Paris Jackson is reigniting her feud with the executor of her father’s estate, accusing John Branca of “persistent incompetence” and asking a judge to reject his nearly $110 million fee request for work on the late pop star’s estate from 2023 through 2024.
In a new motion filed Friday and obtained by Rolling Stone, Michael Jackson’s only daughter claims Branca missed his own self-selected Sept. 15 deadline to submit complete financial accountings for 2023 and 2024, instead filing documents that were either incomplete or “nothing more than a placeholder.” Despite the alleged deficiencies, she says, Branca sought $109,219,648 in combined compensation for himself, his lawyers, and his late co-executor, John McClain, who died in May at age 71.
“It is unclear how executor could calculate and distribute such an amount with any confidence and yet be unable to file complete and accurate accountings years later,” her new 12-page motion states. “Paris respectfully submits that the gap between executor’s level of compensation and his persistent incompetence is intolerable.”
Calling the fee request “particularly offensive” in light of the allegedly “delinquent” financial accountings, Paris is asking the retired judge overseeing the long-running estate to reduce Branca’s compensation from 15 percent to 10 percent of the estate’s gross entertainment-related income. She wants the reduction applied retroactively to 2023 and kept in place until Branca submits complete and accurate accountings through 2026.
“It is an understatement to say that this motion is completely without merit,” a spokesperson representing the Branca-led estate said in a statement shared with Rolling Stone. “[Paris’] attorneys have motioned for a reduction in executor compensation, when in fact the executors waived that from the estate’s beginning, and have never taken any executor compensation. They are paid a separate, court-ordered management fee for operating the hugely successful Michael Jackson business.”
Michael Jackson was 50 when he died on June 25, 2009, from an accidental overdose of the surgery-strength anesthetic propofol at his rented mansion in Los Angeles. Branca quickly stepped in to manage his affairs, and his lawyers have long credited him with transforming Jackson’s estate from one saddled with more than $500 million in debt into an enterprise valued at roughly $2 billion.
Paris’ new motion comes nearly six months after she won a separate legal battle to force three lawyers who worked for her father’s estate to return $625,000 in bonuses authorized by Branca. In an April 29 ruling, the retired judge, Mitchell Beckloff, found that the estate had failed to demonstrate the payments were “just and reasonable based on the information provided.”
“In fact, on the evidence presented, the bonus amounts paid appear arbitrary — what Mr. Branca determined was appropriate,” Beckloff wrote. “While Mr. Branca may, in fact, know better than anyone about the value of legal fees, there must be some specific and detailed factual basis for an order finding fees are just and reasonable.”
Paris, 28, is a beneficiary of her father’s estate along with her brothers, Prince, 29, and Bigi, 24. In other recent court filings obtained by Rolling Stone, her lawyers said she did not undertake her battle with Branca lightly.
“This litigation is painful for Paris. It is a distraction from her own life and her own career,” they wrote.
Ken Casey stuck around after the show in San Diego, California, talking to members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
Some of the challenge-coin haul.
The band started as a bet. “My band has a show in three weeks,” Casey’s coworker told him in 1996. “I dare you to open for us.”John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
Dropkick Murphys (from left): Casey, DaRosa, Webster, Kelly, Rheault, Brennan, and Lynch John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
Casey is largely the voice of the band, but the other members back him up. “We’re so lucky he’s the mouthpiece,” says Brennan, left. John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
“Only the Irish can take a song about death and destruction, famine, alcoholism, and raise a glass like it’s an anthem,” says Casey. John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
“Anytime it feels like things are about to plateau for us, something gives us a little bump,” says guitarist Lynch. “It feels exciting. It feels dangerous. It feels like doing something.” John Francis Peters for Rolling Stone
Jay-Z performing at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis in Paris.
Jay-Z Deserves the Super Bowl Halftime Gig
Where’s the love? Jay-Z asked that question 25 years ago, in the chorus of one of many songs in his catalog that still move audiences today. If he performs “Heart of the City” as part of his Super Bowl halftime show next February, those indignant bars are sure to be a highlight: “First the Fat Boys break up, now every day I wake up, somebody got a problem with Hov…” It would be an appropriate choice, too — because then as now, any time Jay-Z notches a new achievement, people find a way to complain.
The jokes and nonsense started almost as soon as the first rumors trickled out that Jay, whose company Roc Nation has executive-produced the Super Bowl halftime show since 2019, might be choosing himself to headline next year’s show. “Jay-Z just Dick Cheney’d himself for the Super Bowl,” Puck‘s Matthew Belloni quipped on X last week, alluding to the time that the late prince of darkness, who’d been asked to run the vice-presidential search committee for George W. Bush’s 2000 campaign, put himself on the ticket. (Super hip and current reference, and not at all apples-and-oranges.) Others pointed to TMZ reports that pop stars like Harry Styles and Justin Bieber had been asked first. “How are they the frontrunners, and he end up in the front?” Cam’Ron, who’s delighted in trolling Jay for many years, wondered aloud on his podcast. “Out of all the people on the roster, they couldn’t pick nobody else?” asked Cam’Ron‘s co-host, Ma$e.
These critiques miss the point, which is that Jay-Z is one of the best choices for a high-profile gig like this. He’s a superstar with a comparable level of name recognition to any other A-lister in music. He has a deep stack of classic songs going back decades. And he’s a highly skillful live performer who knows his way around a stadium stage, as he’s spent this year reminding people on his Jay-Z 30 tour. He tore down Yankee Stadium three nights in a row this summer; just last week, he rocked SoFi Stadium, which happens to be the same place where the 2027 Super Bowl is being held. He held the crowd’s attention with ease at all of those shows, and though there were plenty of glittery guests — that’s a given at a Jay show, and it will surely be true at the Super Bowl, too — he did it mostly through the force of his own magnetic energy. Let’s state the obvious here: Jay-Z is really, really good at rapping. We’re talking about one of the slickest, sharpest talkers in the history of words, someone who made it to the top through a sustained act of myth-making, then kept going. Are we seriously asking whether he can handle a 15-minute televised performance?
And yeah, there’s a touch of self-congratulation in the way he appointed himself. So what? Praising his own gifts is arguably Jay-Z’s greatest talent of all. He made a fine art out of self-applause. He told his story again and again, retracing the steps from Marcy Projects to the corner suite, and he made us believe. It would almost be insulting to the audience if he didn’t give himself the gig at some point.
Pop culture observers in recent years surely remember the backlash to Super Bowl headliners like Kendrick Lamar and Bad Bunny — all of it at least culturally conservative, and much of it frankly just racist. The blowback to Jay’s announcement is mostly coming from other quarters, at least for now (let’s just wait to see what the right-wing swamps make of this one). But it’s disappointing in a different way. Jay-Z has spent his career expounding hip-hop as a mainstream commercial force. He’s not a businessman, he’s a business, man. But he’s also an artist. He’s made huge amounts of money, and gotten himself into the rarefied rooms where he even has the ability to give himself a gig like this, by spinning his experiences into compelling narrative art, one verse at a time. Let’s not lose sight of how impressive his life’s work really is. Jay-Z is not some random C-suite bro, and he’s definitely not Dick Cheney. He’s one of the greatest rappers of all time, by any measure. He’s earned that Super Bowl spot.