrad Murray

was administering to him was beyond belief.

On the day he died, Jackson had been on propofol,

which is an anesthetic, which should only be administered

by anesthetists, for 60 consecutive days.

- [Narrator] 3:00 a.m. June 25th, 2009.

Shockingly Michael Jackson is still awake

even after receiving dose after dose

of dangerously strong drugs.

10:20 a.m., with Jackson still awake and in visible agony

Dr. Conrad Murray makes a final, fatal decision.

- He'd taken quite a severe battering from the press

and also through the trial and I just think

it just got to him, it really did.

It just broke his heart, it killed him.

- [Narrator] How did it happen?

What went wrong, and how did a man

gearing up for 50 sold-out concerts suddenly die?

Join us as we investigate the last 24 hours

of Michael Jackson. [dramatic music]

- Whatever you think of Michael Jackson,

one thing you have to concede

is that he was an extraordinary performer.

One of the greatest performers not just of his generation

but of any generation.

[electronic pop music]

- [Narrator] Michael Jackson has spent

almost his entire life center stage.

At just five years old, he was changing the music industry

with his brothers as the lead singer in the Jackson Five.

Jump-starting a solo career where he delivered hit

after momentous hit from Motown to disco to pop,

Michael Jackson was unstoppable.

- Beyond Michael Jackson's talent

what made him kind of go beyond the group was his ambition.

You know, he was a student of the craft

and so when he wasn't performing

he was to the side of the stage in the Apollo,

in the Regal and he was watching people like James Brown

and people like Smokey Robinson and Jackie Wilson

and he was watching and learning, picking things up.

And so he was such a student of his craft

that when it was time for him to branch out on his own

he had a lot of ideas.

- I think deep down everybody was waiting

for Michael to go solo, but obviously not saying it.

So when we actually saw that he was solo by himself

singing this infectious song

that you just couldn't stop singing

we were just like, you know, thank goodness.

Finally, he's on his own, it was like that.

It was a real, you know, to go straight to number one

with your first solo record after being in a band

called the Jackson Five and doing that on your own

that's pretty impressive.

- I think what Michael learned very early on in his life

was that music and the stage was the place

where he felt most at home,

and that's where he would escape into.

And you know, when he was in the studio

with Berry Gordy and they were going over a song

over and over and over, you know, it was hard work,

but he liked it, he enjoyed the craft.

He enjoyed making music, he loved music.

He learned very early on how to perform, you know,

and how to put on that mask.

Even as a child, once you hit that stage, you perform

and you become a character.

But behind that, there's no question

that he was struggling with a lot of things

and struggling to make sense of who he was

and how to reconcile his strange life.

- [Narrator] But a key event in 1984

would impact the course of Jackson's life forever.

[slow, somber music]

January 27th, 1984, Michael Jackson was starring

in a Pepsi commercial.

The plan was for Jackson to descend a staircase

and execute his iconic dance moves,

but things took a turn for the worse.

When the cameras began to roll,

Jackson took his position as rehearsed,

but the pyrotechnics were ignited too early

and struck Jackson, causing his hair and face to burn.

The burns caused by the pyrotechnics

scarred Jackson for life.

The damage to his scalp and face left Jackson

with no choice but to pursue plastic surgery.

A treatment he would become addicted to throughout his life.

- It was a huge change for everyone.

We couldn't believe his image had changed that much.

- [Narrator] Michael Jackson had struggled

his whole life with his appearance.

As a young child, he was abused by his father,

bullied by his older brothers,

and lived under constant media scrutiny.

- The very least you can say about Michael Jackson,

'cause it's well documented, he struggled

with his own identity, his own sexual identity.

He was bullied as a child by his father, his brothers.

His brothers called him big nose.

And obviously later in life he bleached his skin.

He became obsessed with bleaching his skin

and plastic surgery and this is a man

whose identity is fundamentally conflicted.

He doesn't know who he is, who he wants to be,

who he ought to be, who he's trying to please

and he's looking for his place in the world.

And when you stand up on a stage as grand

as the one that Michael Jackson spent his entire life

standing on, it's very difficult to get the advice

and the support that you actually need.

And there's no question he struggled with that.

And the way his body was decimated at the end of his life

both by actions he himself took.

The plastic surgery, the bleaching of the skin

together with the internal decimation of his body

through the use of prescription drugs

and the abuse of those drugs, there's no doubt

that Michael Jackson's life was a fractured,

fragmented life and that the real story of Michael Jackson

is really a struggle to find out who he was.

And to be more than that, to at least come close

to accepting who he was, which clearly he didn't.

And when you are that conflicted

you are in a high degree of emotional pain or distress.

Call it what you will, but it doesn't make life easy

and when you put your head on the pillow at night

it doesn't make it easy to sleep,

and certainly doesn't make it easy to sleep restfully.

