Michael Jackson and his sister Janet are the kind of celebrities that couldn’t evade the media if they tried. They are two of the most watched performers of the past couple of decades. As flashy as their performances are, the drama in their personal lives sometimes is even more attention-getting. When it comes to Michael Jackson, some of that drama is downright bizarre.
Janet Jackson and James DeBarge: Jackson was eighteen in 1984 when she eloped with DeBarge, a member of the DeBarge Motown family group. In March 1985 the marriage was annulled with DeBarge’s drug habit usually noted as the reason for the marriage ending. In 2005, rumors that Jackson and DeBarge had a daughter surfaced when DeBarge’s youngest brother claimed that the child, eighteen at the time, lives with Jackson’s oldest sister, Rebbie. Janet Jackson denied the claims.
Janet Jackson and Rene Elizondo: The couple’s secret marriage in 1991 ended in 1999 with a very nasty divorce that provided great material for the tabloids. Elizondo sued Jackson for spousal support and once their court battle had ended, he received a multi-million dollar settlement.
Michael Jackson and Debbie Rowe: Did they get married just so she could produce a couple of children for Jackson? She was a nurse in his dermatologist’s office before they wed. Once married they lived in separate residences and, when the multimillion dollar divorce settlement was in place, they went their separate ways with him keeping custody of the kids. Among stories being circulated about this strange marriage is one by Rowe in which she states that both children were conceived through artificial insemination.
Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley: Jackson’s first marriage was to Elvis’s daughter, Lisa Marie. They were married in the Dominican Republic in 1994 in a private ceremony which they denied. In June 1995 they announced they were deeply in love and trying to have a child. By December 1995 the couple separated and Presley filed for divorce the following month citing “irreconcilable differences” for the marriage ending. With both Jackson and Presley being extremely wealthy on their own, apparently they were able to dissolve their marriage without making claims on each other’s money.