Michael Jackson’s Desperation to Keep Performing — Even as His Body Failed Him

Sixteen years after Michael Jackson’s sudden death, one of his closest friends has broken his silence — and his account paints a devastating portrait of the King of Pop’s final days.

In his new memoir Crazy Lucky: Remarkable Stories from Inside the World of Celebrity Icons, longtime friend and personal attorney John Mason reveals the physical, emotional, and financial pressures that drove Jackson to push himself beyond the breaking point in 2009, as he prepared for his ill-fated This Is It concert residency.

The residency, scheduled from July 2009 through March 2010, was meant to be a triumphant comeback for the 50-year-old superstar. Instead, it became a death march. Mason recalls receiving a troubling call that year while living in Reno: “Someone told me that Michael was in ‘really bad shape.’ He was trying to tour again, but he had collapsed onstage during rehearsals. Yet, he was back at it the next day. Michael was Michael.”

Behind the scenes, Jackson was battling severe insomnia — a condition so crippling that concert promoter AEG brought in Dr. Conrad Murray to manage his sleep. According to Mason, Murray began administering nightly doses of propofol, a surgical-grade anesthetic never intended for home use, in an attempt to get Jackson the rest he needed to perform.

Jackson’s last words to Mason revealed both his exhaustion and his fear: “I can’t function if I don’t sleep. They’ll have to cancel it. And I don’t want them to cancel it.”

Financial pressures were mounting, too. Mason writes that Jackson was nearing bankruptcy and at risk of losing his beloved Neverland Ranch. The shows — and the grueling rehearsal schedule behind them — were his lifeline.

On June 25, 2009, Jackson died of cardiac arrest caused by a lethal mix of sedatives and propofol. Dr. Murray was later convicted of involuntary manslaughter, stripped of his medical licenses in multiple states, and served two years of a four-year prison sentence.

Mason’s memoir adds a deeply personal layer to a story that has been told largely through court proceedings and tabloid headlines. His account strips away the spectacle, revealing a man driven by the same perfectionism that built his legacy — but trapped by it in the end.

For fans, the image of Jackson rehearsing through exhaustion, terrified of disappointing his audience, is as haunting as it is heartbreaking — a stark reminder of the crushing weight that can come with life at the top.