Did Prince Try to Murder the King of Pop?
Prince tried to involve the crowd, but they were unenthusiastic. So he decided to call it a day. As he exited the stage, he leaned against a prop lamppost, stumbled, and fell into the crowd with the prop. Michael Jackson was delighted, and his glee at the Purple One’s humiliation fueled a lifelong beef. Years later, MJ still savored his rival’s literal fall. As he described it: “He made a fool of himself! He was a joke … People were running and screaming. I was so embarrassed. It was all on video“. Understandably, Prince was mortified. He was embarrassed not only before a crowd, but in front of his idol, James Brown, and his rival, MJ. So he decided to run him over. Per music producer Quincy Jones, a livid Prince waited in a limo outside the concert venue, and planned to run MJ over when he came out.
It is unclear if Prince actually made the attempt, but as Jones told QG in an interview, he fully intended to do so. By the late 1980s, the King of Pop and the Purple One were at the top of their game. Despite the bad blood, Quincy Jones tried to bring them together in a collaboration. His first attempt was the charity single We Are the World, which Michael Jackson co-wrote and performed in. Prince promptly refused to participate. A few years later, Jones tried to bring them together on the song Bad, to sing opposite each other and perform jointly on the music video. Prince expressed some interest, but eventually declined. So MJ did the video with Wesley Snipes.
