Michael Jackson Estate Demands MSNBC Pulls Conrad Murray Documentary

The childhood home of Michael Jackson is reflected in the glass of a framed picture of the late singer

Paul Warner/WireImage

The executors of Michael Jackson's estate have demanded that MSNBC cancels its plans to run a documentary about the singer's relationship with Dr. Conrad Murray, the physician who was found guilty earlier this week of involuntary manslaughter in the pop star's death. According to the Jackson estate, Michael Jackson and the Doctor: A Fatal Friendship, attempts to "to shift the blame post-conviction to Michael Jackson, even though a jury considered the evidence and rejected this very argument."

MSNBC purchased the documentary from October Films, a British production company, and has scheduled to air the program on Friday and Monday night along with an interview with Murray conducted by NBC News correspondent Savannah Guthrie. The network has not yet responded to the estate's request.

Related
• Timeline: The Trial of Dr. Conrad Murray
• Photos: Michael Jackson Remembered
• Photos: Michael Jackson's Funeral

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Song Stories

“Piano Man”

Billy Joel | 1973

Billy Joel’s first hit, “Piano Man,” was – ironically – an autobiographical lament about how his first album wasn’t a hit. When Cold Spring Harbor didn’t take off, Joel briefly became a lounge pianist in Los Angeles, and this song, about that experience, expressed his frustrations and fears at the time: “And they sit at the bar and put bread in my jar/And say, ‘Man, what are you doing here?’” “It was all right,” Joel said later, about the gig. “I got free drinks and union scale, which was the first steady money I’d made in a long time.”

More Song Stories entries »

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