When the movie “Michael” started playing in theaters this year, almost everyone in the Jackson family went to see it right away. Jermaine Jackson did not. He’s Michael’s older brother, one of the voices you heard on all those early Jackson 5 records, and he’s also the father of Jaafar Jackson, the young man who plays Michael in the film.
Jermaine wanted to wait. And he wanted to wait for a very particular reason.
He told the family he’d see it for the first time at the big Berlin premiere, in a theater packed with fans. His own son, up on the screen, becoming the brother he grew up with. Jaafar wasn’t sure about it. He asked him straight out.
“Dad, you sure you want to wait?”
Jermaine was sure.
Jaafar grew up in one of the most famous families in the world, and Michael wasn’t the King of Pop to him so much as a beloved uncle. Playing him was the role of a lifetime, and it came with a weight most actors never carry. His own father would be sitting in that audience. Before the premiere, Jaafar leaned on him for advice, and in the clip below Jaafar talks about what his dad told him about stepping into Michael’s shoes.
Here’s Jaafar on the words his father, Jermaine, gave him before he took on the part.
Jaafar Jackson on the advice his father Jermaine gave him about playing Michael
Then came the night in Berlin. Jaafar told Variety that his father got through the whole film and had tears in his eyes when he walked up on stage afterward. And either that night or the next day, Jermaine called his son.
Jaafar says his father told him that in many moments during the movie, he honestly couldn’t tell the difference between his son and his brother. The face, the walk, the way he moved. For stretches of it, Jermaine wasn’t watching Jaafar anymore. He was watching Michael. And he told him how much he still misses his brother, and that smile of his, more than anything.
The scenes that hit him hardest were the performance scenes from the “Bad” era. That’s the Michael a lot of people picture first: the black outfit, the buckles, the footwork. Watching his son pull all of that back to life clearly got to him.
If you want to feel why those scenes carry so much, here’s the real thing. This is Michael himself in the “Bad” short film, the performance Jaafar had to study frame by frame.
Michael Jackson performing in the official “Bad” short film
Fans can say a young actor nailed it, and plenty have. It lands differently when the man’s own brother sits in the dark and, for a few seconds at a time, forgets he’s watching anyone else. That’s what Jermaine told his son he saw.