Featured Image Credit: Lionsgate
Topics: Celebrity, Entertainment, Music, TV And Film
Simon Fearn
Michael Jackson biopic Michael is an undisputed hit with film lovers. It has earned more than $400 million at the global box office and has a 97 percent Rotten Tomatoes audience score - though critics have been less kind with a 39 percent rating.
It’s also not gone down so well with some of Jackson’s family members either.
Those who have seen the film are all talking about one thing: how often we see Jackson’s bodyguard Bill Bray on screen.
Played by KeiLyn Durrel Jones, Bray is in almost every shot.
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One viewer wrote on X: “This man is somehow the third lead of this film. What the hell was that about.”
It’s got people talking about who the real Bill Bray was, and looking to learn more about his and the singer’s extremely close bond.
Bray was a former LAPD officer who started working for the Jackson 5 part-time, going on to become the head of security for both that band and Jackson as a solo artist in 1981.
Originally hired by Michael’s dad Joe Jackson to keep Michael out of trouble when he was a child star, the singer would later describe Bray as more of a father to him than his actual dad.
Bray was apparently so protective of Michael that Joe complained he had on one occasion denied him access to his own son, according to Rolling Stone.
The music magazine said Bray took Michael to the doctor, advised him on business deals and took all safety concerns in hand, adding that he was involved in ‘every part of the singer’s life’.
Durrel Jones told NBC California: “He was definitely sort of an avuncular pseudo father figure to Michael - personal security guard, and friend, confidante.”
Bray’s wife Gail told Fox News: “There was one time at the beginning when Michael finished a show, he would run and jump in Bill's arms when he got off stage."
While Jackson said to Bray in a 1992 note later acquired by TMZ: “Thank you for being a father. I don't know what would have happened to me if you were not around.”
Fans of Michael have said Bray's presence in the film showed 'the significance he [had for] Michael' and 'how inseparable they were'.
Bray and Jackson reportedly fell out in the mid-1990s, according to Reuters, though the reason why was never made public.
He continued to stand by the singer, however, saying of the allegations of child abuse levelled against Jackson: "I don't want to say anything that would hurt Michael.”
After his retirement in 1996, Jackson continued to fund Bray's health insurance, but it had been years since Bray heard from anyone in the Jackson family when he died in 2005 at the age of 80.
At the time of his death, Jackson’s publicist Raymone Bain told Reuters: “Michael is very, very, very saddened to learn of the passing of Bill Bray, who was a longtime friend and mentor to him and very trusted adviser to him.”