King Charles reportedly disapproved of Princess Diana's friendship with Michael Jackson and blocked the King of Pop from meeting Prince Harry and Prince William after their mom's tragic death, RadarOnline.com has learned.
Jackson's former bodyguard and longtime confidant Matt Fiddes recounted the story on a recent episode of the Anything Goes With James English podcast, as The Daily Star reports, detailing MJ and Diana's unique connection.
Diana and Jackson, who were two of the most famous people on the planet in the late '80s, bonded over the pressure of the intense media attention and scrutiny they faced.
"He used to talk about Diana a lot — he said that she was his ideal wife," Fiddes recalled. "They spent hours on the phone ... she used to ring all the time and he used to ring her all the time. But Prince Charles — King Charles now — tried to put an end to it a lot."
Princess Diana died in a car crash in Paris in 1997, a year after divorcing Charles. And when Jackson was in London several years later in 2002, he wanted to meet her sons William and Harry to pay his respects.
"Prince Harry and Prince William wanted to meet Michael," Feddes said. "Obviously they knew their mum was friends with Michael Jackson — she used to go to the Wembley concerts during the Bad era and so on. We set it up, for Michael to meet them, but King Charles, we were told he had put a stop to it."
The singer was reportedly supposed to greet the young princes at the House of Lords, but the meet was canceled at the last minute due to Charles' concerns over potential "controversy."
"We had a very official letter come through saying 'Prince William and Prince Harry will not be meeting Michael Jackson,'" Feddes explained. "That was hard, because we had to deliver the news to him and that's kind of why he came to London."
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Jackson was first accused of sexually abusing a 13-year-old boy in 1993. His failed meeting with the princes came shortly before Martin Bashir's 2003 documentary Living With Michael Jackson led to further allegations of child molestation and a high-profile trial.
Feddes claimed that Prince Harry remained a fan, however: "I met him at Cheltenham racecourse. He said 'You’ve got to introduce me to Michael, I want to find out a bit more about my mum.'"
