Michael Jackson’s calorie intake had become so low in the build-up to his 50-date London residency that he was force-fed, the Daily Mirror report. “He used to forget to eat because he was so focused and [show director] Kenny Ortega and I used to cut up his food and physically feed him,” Randy Phillips claimed. “Frail, he certainly wasn’t. He was always very thin but not to the point where he couldn’t perform. He really kicked into high gear and was totally engaged in the last two weeks. Before that he was nervous and not really coming to rehearsals. But that was his schedule and that was how he wanted to do things. It was like when you revise the day before an exam — that was the way he operated. Michael did not have a gruelling schedule– he had Michael’s schedule. He didn’t need to rehearse that much. He was so talented that he didn’t need to. When he started dancing, he was dancing better than the best 20-year-old dancers in the world. He was that good.” Phillips went on to describe the last time he saw Jackson. “He did a three-hour rehearsal and we all finished up at 12.30am on Thursday morning. He was really excited. He was super-charged and did a group hug with Kenny Ortega and his manager. He was like a kid in the candy store - he was so up for it. I walked him out to the car and he put his arm around me and, speaking softly like he always does, he said to me: ‘Do you know what – we are here, we are going to make it. I love you for doing this and now I know I can do it. That was the last thing he said to me and I never heard from him again.”
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