- Michael Jackson's past is a difficult one,

is a complex one and you know,

he's the kind of quintessential child star

who's kind of pushed into the business,

into show business at a very early age.

His relationship with his father was difficult.

His father was abusive, both emotionally and physically

and that was hard for Michael.

People respond to that kind of abuse differently

and with some of the other brothers

I think that it didn't impact them

the same way psychologically that it did Michael.

It really hurt him, and he carried it

throughout the rest of his life, you know,

that his father drove him and pushed him

but never treated him like a son.

In fact, they called him Joseph.

They didn't call him dad or daddy or father.

His name was Joseph, and so it kind of represented

that emotional detachment.

- I think what the public doesn't know

is that he forgave his father

for some of the hurt that was caused

and at the end of his life

he was very much on good terms with his father.

So I think that a lot of the things that, they happened

a long time ago, and you know, Michael forgave.

[somber piano music]

- When Michael released Dangerous,

it was like he'd gone through a new change again

because now his face had changed way more

and he'd become even more lighter than before.

And everybody was starting to question, OK,

what's going on with the skin color?

Do you know, this is really odd.

I personally believed that no one quite knew

if he was actually trying to be white,

but they all assumed he was trying to make himself white.

And I think it angered a lot of people

because people felt he was such a good looking guy

and gorgeous a lot of us were like, upset

that he was changing his face.

We're like, don't change your face Michael.

We love you the way you are.

But he'd already changed it by Dangerous

and it was like, so that was the controversy

that was going on.

People weren't quite sure

if he was trying to make himself white or,

we could see his nose had changed

and things were looking a little bit different.

So everyone was a little bit, it was a weird time.

- He definitely had vitiligo.

Which you know, the interesting thing about that

is that a lot of people didn't believe him.

Or for a long period of his career

people didn't even know that he had vitiligo.

I think the first time that he mentioned it publicly

was to Oprah Winfrey, which was 1993.

So when his skin began lightening

people didn't know what to make of it.

And then finally he told people that he had vitiligo

and people didn't believe him.

And you know, it took really until he died

and the autopsy report actually indicated

that he had vitiligo.

But again, imagine being somebody

that grows up in front of the world

and you have this pretty unusual skin condition

and people are saying things like,

you are ashamed of your race, you know?

And, you don't want to be black.

You're trying to be white.

So there were things that were his choice.

I mean, the plastic surgeries were certainly his choice,

but there were things that weren't his choice

and the skin disorder was not his choice

and it was something that he had to deal with

in front of the world.

- Personally I actually felt

confused about why he would want to be white.

I didn't get that, but I think

the problem with that episode in his life,

I don't think they were vocal enough about his vitiligo.

And that's sad, 'cause they should have been, 'cause then

people wouldn't have been jumping to conclusions and stuff,

and I do think that in a way Michael probably,

I think he probably didn't want people to know.

- Michael Jackson from a very young age

had the world's eyes on him at all times.

And unfortunately when he was really young

he suffered a lot of abuse from his father.

His father called him big nose.

When he started to transition into adolescence

he remembered fans seeing him with acne

and just being horrified that he wasn't this child,

you know, this child star anymore

and that was very traumatic for Michael.

That, you know, his whole identity

was wrapped into being a performer

and having people love him, his audience.

So when his physical appearance started to change

it was very difficult for him to understand

how to deal with that, and he talks about

how he used to just go into a closet and cry.

It was very, he didn't even want to look at himself

in the mirror and he didn't want to go out into public

other than when he went onto stage.

And so all of those experiences when he was young

contributed to this kind of desire

to change his physical appearance.

And he was also an artist and he kind of just began

to treat his face as a work of art.

And he wanted to, he had this kind of various ideals

of perfection that he was trying to achieve physically.

And so he, you know, one plastic surgery after another

and his physical appearance just changed over and over again

and people didn't know what to make of it.

But I think there are a lot of complex reasons

for why he did them.

[slow dramatic music]

- And so at that time it was incredibly confusing

for people who'd watched him.

You know, everyone loved him and knew what he looked like

and it was confusing for us to see

that he had changed his color.

And it's only later on, obviously, way down the road.

Well, 15 years later you find out that he had vitiligo

which is a serious skin condition

where you completely lose pigment.

And I feel that because it was the 80s

stars were all about mystery then.

And people, you know, especially in the industry

didn't want artists, it's not like now,

where you know everything about an artist.

It was like, you didn't get married back then.

The artist was supposed to be an enigma

and I don't feel that they thought

it was the right thing to tell the public

what was really going on with Michael

because they didn't want it to affect, I think,

his image and everything else.

I really believe that, because you know,

when you hear what he says in interviews later on,

you know, he didn't want people to know

about all the vitiligo.

I just think it was traumatic in itself

that he was going through that himself.

