Michael Jackson carried baby dolls after Lisa Marie Presley refused to have children: "She promised..."
Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley's relationship was nothing short of an enigma; they were madly in love with each other but unfortunately, never on the same page when it came to having children. Throughout their whirlwind romance, Jackson was pained because Presley refused to honor his bloodline. "She promised me that before we married, that would be the first thing we'd do is have children," he told Rabbi Shmuley Boteach during their secret taping between 1999 and 2001. "So I was broken-hearted and I walked around all the time holding these little baby dolls, and I'd be crying; that's how badly I wanted it, you know. I was determined to have children."
During their 1995 interview, Presley seemed uncomfortable when questioned about being pregnant. During the candid discussion, fans asked the pair burning questions about their marriage that were displayed to them. "I want to know if you've done the thing, Michael?" a fan cheekily inquired. "I know that this is an intimate question, but are you having sex together with Lisa Marie?" a follower posed. "Do you guys really love each other, or are you just doing this to satisfy the media?" an admirer lambasted. "Are you guys intimate again?" a Jackson addict quizzed. "I can't believe it; this is about the skepticism," the 'Thriller' hitmaker reacted. "Yes, yes, yes," Presley affirmed, cutting in.
"And we have read in the papers that you are expecting a child," the interviewer subtly raised the topic, inviting a scowl from Presley. "We will be expecting a child; know when I'm
not going to .." Presley trailed, trying to cover up her discomfort. "We're not going to say when. It is in the hands of heaven," Jackson instantly quipped, ending the speculations. As per The Mirror, years later, in 2010, while doing an exclusive sit-down for Oprah Winfrey, Presley revealed that she was afraid of potential custody battles. She clarified that she didn't want to go through the agony of having children during a divorce dispute because she already had two from her former marriage to Danny Keough.
"There was [pressure to have kids], and I did want to; I just wanted to make sure," she told Oprah. "I was looking into the future, and I was thinking I don't ever want to get into a custody battle with him. I know; I've had children. I knew that bringing children into certain circumstances, you have to make sure everything's safe and secure and okay. I wanted to make sure that he and I were really united." Their marriage was rocked by drug abuse and the infamous child molestation case. Presley encouraged Jackson to resolve his differences out of court since she initially thought he was innocent.
“So, she filed. But the truth was, Michael never intended to file. It was Romeo and Juliet, the poison mistakenly drunk. Michael was incredibly hurt, and my mom tried and tried to reach him, calling and writing him. But he refused to speak to her.” pic.twitter.com/IUlOrpGWNI
— presleyjackson (@lmpmjjj) November 8, 2024
As per Entertainment Weekly, without finding a way to fix their doomed marriage, Presley filed for divorce, citing "irreconcilable differences," in 1996. Their relationship blew hot and cold for the next four years. "When we were together, we were really in love," she confessed to Winfrey during the interview, "and then we had the rough patches."