Angela Bassett Says Agents Wanted Her To Turn Down Role As Katherine Jackson In ‘The Jacksons: An American Dream’ Miniseries Due To Controversies Surrounding The Famous Family: I’m Not Going Out For The Role Of Michael, I’m Going Out For The Role Of Their Mother

Angela Bassett, Katherine Jackson

Angela Bassett Says Agents Wanted Her To Turn Down Role As Katherine Jackson In ‘The Jacksons: An American Dream’ Miniseries Due To Controversies Surrounding The Famous Family: I’m Not Going Out For The Role Of Michael, I’m Going Out For The Role Of Their Mother

There’s seemingly an alternative universe where Angela Bassett never played Katherine Jackson in the 1992 miniseries “The Jacksons: An American Dream.”

Angela Bassett is an actress that has an amazing range! Over the years we have seen her portray many different iconic characters, including Betty Shabazz in the 1992 film “Malcolm X,” Stella Payne in the 1998 film “How Stella Got Her Groove Back,” Claudine Watson in the 2011 film “Jumping The Broom,” and Ramonda in “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” which was released last year.

As iconic as her body of work is, it seems one of her projects came with a big hurdle she had to overcome before she could fully step into character.

During a recent interview, Angela Bassett shared that her role as Michael Jackson’s mother, Katherine Jackson, almost never happened. According to the actress, while she was in the middle of auditioning for the ABC TV miniseries centered around the Jackson family, her agents, who were against her taking the role, said,

“You know what, there’s a lot of allegations about Michael [Jackson] in the press, and we don’t think you should do this project.”

Bassett noted that her agents’ criticism was hard to receive because she had been a fan of the musical family for so long. She then shared,

“They were the first concert I ever went to as a little girl. I had posters on my wall.”

She added,

“Here’s one of them in the room, auditioning me to portray his mom. This was a crazy trip for me.”

In the end, Bassett stood her ground against her agents and took the role. She recalled,

“I remember telling my agents ‘No, no, no, I’m not going out for the role of Michael, I’m going out for the role of their mother. And no matter what, whatever the allegations, or whoever, whatever we think — one thing is true, that I believe, that I can see, is that they adore their mother. They revere their mother. And that, a reverence for motherhood, for mothers, that’s what I want to put out into the world.”

Michael Jackson

She then shared that the miniseries “went on to have like 40 million viewers.” Bassett added,

“We don’t get those kinds of eyeballs on the show today.”

Thankfully, Angela Bassett trusted her gut and took the role. Arguably, to date, her portrayal of Katherine Jackson is of one her most remembered projects. Last year fellow actress KeKe Palmer went viral for her impression of Bassett as Katherine Jackson.

What are your thoughts on this entire situation? Tell us below!

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