I wasn't there, but I just feel

that when you see later interviews with him with Oprah

and he opens up and he talks about it

you see that he's traumatized by the fact

that he wasn't able to tell people before.

Now he's telling everyone.

Everyone's looking at him like he's not telling the truth

and that's really a shame, because now you look back,

you realize this guy, he wasn't well.

He had some serious illnesses, you know, the vitiligo.

He had the burns from the Pepsi ad

and so he had a lot of plastic surgery

to reform parts of his head and stuff like that.

I mean, there was a lot of stuff that was hidden.

- When I first met Michael he had control in his life.

And I think the control started slipping away 2003 onwards

when he sank deeper into despair over the false accusations.

And I think that there were a lot of doctors

that just barged their way into his life

and just people, he just had so many people around him.

And a lot of them, I didn't really understand

what they were doing in his life.

And I think that they influenced him

and it's like they took control.

- [Narrator] But something much more sinister

began on that day in January 1984.

Something that would lead to his early death 24 years later.

[slow, ominous music]

- When he burnt his hair at the Pepsi commercial

he started using painkillers then.

He then fell from a stage and broke his leg.

He also cracked a vertebrate in his back

and those things have caused him terrible pain.

[slow instrumental music]

- I never saw Michael take even an Asprin

when he was with me.

I was absolutely horrified when I found out

and the circumstances of his death,

which became clear in the news.

He, when I was with him and our families were together

he was always bright, alert,

and there was never any question of him being on anything.

- I think that Michael made certain choices

to cope with his reality and some of those choices

led to kind of an insulated existence by necessity.

You know, when he creates Neverland

it's a way for him to cope, right?

To kind of block out the real world.

Or when he's taking pain medication

it's a way to kind of block out all the things

that are difficult, you know, all the pain

that he's struggling with and just all the pressures

that he's dealing with, but unfortunately

there are repercussions to that.

You know, when you seclude yourself,

when you isolate yourself

or when you make some of these choices

there's kind of an inevitability

in terms of further isolating yourself from maybe people

that could help you or that could at least

that you can have a more healthy kind of relationship with.

I think prescription drug abuse

is common in celebrity world.

I think it's very easy to get caught up

in being a celebrity.

And you try and get your body to work

for what your heart desires and what your mind wants.

On a small scale I find that, even I am not a celebrity,

but even trying to live up to the demand of going to bed

when you've gotta go to bed and wake up

when you gotta wake up, look like you've gotta look

and do what you've gotta do is a toll.

Imagine those who are in front of the camera,

big celebrities, I think if I'm fair on them

I think it's sad, but I think it's a price

that they have to pay unfortunately

if they want to go down in history

as people that were really icons.

And I think the bigger the celebrity the bigger the price.

- The first time that it was actually brought

to my attention was in March 2009

when I was at the Lanesborough Hotel

and he requested that I get hold of some medication

through my family contacts, 'cause I've got six members

of my family in the medical field.

And when I went into his bathroom then,

that's when I was aware.

[soft, slow piano music]

I saw lots and lots of pill boxes

and various different medication in there.

There was Demerol, there was Paxil, Zoloft,

and that made alarm bells ring in my head.

I assumed that if it's his suite and his bathroom

that they'd be his.

I didn't see any name on them,

but I assumed that they were his

and in light of what's happened

I'd safely conclude that they were his.

I never, ever, ever saw him take anything

and if I had I would have put a stop to that straight away,

but I never did.

I was absolutely shocked, and when I saw these things

in the bathroom I wasn't thinking, oh,

you know, he's a drug addict or anything like that.

I was thinking, maybe he's sick and I wanted to know

and I kept on asking him, "What's happening?"

And he was like, "No, everything's routine,

"you know, it's all OK."

And that's when I decided to take a few samples.

I didn't take the whole lot.

I took a few samples of the medication

and I took them home so that I'd have time

to think carefully and find out what they were and see.

And that's what I did, and I found out

that they were painkillers and antidepressants.

- It's sad that we wanted so much from the man

that we kept saying more, more, more

rather than saying hey, no more from you, rest up.

Enjoy your life, enjoy bringing up your children

and you know, enjoying your home rather than saying,

what can Michael Jackson do?

What can Michael Jackson?

I think we drove him to a lot of things.

- [Narrator] At the time of his death,

Michael was taking an almost unbelievable daily dose

of prescription drugs including Demerol, Zoloft, Ritalin,

Prozac, Xanax, Dilaudid, Vistaril, and Prilosec.

- We'll never know the real reasons

why Michael Jackson was taking the volume

of prescription medication that he was.

I mean, he would have said to his friends, his family,

his doctors, yeah, I need this medication.

I want it, I want it, I need it, I want it

because he was an addict and that's what an addict does.

They'll do anything to get their drug of choice.

But as for the doctors, or on the people

who were close to Michael Jackson, allowing that to happen?

Who knows, who knows why they were prescribing that.

