What was the true cost of George Michael’s coming out, and how did it nearly cost Ginger Spice her life? In this gripping video, we uncover the shocking details behind George Michael’s journey to reveal his sexuality—a revelation that shook the world and sparked a media frenzy. But what many don’t know is how his close friendship with Geri Halliwell made her a target of the notorious London Nail Bomber of 1999. George and Geri leaned on each other when they needed it the most, but it almost cost her, her life…
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00:00Breaking news. Police uncover evidence that Ginger Spice was the next target for Notorious Nail Bomber.
00:09At least two people are now known to have died in tonight's bomb explosion in Soho in central London.
00:14This was a specific attack on the gay community.
00:18The bomber held extreme views.
00:21He wouldn't run out of victims to target.
00:24The Spice Girls singer revealed, he threatened to shoot me.
00:28He hated the fact that I was friends with George Michael.
00:31This is a guy who's achieved what every artist would dream of achieving.
00:35I was looking at him and was like, wow, that would be the ultimate goal if I could kind of do what he's doing.
00:42The siege started, but George Michael was nowhere to be seen.
00:47George, can you just come out for like a minute?
00:50The incident took place right here at Will Rogers Memorial Park, just across the street from the famed Beverly Hills Hotel.
00:56A four-year-old singer was arrested after an undercover officer had allegedly seen him commit a lewd act in a public toilet.
01:02What the heck was he thinking? This is so potentially career-ending.
01:07You get a sense that some people thought they'd been tricked, you know, that he had been living a lie.
01:13Someone who appears to the public to be this, and yet they're leading a double life, which means they're really this.
01:23The pressure's on for George Michael to say something.
01:32Maybe I've been misled. I was under the impression you didn't mind talking about this.
01:35Oh, no, I have no problem talking about it.
01:36But if you would rather not talk about it, we'll talk about other things.
01:38No, I'm just trying to work out.
01:39I don't want to embarrass you. I was under the impression we could talk about it.
01:41I'm good at embarrassing myself. I'm very good at that.
01:43Okay, all right. So let's go ahead and talk about it.
01:45You can take us through it step by step.
01:47So what happened? What happened was...
01:52I had spent six or seven years of my life working, working, working, writing music, music, music.
02:02George Michael was named his favorite male vocalist in both the soul, R&B, and pop rock categories.
02:08He was the first one that was definitely an obvious teen band to then go on to take over the world.
02:14What do you think of raps?
02:17George, I want your sex.
02:21The success was so much more than I had ever dreamed of.
02:26And then I had this desire to escape.
02:32The basis for me going to do the shows in Rio was I wanted to see Brazil.
02:37The front of this 160,000 people, there was this guy over on the right-hand side of the stage that has fixed me with this look.
02:47It was so cute. I was so distracted by him that I stayed away from that end of the stage for a while.
02:55Because otherwise I thought I was going to get really distracted and forget the words or something.
03:00The moment I looked at him, I got the feeling that told me I was going to know him very well and he was going to be a part of my life.
03:12I suddenly thought, oh my God, I'm a massive star and I'm gay.
03:20I had boxed myself in. You know, care for what you wish for.
03:28George Michael was a straight down the middle teenage pop star.
03:32They were marketing very specifically to that teenage audience.
03:37I was really, really overwhelmed by the size of things, I suppose. I lived in sunglasses.
03:43I couldn't make eye contact with people. It was bizarre.
03:46I want to be able to develop as a human being, but I feel trapped.
03:53He knew he could never come out, not as being the front man of Wham!.
03:59I never wanted to be someone else.
04:01I wanted to be a star and I wanted people to love me and recognize me in the street as a child.
04:06That was what I wanted, but I never really wanted to be someone else.
04:11It's very hard to be proud of your own sexuality when it hasn't brought you any joy.
04:19I came from a very oppressive household.
04:21When I was a kid, my mother had this fear of me being gay.
04:27Because she felt bad for me, I couldn't help her.
04:32My father just wouldn't even consider that I was gay somehow.
04:37Because being the domineering father I've been and I am, I wanted to take turns with it.
04:45I held on to the stupid hope that actually some woman would actually be so wonderful that there might be an easier option.
04:54And if you have the option of hiding, if you're more successful than you ever dreamed you were going to be, what the f*** are you going to do?
05:04A lot of people must fantasize about you. What sort of people do you fantasize about?
05:13Anselmo was the first time I think I really loved someone selflessly.
05:19It was kind of immediate. Everybody, with the exception of my family, was introduced to him very, very quickly.
05:26Because I felt immediately that everything had changed.
05:32He was always looking for the one.
05:35Well, Anselmo was the one.
05:39The nicest person, the nicest man you could ever meet in your life that simply gelled with us so fast.
05:49That it was like, this doesn't happen.
05:54And Anselmo was introduced as my wife's cousin.
05:57So he did mix with the family, but the family didn't know.
06:04I came out to all my friends and my family outside of my mum and dad at 27.
