UPDATED: Karen Faye's moving testimony - Michael Jackson

Michael in Munich 1999

Karen Faye, who had been Michael Jackson's make-up artist for nearly 30 years, testified about Michael's health in the days before 25th June 2009.

She said Michael was cold as an “ice cube” on June 19, 2009, after a costume fitting.

"He couldn't get warm. I had a space heater, (and) I put it next to him and put him on the sofa and wrapped him in blankets and held him very close to me,” Faye said.

Michael Jackson costume fitting with Zaldy 19 June 2009

Michael at a healthy weight



Karen said she watched tour director Kenny Ortega try to feed Michael some chicken and pleaded with him to call a doctor.

The next day, she sent an email to Michael's manager, Frank DiLeo. A fan who had a recent meeting with Michael had contacted her with concerns, and she told DiLeo she agreed with the fan.

Jurors and  Katherine Jackson watched as the fan’s email was projected on a courtroom screen.

“(Michael) took his jacket off, and I saw something horrible. A skeleton. I watched his back. It was only bones. I am still in shock,” the fan said of her June 2009 meeting with the star, during which he tried on a jacket.

“It is humanly impossible for a human being to be a skeleton and dance for two hours straight without any danger,” the fan wrote.

Fans, such as myself, who spent many hours doing online research, trying to find out why Michael had suddenly died, have heard this story before. There was a website set-up by some fans who were around Michael in the last few months, and saw his health deteriorate. They contacted Karen about their concerns. They wrote to Michael as well, and put copies of their letters up on the website called This-Is-Not-It. But many fans disbelieved them, and thought they were glory seeking, and making up stories to gain fame. The letters have now been taken down, but I printed copies of them. 
The fan mentioned by Karen in her testimony above, visited Michael on 11th June 2009 whilst he was filming the Dome Project (see my timeline here). She gave him a red jacket as a gift, and it was while he was trying it on that she saw how thin and emaciated he was. She said that the jacket was a small woman's size but was still too large on him.
I think you'd agree from the photo above at the costume fitting that Michael was much thinner than he normally was. I have argued about this many times on fan forums, and yes Michael has been thin before, for example during the 2005 trial. But my point is, he wasn't about to start a 50 show concert in 2005. The body needs energy for a performance, and draws on the body's reserves. If you have no bodily fat to burn up, the body starts to break down muscle for energy.

19th June was the day that Michael was sent home from rehearsal by Kenny Ortega, who said he was incoherent, shivering and obsessive.

You can read more of Karen's testimony here.



Many fans also do not like Karen, and believe she is a liar. However, this testimony is under oath, and I believe what she is saying is the truth. I personally don't know what Karen nor the fans who spoke out about Michael's health, really have to gain from lying at this point. Lying isn't going to earn them money nor help them gain longlasting fame.

UPDATED 14th May

"Oh, my God, Turkle, I can see Michael's heart beat through the skin in his chest," stylist Michael Bush said after a costume fitting on June 19, 2009.

Turkle is the nickname of makeup artist Karen Faye.

"Get him a bucket of chicken," manager Frank DiLeo said in reply to concerns about Michael's weight loss, Faye testified.

"It was such a cold response, it broke my heart," Faye said through tears.

The Michael Jackson that the public saw in the documentary "This Is It" is not reality, Faye said.

She was asked to help retouch the video to make Michael look healthier on the big screen, she testified. But she refused.

"It was a lie. I didn't want to lie," Faye said. "Everybody was lying after he died, saying that Michael was well, and everybody knew he wasn't. I felt that retouching Michael was just a part of that lie."

Before Faye testified, jurors heard a similarly disturbing description of Michael in his final days from "This Is It" associate producer Alif Sankey.

Michael "was not speaking normally" at the June 19 costume fitting, Sankey said. She and producer Kenny Ortega cried after he left because of his appearance and what he said."God keeps talking to me," Michael told Ortega, Sankey testified.

Faye said Michael seemed "frightened," and he was talking to himself, repeating "the same thing over and over again."

"He kept repeating, 'Why can't I choose?'" she said.

Michael was shivering from chills, and it was "like I was touching ice" when she put on his makeup, Faye testified.

Faye said she raised her concerns with AEG Live CEO Randy Phillips. He told her, "Yeah, this is bad. It's not so good. I had to scrape Michael off the floor in London ... because he was so drunk," she said.

Sankey, who knew Michael since she first danced with him in 1987, said she screamed at Ortega in a phone call after the June 19 rehearsal, begging that he get help for Michael.

"I kept saying that 'Michael is dying, he's dying, he's leaving us, he needs to be put in a hospital,'" Sankey said. "'Please do something. Please, please.' I kept saying that. I asked him why no one had seen what I had seen. He said he didn't know."




So it seems that people who knew Michael and had worked with him before, could see that he he was not well. If you have seen Michael work before, and compare that to his 2009 rehearsals, you will see a difference. See the videos of 'Billie Jean' on my post here. Michael was always very energetic, and moved around a lot. A lot more than most people do, and more than most dancers do. So if you only saw him rehearse in 2009, you might not see a problem.

However, enough people saw real problems on 19th June, and although personally I think even then was not soon enough, someone should have taken responsibility at this point. But what we know actually happened, was a meeting took place at Michael's house with Dr Murray present. Murray and Michael said everything was fine.

Knowing Michael's history, this was hardly an acceptable reassurance.