It certainly wasn't for Michael Jackson's wellbeing.

Michael Jackson needed to get off those drugs,

not to take more of them.

He needed to take fewer opioids.

He needed to take fewer benzodiazepines.

He certainly needed less propofol.

But we'll never know what was going through the minds

of those people allegedly caring

and treating Michael Jackson.

One can only assume that like with so many people

that have come before him and so many people afterwards

that the richer and more famous and celebrated you are

the more at risk you are of not getting the advice

and support that you need 'cause people will give you

and tell you what you want to hear

rather than what you need to hear.

And that's the tragedy of Michael Jackson

and many others like him.

- [Narrator] This cocktail of drugs

was placing an enormous strain

on Jackson's already exhausted body.

But while the prescription drugs may have become habit,

mounting pressures outside of the singer's control

were beginning to take their toll.

- Please keep an open mind and let me have my day in court.

I deserve a fair trial like every other American citizen.

I will be acquitted and vindicated when the truth is told.

[soft music]

- [Narrator] Although Michael Jackson was cleared

of all child sex abuse allegations,

the years of public humiliation

at the hands of the hounding press

left his reputation in complete ruin.

- The 1993 alligations was extremely traumatic for Michael.

He was on tour at the time.

This is when he developed an addiction to painkillers.

It was, he, in his own words described it

as a humiliating experience.

They did a strip search on him, took photographs of him.

They had like 70 police officers go through his property

and what made him angry about it

is that they never found anything that would indicate

that he was in fact guilty.

- Oh, it took a lot out of him.

I mean, yeah, he didn't eat very well.

I mean, can you imagine the pressure

he must have been under?

And the pressure was enormous for him.

I mean, of course we knew that he was innocent

of all charges, but, you know,

a lot of innocent men have been found guilty

and evidence can fall one way or the other

so the stress of three months of going to court

every single day, he looked thin, he looked anemic almost.

I mean, it was just, I think that really

was probably the worst thing in his life

as far as his health goes and his mental state.

Yeah, I mean, the trial took a lot out of him.

I mean, you know, he didn't eat, sleeping very badly.

And really, that probably took 10 years off him

I should think.

- How everything started to go wrong with Michael Jackson

was with the child abuse allegations.

And I think, when I first heard it I remember thinking

to myself, well where did that come from?

I mean, we all know that he's like a kid.

He's a kid himself, so what's that about?

So first of all, there was confusion.

You're thinking, is it true, isn't it true?

And this was always the general consensus

from people that you spoke to was, I'm not sure.

And you'd have some people go, "I think he did."

It's typical, it was this witch hunt.

It was a total witch hunt by the media

already sort of saying that he was already guilty

before he was even proven innocent, you know?

And I felt that that's when things

started to go down for him in terms of,

the public couldn't work out what was true and what wasn't.

That's what was bad, and then when it was settled,

an out of court settlement, this was what was a big mistake.

[peaceful music]

- Fabrications.

First of all, I say the allegations.

That was a very fabricated story

that when it went to court, found innocent on all charges.

You know, not even an alcohol drink.

Also I'd like to say, you know,

there's so many, to pin one, I think would be unfair.

- Perhaps there's an ounce of truth in what's written,

but it's totally embellished and taken out of context.

And I really think that people actually

get some kind of kick out of it, they love it.

They don't want to print the truth, you know?

And so basically it means that when people do come forward

and tell the truth, no one believes them.

He'd taken quite a severe battering from the press

and also through the trial

and I just think it just got to him.

It really did, it just broke his heart, it killed him.

- [Narrator] Once revered

as the pinnacle of musical achievement,

Jackson sank into a reclusive lifestyle.

For 12 years he kept a low profile, hiding away

and drowning in $400 million of debt.

- You know, I think that certain people

around Michael Jackson cared about him,

tried at different parts of his life to help him.

Unfortunately when you have that much power

you can surround yourself with the wrong types of people,

the people that will just say yes to everything

and so some of the people, including Lisa Marie Presley

who did really try to help Michael

and kind of had a more balanced relationship with him

weren't there in the end, you know,

and didn't have a place in his life.

And so there weren't a lot of people.

I know that his family tried to help him in certain ways

when they could reach him, but it was hard

in those final years for people

to kind of get into that inner circle

and really see what was happening.

- He was very hurt by the misreportings in the press,

but I think his defense mechanism was actually,

was not to read them, don't listen, you know.

They can say, they're gonna say

whatever they're gonna say anyway

so just don't read, don't get involved with that.

'Cause I said to him one day, I said,

"Why don't you just sue them?"

And he said, "Mark, if I was to sue everyone

"that wrote something about me that was untrue

"I'd be in court every single day."

So it just wasn't worth it for him

so he just decided to let it go.

