Michael Jackson Wanted to Play Morpheus in Early ‘Sandman’ Adaptation, Neil Gaiman Says

TMZ Investigates: Who Really Killed Michael Jackson,” detailing how she once worked for famed Hollywood dermatologist Dr. Arnold Klein, who gave the pop king Demerol — an addictive and powerful opioid. “I was basically as bad as [Klein],” Rowe, 63, shockingly states in the doc — airing tonight on Fox.

Debbie Rowe breaks down in tears as she discusses her ex-husband Michael Jackson’s drug addiction in a candid new documentary.

The road to a filmed adaptation of Neil Gaiman's comic series The Sandman, first published in 1989, finally came to an end with a Netflix series that premiered this month. With a timeline like that, there's bound to be at least one or two surprising pitches for the show that never came to fruition, and Gaiman revealed one on a recent episode of Josh Horowitz’s podcast Happy Sad Confused.

Michael Jackson’s two oldest kids are remembering the late star on what would have been his 64th birthday.

Ethan Shanfeld In 1996, Michael Jackson paraded the globe with the HIStory World Tour, playing 82 shows for over 4.5 million fans. But that same year, the King of Pop apparently had his sights set on an entirely different gig: playing Morpheus in a television adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s “The Sandman.” “By 1996, I was being taken to Warners, where the then-president of Warner Bros sat me down and told me that Michael Jackson had phoned him the day before and asked him if he could star as Morpheus in ‘The Sandman,’” Gaiman said on Josh Horowitz’s “Happy Sad Confused” podcast. “So, there was a lot of interest in this, and they knew that it was one of the Crown Jewels, and what did I think? And I was like, ‘Ooh.’”

The Sandman creator Neil Gaiman has revealed Michael Jackson had wanted to be cast as Morpheus.Gaiman discussed the early iterations of the Netflix project in the 1990s, adapting his comic book series which ran from 1989 to 1996.In an interview on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Gaiman said: “By 1996, I was being taken to Warners, where the then-president of Warner Bros sat me down and told me that Michael Jackson had phoned him the day before and asked him if he could star as Morpheus in The Sandman.He continued: “So, there was a lot of interest in this and they knew that it was one of the Crown Jewels and what did I think? And I was like, ‘Ooh.’”In the Netflix adaptation recently released, Tom Sturridge plays Morpheus.

Author and comic book writer Neil Gaiman has been making quite an impact on television in recent years with his series “American Gods,” “Good Omens,” “Lucifer,” and the newly released “The Sandman” on Netflix.

Rapper Nicki Minaj shouted out Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston in her Video Vanguard Award acceptance speech at the 2022 MTV Video Music Awards.After a small hiccup of not having her phone — which had her typed-out speech — on stage, Minaj read off what she wrote about her opportunities, collaborators and more.“Let me tell you something,” she began after performing a medley of her hits. “I don’t want to miss out rolling the music on me but I never ever in my life have written a speech, and today I jotted something down on my phone, and I gave it — I gave my phone to Joe and he’s not up here with it.

Neil Gaiman is revealing secrets behind the long process to adapt the “The Sandman” comics for Hollywood.

After floundering in development hell for many years, Neil Gaiman’s “The Sandman” is finally a TV series, thanks to Netflix. And the critical consensus of the show is, well, pretty good? It may be almost too faithful an adaptation, but for those who love the comic, it’s a great take on a project many thought unfilmable.

Neil Gaiman has a confession. He played a big part in killing a movie adaptation of his classic graphic novel series, The Sandman.