Fact #43383
When:
Short story:
The Michael Jackson album Dangerous is launched in the UK with a lavish invitation-only party for 400 media folks in the Lancaster Room of the Savoy Hotel, London, England, UK, Europe.Full article:
Johnny Black (diary entry) : As we come in we are shown into a darkened tunnel, a mini-labyrinth, with images of Jackson strategically illuminated along its length. The Lancaster Room is decorated with representations of scenes from the album's cover and promo videos. There are disco lights on an industrial metal rig which wends its way through the cut-glass chandeliers.
There are six large video screens on the wall set among the delicate plaster-work and Roman columns. There are huge central tables overflowing with salmon, king prawns, trout, dishes of beautifully-prepared salad, profiteroles piled into an elegant tower about three feet high. Bottles of Michael Jackson-labelled champagne are brought round by waiters who cruise among the guests looking as if they're faintly disturbed to have been cast among so many dubious, if stylishly-dressed, characters.
The waiters also serve up dishes of ice cream balls dipped in vanilla and chocolate icing, on trays overflowing with dry ice.
The images on the video screens bounce up and down, because the projectors are wobbling to the beat of the music.
Afterthought - three days later. The thing that I recall mostly now is not the two-feet high ice sculpture of the word DANGEROUS in the foyer of the Savoy, not the lengthy, meaningless speeches by Sony Executives telling us how wonderful the new album is, not the witty banter of the media crowd (me among them), but the two hungry old people who begged me for money as I arrived outside The Savoy. They lay under an archway not two hundred yards from the entrance to The Savoy. Almost symbolically, given that Michael's new single is entitled Black Or White, the couple was an old black man and a slightly younger white woman, very ragged, covered up with old clothes, newspapers and sides of cardboard boxes to keep warm.
Inside the hotel, a free meal of champagne, salmon and profiteroles was provided for 400 people who did not need it. Outside were the homeless, the hungry, the lonely, the lost. To my shame I have to admit that I gave them no money. I mumbled, "Sorry, I've nothing." This was a disgraceful lie.
(NOTE : These recollections are an edited version of my diary entries made at the time)
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There are six large video screens on the wall set among the delicate plaster-work and Roman columns. There are huge central tables overflowing with salmon, king prawns, trout, dishes of beautifully-prepared salad, profiteroles piled into an elegant tower about three feet high. Bottles of Michael Jackson-labelled champagne are brought round by waiters who cruise among the guests looking as if they're faintly disturbed to have been cast among so many dubious, if stylishly-dressed, characters.
The waiters also serve up dishes of ice cream balls dipped in vanilla and chocolate icing, on trays overflowing with dry ice.
The images on the video screens bounce up and down, because the projectors are wobbling to the beat of the music.
Afterthought - three days later. The thing that I recall mostly now is not the two-feet high ice sculpture of the word DANGEROUS in the foyer of the Savoy, not the lengthy, meaningless speeches by Sony Executives telling us how wonderful the new album is, not the witty banter of the media crowd (me among them), but the two hungry old people who begged me for money as I arrived outside The Savoy. They lay under an archway not two hundred yards from the entrance to The Savoy. Almost symbolically, given that Michael's new single is entitled Black Or White, the couple was an old black man and a slightly younger white woman, very ragged, covered up with old clothes, newspapers and sides of cardboard boxes to keep warm.
Inside the hotel, a free meal of champagne, salmon and profiteroles was provided for 400 people who did not need it. Outside were the homeless, the hungry, the lonely, the lost. To my shame I have to admit that I gave them no money. I mumbled, "Sorry, I've nothing." This was a disgraceful lie.
(NOTE : These recollections are an edited version of my diary entries made at the time)