- To a certain extent, in terms of naive,

I think because he has lived a lot of his life

in the public eye with all the adulation

and all of the fans I think to a certain extent

perhaps he hadn't experienced some of the things

that we've experienced in everyday life.

So for those reasons perhaps a little bit naive.

And I think that he always wanted to see the best in people

and I think towards the end he realized

that there are some very bad people out there

who don't wish you well at all and in terms of lonely

I would say Michael was lonely.

It's not that he didn't have people around him.

He had fairly few people that really understood him

and understood what he'd been through,

and the kind of life he had.

In fact, there aren't very many people

that have been through what Michael's been through.

And from that point of view I would say he was very lonely.

[peaceful piano music]

- [Narrator] In what many consider an attempt

to offset his debt, Jackson made a deal

with AEG Live to perform a series of 50 concerts

in a final curtain call at the London O2 Arena.

[dramatic music] March 5th, 2009.

Michael Jackson announces to the world, This Is It.

- This is it, I mean this is really it.

This is the final, this is the final curtain call, OK?

And I'll see you in July.

[audience screaming]

I love you. [audience cheering]

I really do, you have to know that.

I love you so much, really, from the bottom of my heart.

This is it, and see you in July.

[audience cheering]

- After Michael announced the concerts

he stayed in London and my family came up

and we spent the weekend with Michael

before he flew back to the states.

He was in a really good, positive mood.

I mean, he was in such a positive frame of mind.

Best I'd seen him for a long time

and it was so reassuring and we had big plans

and he was gonna come to London.

And you know, it was over the school holidays

and the kids were all gonna get together

and we have loads of free time

and things we were gonna do and all these plans we had.

He was just so positive.

- I think he's extremely in control.

Whether if that was Michael's magic or his madness,

like they say, I think he was very much in control.

And in one hand it's what brought out his genius

and in the other hand it's probably

what brought out sometimes these traps that he fell into

by not having this management that he would listen to.

And I think, you know, that there was times

when Michael was very much in control.

- Michael didn't sign up to do 50 concerts.

He said that to me, that he only thought he was doing 10.

And he wasn't very happy about the fact

that it was gonna be 50 concerts, and I don't think he knew

how he was gonna be able to manage it.

- [Narrator] But the concert rehearsals

were not going to plan.

Director Kenny Ortega noted

that Jackson often didn't show up

and when he did he was late, weak, and fatigued.

- Michael had problems and he felt a lot of pressure.

At this time his finances were in disarray

and this was his last shot, you know.

The This Is It tour, you know, it really was,

he was feeling an enormous amount of pressure

and he felt desperate to be able to sleep.

Just to be able to get on that stage

and feel like he could do it.

And so there was an enormous amount of pressure

and there was a lot of money involved

and you know, and certainly Michael made choices, you know,

but at the same time there's this doctor

that had an ethical responsibility,

even when he's giving him this propofol to monitor him,

to not leave the room, you know, to have just basic

kinds of things that you would expect

and those things weren't there.

Michael didn't want to die.

I mean, he had three kids and certainly

he made choices, but it's tragic, it's a tragedy.

- [Narrator] June 22nd, 2009.

As the first of 50 nights of performing gets closer

Michael Jackson is battling immense pressure.

His body is struggling after years

of prescription drug addiction and medical surgery.

But the world expects to see Jackson as they remember him.

The king of pop.

In his Beverly Hills mansion,

Jackson is unable to fall asleep.

At his bedside, Dr. Conrad Murray.

Dr. Murray knew that the propofol he was administering

to Jackson was incredibly dangerous

and had attempted to reduce his dependency on the drug

by giving him a lower 25 milligram dosage.

After taking the antianxiety drug Ativan

and the sedative Versed Jackson finally falls asleep.

June 23rd, Dr. Murray again administers Ativan and Versed

to help Jackson sleep.

10:00 p.m. June 24th, at the Staples Center

in downtown Los Angeles,

Jackson arrives three hours late for rehearsal.

The show was already running behind schedule,

but that evening according to eyewitnesses,

Michael Jackson gave an incredible performance

and it seemed as though the king of pop

was finally getting back on form.

- Michael's dancing and he's totally focused.

He knows exactly what he's doing and he's doing great.

And you know, I just believe he was in the wrong hands.

I disagree with everyone who says

that he wasn't gonna be up with the shows and up to it.

He's a perfectionist, he would have been fine,

but he needed to be taken care of.

He's an artist, they have to have special care, you know,

and I don't think he had it.

- The movie came about using the rehearsals

and using the production and the direction

and the input that Michael had

and they wanted to show people, look,

this man was definitely up for it.

Focused energy, he was up for what was ahead.

He was looking forward to it

and I think the movie was a very good move

by AEG to say, look, the man put so much into this.

He would want the world to see what he was doing,

what he can do, and I think it was a good move for the fans

and it was a good move for Michael.

