There are plans underway by the Jackson family, of course spearheaded by calculating dad Joe, to take over at least five of Jackson’s planned final concerts at the O2 arena in London. Jackson’s four brothers are said to be planning some kind of tribute concert series to the late fourth best-selling artist of all time, with sisters Latoya and Janet possibly joining them. They have to have something to tide them over while they rub their hands together waiting for Michael’s money:

The show must go on!

Michael Jackson’s siblings are reuniting to take over their beloved brother’s show, using 100 hours of the pop king’s rehearsal-video footage as the show-stopper centerpiece to their live tribute performances.

Sisters Janet and La Toya, who were never part of the Jackson 5 kid band, said they would probably join the family act on July 13, the date when the Gloved One would have opened his wildly anticipated “This Is It” concert series at London’s O2 arena.

“We might do the 13th or a date in August with Jan and Toya,” said a family member. “We may rehearse after the funeral. It’ll be good and we’ll do it right for Michael.”

The sibling rivals — who also include Tito, Jermaine, Jackie and Marlon — are putting aside their differences and are working on the choreography to back up songs and dance numbers Michael already worked on.

If all goes well, the Jacksons are looking to fill at least five of the 50 gigs their superstar brother was scheduled to perform on his sold-out comeback series.

They are even looking at a world tour after playing at the O2 arena, a family source said.

With the first concert date looming and with Jackson’s memorial-service extravaganza on Tuesday, the famous siblings are racing the clock.

“They’re working on keeping the tour going,” said another family source.

Patriarch Joe Jackson, who has had patchy relationships with his kids and was cut out of Michael’s will, was reportedly the one who came up with the idea.

Tito Jackson, 55, who played guitar and sang as a member of the Jackson 5, was already installing a customized sound studio at his home in Calabasas, Calif., but is now building a video-editing suite.

He plans to view the hours of Michael’s performance videotape shot at LA’s Staples Center by concert promoters AEG Live to go along with the dance routines, sets and costumes created for the show.

“Michael would have wanted the show to go on and that’s what we’re doing. We are not giving up on Michael because Michael would not give up on his fans,” a family source said.

Tito has also been making midnight runs to his late brother’s home in LA, loading up a U-Haul van filled with memorabilia and extra sound equipment to use in his home-studio setup, sources said.

“Tito used to park his old Bentley in there. Now it’s outside on the curb because the garage is so jammed,” a neighbor said.

Jackson matriarch Katherine, who was named as guardian of Michael’s three kids, gave the OK for her children to divvy up the treasure trove of Michael’s personal possessions, according to a family source.

AEG Live just may make a killing out of its deal instead of having to pony up $85 million in ticket refunds.

[From NY Post via Gossip Rocks]

It isn’t fair for me to say they’re all salivating over the estate. Janet was genuinely broken up about her brother’s sudden death when she spoke at the BET Awards last Sunday. Older brother Jermaine also seemed very upset in an interview aired on The Today Show last week. He said “I wish it was me” and cried real tears. You can tell that he loved his brother but it seems like they were estranged the past few years. Jermaine admitted that he had no idea if Michael was abusing prescription drugs.

The more I watch videos of Jackson and his family and the more I learn about him, the more sympathy I feel for him. I believe that the jury is out when it comes to whether he hurt any children. Remember he was acquitted in a court of law. If he was entirely innocent it must have been devastating to have been accused, to go through a trial and to have that hanging over his head for the rest of his days. He seemed to love kids and just wanted to be one. Many assumed that his first payoff in the early 90s was an admission of guilt, but his ex Lisa Marie Presley is said to have advised him to settle the first case in order to avoid a trail. If he was guilty he deserved much more than the public condemnation and the financial hit he received, however. A lot of people are saying that all these tributes to Jackson are unwarranted if he was really the pedophile he was rumored to be. That’s definitely true, but I would like to see more evidence of that other than two families who were both out for large sums of money.

Jackson did just one set of interviews in years and he ended up getting trashed by filmmaker Martin Bashir. Over the weekend I watched a long rebuttal to Bashir’s series on Jackson, called “Living with Michael Jackson, Take Two.” Jackson also recorded all those interviews, and contrary to what Bashir claimed in his series about how kids weren’t safe at Neverland, Bashir praised Jackson’s charity work when he thought the cameras were off and said that he was misunderstood. There are many more revelations in this series that I might cover a little later, but overall I came away with the impression that this was a man who felt things deeply who ended up really hurt by the way the press trashed him. Whether he’s guilty of abusing kids or not it’s hard to tell. If he wasn’t, it was truly tragic. If he was, he deserved to be in jail.

Ultimately Michael Jackson died trying to shut out the world with drugs. We may never know the complete truth about him, but it’s clear we’ve only seen one side for a long time. His family wants to honor that in their way, even if money is just as powerful a motivator for them – as it seems to have been throughout their youngest member’s tragic life.

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