Becoming an A-lister with “Gladiator” was horrible for him

Apr 1, 2015 08:46 GMT  ·  By
Russell Crowe promotes his feature film directorial debut, “The Water Diviner”
   Russell Crowe promotes his feature film directorial debut, “The Water Diviner”

Russell Crowe is making his debut as a feature film director with “The Water Diviner,” which is getting a wide release this year, and he’s been busy promoting it. He needs it to be a commercial hit, he admits in a new interview with The Guardian, because it will give him freedom to pick his next projects.

In the same interview, which sees Crowe being uncharacteristically honest and warm, the actor / director makes a somewhat startling revelation, though by no means a new one: Michael Jackson used to prank call him often, a habit he kept for 2 or 3 years.    

The Michael Jackson story

Russell is famous for hating the media attention that comes with being an actor, though he’s by no means against using it when it comes to promoting his projects, whichever their nature.

He admittedly had the worst time of his life after “Gladiator” (2000), which saw him win the Oscar for Best Actor and landed him 1 of his 3 nominations at the prestigious gala. Becoming an A-lister almost overnight (or what felt like overnight to him) brought him so much media attention that he broke down from the pressure.

Being this famous also got him an unwanted fan in the person of the late King of Pop Michael Jackson, Crowe says. The experience wasn’t pleasant, but only because the singer was so immature that prank calling people was his idea of an amazing joke.  

“For two or three [expletive]-ing years,” he says. “I never met him, never shook his hand, but he found out the name I stayed in hotels under, so it didn’t matter where I was, he’d ring up do this kind of thing, like you did when you were 10, you know. ‘Is Mr. Wall there? Is Mrs. Wall there? Are there any Walls there? Then what’s holding the roof up? Ha ha.’ You’re supposed to grow out of doing that, right?”

Apparently, Michael never did. Russell didn’t say how come he stopped calling.

Michael isn’t here to defend himself

This isn’t the first time that Russell mentions his Michael Jackson “connection,” but what’s surprising about this whole thing is that he’s still doing it. Michael has been dead since 2009, so he can’t defend himself by denying Russell’s story.

As it happens, few celebrity pundits believe there’s truth to it: Michael Jackson may have been in many ways “immature,” but it’s difficult to picture him stalking Russell Crowe just so he could prank call him.

Then, assuming he really did do this (for 2 or 3 years in a row, no less), wouldn’t it have been easier for Crowe to simply change the name he booked hotels room under? How did he know it was Michael on the other line? Why did he never attempted to have him stop if it was so annoying, how come he put up for 3 whole years with it?

Too many questions, no answers.