- An extraordinary thing, especially to those

who don't understand how you can develop tolerance to drugs

is that on June the 24th, a day before his death

Michael Jackson during rehearsal gave,

by all eyewitness accounts,

an absolutely extraordinary performance.

So despite the fact that that time

he'd been on Propofol for 60 consecutive days,

that he had this vast cocktail of drugs inside his body

he was still able to perform, and not just to perform well,

but to perform to a level that many other artists,

most other artists could only dream of.

Whatever you think of Michael Jackson,

one thing you have to concede

is that he was an extraordinary performer,

one of the greatest performers, not just of his generation,

but of any generation and his final performance,

the performance on the eve of his death

bears witness to that perhaps more

than any other performance he ever gave.

[somber atmospheric choral music]

- [Narrator] 1:00 a.m. June 25th, 2009.

At Michael Jackson's Los Angeles home

Dr. Conrad Murray sat by the star's bedside

as Jackson lies awake in bed unable to sleep.

Jackson begs Dr. Murray for a dose of Propofol

to send him to sleep and at first the doctor resists.

After 60 consecutive nights of administering the drug,

Murray tries to stand his ground,

but Jackson continues to beg,

expressing his agony and discomfort.

Finally, Dr. Murray surrenders

and administers Jackson the propofol.

1:30 a.m., despite having been administered propofol,

Jackson is still awake.

His excessive use of this highly dangerous drug

has left his body almost immune to its effects.

Dr. Murray gives Jackson 10 milligrams of Valium

and waits by his bedside.

- What's fascinating and tragic

about the way that Michael Jackson died was the sheer volume

of prescription medication that Conrad Murray

was administering to him was beyond belief.

On the day he died, Jackson had been on propofol,

which is an anesthetic, which should only be administered

by anesthetists, for 60 consecutive days.

Just imagine that for a minute.

60 consecutive days of propofol.

And still he could not sleep.

And that's because, like with all drugs,

prescription drugs, synthetic drugs, illegal drugs,

natural drugs, whatever type of drug you are taking,

the brain develops tolerance.

So the effect you get when you first take the drug

is not the effect you get on the 100th or the 200th

or the 500th or the 1,000th time,

so you need more and more and more of the drug

and the pleasure and relief you got

from taking the drug to begin with

turns into pain and distress.

So you take the drug no longer for pleasure

but simply to stop feeling pain.

Michael Jackson undoubtedly was in extraordinary

emotional pain and stress because of his lifestyle,

his life, and the comeback tour.

And also he was putting enormous physical stress on his body

so he had physical pain and emotional pain to contend with

and he just wanted to sleep.

- [Narrator] 3:00 a.m., shockingly,

Michael Jackson is still awake,

even after receiving dose after dose

of dangerously strong drugs.

Dr. Murray proceeds to administer two milligrams

of Versed by an IV drip.

7:00 a.m., disturbingly Jackson is still awake.

Dr. Murray strongly affirms that he spent the night

by Jackson's bedside monitoring his pulse and oxygen levels.

Dr. Murray administers a further dosage of Versed

through Jackson's IV.

- But even that was not enough

to send Michael Jackson to sleep.

So over the next few hours, the last few hours

of Michael Jackson's life he was administered

with benzodiazepines, central nervous system depressants,

sedatives of one sort or another intravenously

until he drifted off into sleep, unconsciousness,

and eventually death.

- [Narrator] 10:20 a.m., with Jackson still awake

and in visible agony, Dr. Conrad Murray

makes a final, fatal decision.

[dramatic music]

He administers a further 25 milligrams of propofol

to Michael Jackson.

The king of pop finally falls into a deep sleep.

11:30 a.m., the powerful cocktail of drugs

inside Jackson's body has now become lethal

and he goes into cardiac arrest.

- [Dr. Peter] So Michael Jackson

might have struggled for breath.

Slowly he might have suffocated,

gradually losing consciousness until the moment came

when his heart stopped.

- [Narrator] 12:26 p.m., an unidentified man

makes the 911 call to the LAPD.

- [Dispatch] Fire Paramedic 33,

what is the address of your emergency?

- [Caller] Yes, sir, I need an ambulance

as soon as possible, sir.

- When the 911 call came our firefighters

at our dispatching center, which is located

four floors below the city hall

down in the catacombs, if you will, of the city.

They took a 911 call that shocked the world.

- [Dispatch] OK sir, what's your address?

- [Caller] It's 100 North Carolwood Drive,

Los Angeles, California 90077.

- [Dispatch] You said Carolwood?

- [Caller] Carolwood Drive, yes.

- Unfortunately at the time the dispatcher

answered the phone call and never once did the caller

ever identify to the Los Angeles Fire Department

that the person that needed our help was Michael Jackson.

- [Dispatch] OK, sir, what's the phone number

you're calling from, and what's the problem?

Exactly what happened?