06:11I was in love.
06:13I was happier than I'd ever been in my entire life.
06:19I remember my publicist calling me to tell me that Freddie Mercury had died.
06:25The pop star Freddie Mercury died last night in London.
06:28The lead singer with Queen, aged 45, had announced on Saturday he was suffering from AIDS.
06:34Fans at his home in West London mourned the best known British star to have died from the disease.
06:41It was impossible to just ignore the numbers of people who were dying.
06:46They wanted a quote from me.
06:48And I remember I was trying to give her the quote and I was crying.
06:54And she just thought, I mean, bless him, I was really sad that Freddie had passed away.
07:00But of course I was crying about something else entirely.
07:03Anselmo and I were in L.A. when he was advised to go for his test.
07:12He hadn't been tested for a while and he was absolutely healthy looking, more than healthy looking when I first met him.
07:19Within a month or two of meeting him, he had a flu that he couldn't get rid of.
07:25And some red marks that came up on his chest.
07:31I remember him leaving the house and to this day I remember looking at the sky and saying,
07:41don't you dare do this to me.
07:44I don't want you to do this to me.
07:47I don't want you to do this to me.
07:49Looking at the sky and saying, don't you dare do this to me.
07:55I mean, I was 27 going on 28, but at that point in time you think that's a lifetime to have waited to be loved.
08:08Anselmo had the test in Brazil.
08:12I went home to my family for Christmas and sat at the Christmas table,
08:21not knowing whether my partner, the people sitting around the table did not know about,
08:27not knowing whether this man I was in love with was terminally ill
08:32and therefore not knowing whether I potentially was terminally ill.
08:35That Christmas was probably the darkest, darkest, most frightening time in my life.
08:46I was absolutely terrified of losing him and the prospect of watching him die of AIDS.
08:57I was in LA and the phone rang and I was told that Anselmo's best friend,
09:02the phone rang and I was told that Anselmo's best friend in Brazil was on the phone.
09:07And then it all goes blurry for a long time.
09:18He was my savior.
09:20It's still very hard for me to explain how finding a companion at that stage in my life changed me.
09:31And such a beautiful companion, such an amazing person.
09:37I wrote my mother a four or five page letter the day after he died,
09:41which was the easiest thing I've ever written.
09:44Telling them how much I loved him and how much joy there was for me in my sexuality
09:53and not to worry for me and not to feel like I had suffered anything.
09:57My mother, bless her, wasn't, she wasn't slightly fazed by the gay thing,
10:03which she probably worked out years before.
10:06She was just devastated that I had gone through a year and a half of terror, you know, without her knowing.
10:16My mum sat me down and told me things about her life story.
10:21And one of them was, one of them was the fact that on the day I was born,
10:26her closest sibling, whose name was Colin, he killed himself within 24 hours of my birth.
10:33And she told me that he was a very depressed young man, very highly sensitive and very probably gay.
10:41My mother, I think my mother showed fear of my own sexuality when I was younger,
10:46that I didn't really understand what it was about, but I knew it was out of character.
10:50And now I understand what she was afraid of.
10:59With George Michael, there was this constant rumour that he was gay.
11:07But he would never say this.
11:13I was called into an office one day at the News of the World.
11:16They had a tip that George Michael had a boyfriend, Anselmo Falleppa, who has since died in Rio de Janeiro.
11:27Now, on the death certificate, the cause of death was brain haemorrhage.
11:31But we were reliably told by various people, no, he had full-blown AIDS,
11:36and these symptoms caused the brain haemorrhage.
11:39What was the public interest in him?
11:42Well, the public interest was, here's this disease ravaging the world,
11:47and a major pop star has been presumably having sexual relations with a man who died of AIDS.
11:54That is, in newspaper terms, that is an explosive story.
11:59You know, the world was turning into a place where it really, you know, thought they deserved to know.
12:04And completely resented that.
12:19Three years after Anselmo died, I met Kenny.
12:23And I called my mother the day after I'd met Kenny to tell her that I'd met this wonderful man, you know.
12:29And, unfortunately, it was the same form. She had to tell me that she had cancer.
12:34Melanoma, which means a skin cancer.
12:37Apparently of the most virulent form.
12:42And I think, in reality, she knew she had a far smaller chance of survival than she was letting on to us.
12:52It went into remission, I guess, for three or four months,
12:54and then came back with a vengeance, and within a week of that, she was gone.
13:00How did you survive what you went through?
13:04The loss of the most important man and the most important woman in your life?
13:07I didn't really. I was like depression and shock that just went on for years.
13:13And then, of course, I got myself arrested.
13:16Beverly Hills police officers arrested the singer known as George Michaels.
13:21A four-year-old singer was arrested at a park just a mile from his home
13:25after an undercover officer had allegedly seen him commit a lewd act in a public toilet.
13:29In this country, and at home, the pressure's on for George Michael to say something.
13:35Will you take us back to the day of the arrest?