- [Caller] Sir, what happened was,

we have a gentleman here that needs help

and he's not breathing, he's not breathing

and we're trying to pump him, but he's not, he's not--

- [Dispatch] OK, OK, how old is he?

- [Caller] He's 50 years old, sir.

- [Dispatch] 50, OK.

He's unconscious, he's not breathing?

- [Caller] Yes, he's not breathing, sir.

- [Dispatch] OK, and he's not conscious either, he's not--

- [Caller] No, he's not conscious, sir.

- [Dispatch] OK.

- Once the dispatcher got information

about the patient and what was happening with the patient

the identifier said that the patient was pulseless

and non-breathing and that a doctor was on the scene

doing CPR on the bed.

So part of our instructions as already

our firefighters and paramedics are responding,

we still have a firefighter on the phone with the caller

giving directions to give life saving techniques

to the people that could help.

- [Dispatch] All right, do you have, is he on the floor?

Where's he at right now?

- [Caller] He's on the bed, sir, he's on the bed.

- [Dispatch] OK, let's get him on the floor.

- [Caller] OK.

- [Dispatch] OK, let's get him down to the floor.

I'm gonna help you with CPR right now, OK?

- [Caller] We need someone to get, we need--

- [Dispatch] Yes, we're already on our way there.

We're on our way.

I'm gonna do as much as I can to help you over the phone.

We're already on our way.

Did anybody see him?

- [Caller] Yes we have a personal doctor here with him, sir.

- [Dispatch] Oh, you have the doctor there?

- [Caller] But he's not responding to anything, to no,

he's not responding to CPR or anything.

- [Dispatch] Oh, OK, well we're on our way there.

If your guy's doing CPR and you're instructed by a doctor

he has a higher authority than me and he's there on scene.

- [Caller] OK.

- [Dispatch] Did anybody witness what happened?

- [Caller] No, it's just the doctor, sir.

- [Narrator] Paramedics arrive at the scene,

but Dr. Murray can no longer detect a pulse.

- I was told that Michael Jackson was being transported

to UCLA Hospital on June 25th and the fire department

was on scene at Michael Jackson's house

three minutes and 17 seconds

from the time the emergency 911 call came on June 25th

to when it came to the fire station

from the firefighters getting out of the fire station

to the address where Michael Jackson was

was three minutes and 17 seconds.

And we worked on Michael Jackson for approximately

about 48 minutes and once the fire department realized

that it was now proper to transport our patient,

Michael Jackson to the hospital, they were 2.3 miles away,

but he worked about 45 to 48 minutes.

We worked 45 minutes because as paramedics

we call it the golden hour, and the firefighters

and paramedics can pass medications,

can do life saving techniques to help our patients.

We're in contact with our base station,

which is at UCLA giving us medical direction

on what type of medicines we could give our patient

to help him survive.

- [Narrator] 2:26 p.m. June 25th, 2009.

The legend of Michael Jackson comes to a shocking end.

He is pronounced dead

at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center.

- Oh, it was devastating.

- It was like the world paused.

- I just can't actually believe it.

It still feels like it's a really bad dream.

It hasn't really sunk in.

It doesn't feel real, it just, it feels all wrong.

- Well I was actually in my room

and I was watching something on one of the other channels

and I got a phone call and a friend of mine said,

"Have you seen the news?"

And I said, "What do you mean?"

And he says, "Put the news on," so I flicked over

and of course it said Michael was admitted to hospital

and then it just got from one bad thing to another

and then he was pronounced dead, and it was, I mean,

I just couldn't believe it.

I thought it was in a dream.

I was gonna wake up, it was all a big joke.

I just couldn't absorb it, it was just horrible.

This happened, I think U.K. time around 2:00 in the morning

and my kids were upstairs and I thought,

well, do I go up and tell them?

I said, no, no, no, let them sleep.

They have to get up for school in the morning.

And well, I went up and knocked on their door

and I said, "Look, I've got something

"really awful to tell you."

And I told them, and you know, they just broke down

in floods of tears, so it was, really,

that's what hit me then, really.

- Everybody felt a connection.

Whether you liked him or not, you grew up with something

you remember the song, you connected.

It could be a dance with your partner.

Whatever it is, it was at a place.

You first heard when Thriller came out.

You was upstairs on the BB, I don't know, whatever it was

and they felt there was a certain element of loss.

Something, whether they like him or not.

- Ever since I was born

Daddy has been the best father you could ever imagine.

[sobbing]

And I just wanted to say I love him so much.

- [Narrator] But the question on everyone's lips is,

why did this happen?

And the second question, who is to blame?

- He got in a bad situation, you know?

He got in a bad situation where he had developed

a dependency on certain prescriptions including propofol,

which wasn't supposed to be used

in the way that it was being used.

And unfortunately there were doctors

including Dr. Conrad Murray who weren't directing him

to the kind of help that he actually needed.

Whether he needed help sleeping

or whether he was having anxiety

or these different things that he was saying

that he needed help with, you know,

instead of getting what he needed,

they were using these very unusual,

dangerous methods to address those.

And you know, he's building up for this big comeback tour

and his doctor's putting him to sleep every night

with propofol, which is usually used for surgery.

And it's extremely dangerous and so Michael Jackson died

because of what happened throughout his life

which is that the people around him

viewed him for what they could get from him.

And you know, in this case, the doctor was getting

$150,000 a month and was being extremely reckless.

- It was gross neglect.

And this was not someone that I would trust as my doctor.

And that's all I really will say about that.

Someone like Michael Jackson

should have had a proper doctor, not someone,

you know, in America it's very much a problem, I believe.

I find that you can pretty much get your hands

on lots of prescriptive drugs and things like this.

This is why Hollywood has so many problems with drugs.

So I would just put it down to gross negligence, you know?

- What Conrad Murray should have done,

if he is putting Michael Jackson into in effect

a drug-induced coma, which is what he was doing,

he is putting Michael Jackson to sleep

with a vast quantity of prescription medication.

Then that needs proper monitoring and he was not qualified

to do that, he wasn't qualified to do it.

So he was gambling, really, with Michael Jackson's life

and doing what Michael Jackson wanted him to do

simply because he was afraid not to.

Perhaps because he had problems in his own life.

I think there were well-documented issues

Conrad Murray had with debt

and his own personal financial situation

so Jackson wasn't a patient he could afford to lose,

but of course he lost him,

and he lost him in the worst possible way.

- [Court Official] You're charged with the offense

of involuntary manslaughter, a felony, Dr. Murray.

How do you plead?

- Your honor, I am an innocent man.

I therefore plead not guilty.

- The facts in this case, in my view,

suggest that virtually none of the safeguards

for sedation were in place when propofol was administered

to Michael Jackson.

It's an egregious violation.

No competent physician would give these drugs

without having emergency equipment present.

- Well, I think it was just an awful accident

where medication that was used

shouldn't have been used unsupervised.

That kind of medication is only used in hospitals

as far as I know and he should have been

on some kind of monitor.

But he shouldn't have been given it in the first place.

Unfortunately if you pay, what's the saying

he who pays the piper calls the tune

and if Michael wanted that, he'd find someone

and pay 'em enough to do it.

And sadly that took his life away.

- I wished he had the opportunity

of having a life for himself

and letting the children grow up and say, you know, Dad.

So he can sit back, and whether they perform or whatever

I think for him to enjoy something that he never had,

it felt like from the day he was born

to the day he died he entertained.

If that's the way he wanted it, then good for you,

but if he wanted some privacy,

I don't think he got enough of it.

I don't think it was fair.

I think we should respect him and honor him

for what he gave musically.

[sad, slow piano music]

- You know, what's getting lost here

is that Michael Jackson is an incredible artist.

And artists aren't always normal.

In fact some of the greatest artists are very eccentric

and very unique, very different and Michael's no different.

Michael was a great artist.

He lived his life in a different way, in an unusual way,

provoked a lot of questions, but when we go back

to those songs and we go back to those videos,

when we go back to those albums

we find just an incredibly rich, diverse array of art

that deserves attention.

For all the scandals, for all the eccentricities

Michael was an artist

and he wanted to be remembered as an artist.

In fact, one of his last quotes in 2007

was a quote from Michelangelo, and he says,

"To escape death I bind my soul to my work."

- On the question everybody asks in any death,

but especially the death of one of the 20th century's

most iconic figures, is who is responsible?

Who can we blame?

And obviously Conrad Murray was the fall guy

and rightly so.

There's no question that he played a contributing role

in Michael Jackson's death,

but so did Michael Jackson's family.

Did Michael Jackson's father play a role in his death?

Did the many people who allowed Michael Jackson

to go down the road he went down play a role in his death?

Of course they did, but, and here's the but,

ultimately you cannot take a drug or a drink by accident.

[dramatic music]

Yeah, you have to either ask someone to administer it

for you or you have to administer it yourself.

And the only hope that any addict has is that they see

that they are responsible for their own actions.

Because the more we allow an addict

to pass the responsibility for their addiction

onto someone else, the more impossible recovery becomes.

So if we were to really say, who is ultimately to blame?

One has to point the finger at Michael Jackson himself.

Not in a harsh, judgemental sense,

but just in the sense that other people watching that story,

that they need to learn what they need to do

if they are suffering through similar problems.

They know what they need to do to recover,

which is to take responsibility for their own addictions.

Do not make it somebody else's fault

otherwise the addiction will kill you.

- [Narrator] Michael Jackson was an icon, a legend,

the king of pop, but the real tragedy of Jackson's death

is a lesson in the price of fame.

When you can have everything in the world,

who can stop you if you can't stop yourself?