13:38I was followed into the toilet by a man. I think the official word is entrapped, I suppose.
13:43I was coaxed fairly directly.
13:47Really?
13:48Yes, it's illegal. It's basically being coaxed.
13:51What did the guy do?
13:53I'll tell you, this is the nicest way I can put it. I've put it this way before,
13:56and I don't want to be graphic and nasty.
13:58He played a game called, I'll show you mine, you show me yours.
14:03I thought I was watching someone pleasuring himself.
14:06Okay, gotcha.
14:08And staring at me.
14:10Okay.
14:12I kind of responded in kind.
14:14Okay.
14:15Very briefly, actually.
14:17And the guy then walked out of the bathroom.
14:23So I just gathered he wasn't very impressed.
14:25And I left.
14:28As I reached the street, the cops swooped on me, basically.
14:32I remember so clearly.
14:34There were these two guys that I think were also part of the kind of entrapment set up
14:39that were going in and out of that bathroom.
14:41And something in me said, you shouldn't go in there.
14:46There's something really dodgy going on.
14:48But I went.
14:50My God, why didn't I just sit with a journalist and say, I am gay?
14:53At least two people are now known to have died in tonight's bomb explosion in Soho in central London.
15:00There are up to 30 other casualties.
15:02The device exploded around 6.30.
15:05The target, a gay pub.
15:07The Admiral Duncan in Soho's Old Compton Street.
15:09This was a specific attack on the gay community.
15:14People there have spoken of individuals being thrown 30 feet across the road by the force of the blast.
15:19A nail bomb is a very malicious weapon.
15:23It's designed to kill people.
15:26He fundamentally hated anybody who wasn't him.
15:29He wouldn't run out of victims to target.
15:31Breaking news.
15:33Police uncover evidence that Ginger Spice was the next target for Notorious Nail Bomb.
15:38Jerry Halliwell reveals Nail Bomb had planned to kill her on stage at the BRIT.
15:42He threatened to shoot me.
15:44He hated the fact that I was friends with George Michael.
15:47When I was left to Spice Girls, he just took me under his wing.
15:51And he became a really good friend and he said, come and stay with me.
15:54And so I did and I stayed quite a while.
15:56Funny because The Sun did a whole thing that was called Jerry and George at Home or something.
16:01They were dealing with a ruthless terrorist whose intention was to kill a male.
16:06Explain to me, when you made these devices, what your intent was?
16:10Murder, mayhem, chaos, damage given to youths.
16:15Police warn Jerry Halliwell to pull out of this year's BRIT Awards.
16:19The singer says she refused to back down despite threats against her life.
16:24And adrenaline is pumping.
16:26And adrenaline is pumping.
16:29It will linger in my mind forever.
16:38He said to the police that he didn't really mind being arrested and going to trial because it was his little moment of fame.
16:46Copeland was convicted of three counts of murder and three of causing explosions.
16:52He received six life sentences.
16:54With nail bomber behind bars, Jerry Halliwell opened up to The Sun newspaper saying,
16:59I feel so protective of any person who has prejudice against him and I will always stand with my friends.
17:06George Michael is finally opening up about his infamous Beverly Hills bathroom scandal.
17:12At the point that it happened, which was about a year after my mother died,
17:17I think at that point in time I was still very angry about her death.
17:21I think I chose to distract myself from the grief of losing her by doing something where I'd have to fight for my life almost.
17:29My life had been about other people, about terminal illness and bereavement.
17:35There's nothing I could have done about either of the people that I lost.
17:39Were you scared?
17:41Um, part of me was very scared.
17:44To be honest with you, I remember sitting there thinking, well I just have to tell the truth about this.
17:49The outcome I knew was going to depend on me.
17:53You called your dad from LA, didn't you?
17:57He called me actually. That was not a phone call I was looking forward to, I have to admit.
18:01I didn't know how he would react, but he basically called me up and said,
18:05you're who you are, you know, you've got nothing to be ashamed of.
18:08He's been great about my sexuality in general.
18:11In the last five, six years of my life, I've finally come to terms with the fact
18:19that I'm not like other people at all.
18:23And since I was outed, I feel like I've genuinely learned to respect myself.
18:29I never was like other people and I shouldn't have been disappointed in myself for not being like other people.
18:36On Christmas Day 2016, the greatest singer-songwriter of his generation,
18:43an icon of his era, George Michael, was lost.
18:49He understood love, loss, happiness and grief.
18:53And in that help to heal the wounds life inflicted upon us.
18:58They always say be careful about, you know, meeting your idols
19:03because they never can live up to what you think, but actually became something better.
19:07He was like a father figure to me.
19:10What do you think his legacy is?
19:12He was very kind, generous.
19:15He was just such a lovely person.
19:18I hope that people think of me as someone who had some kind of integrity.
19:23And I hope I'm remembered for that.
19:25He loved his family and was a good friend.
19:31I'll never forget him.