“[Stevie Wonder is] our cousin,” Janet, 58, told host Scott Mills on the BBC Radio 2 Breakfast show on Tuesday, August 13. “Not a lot of people know that. He’s our cousin on my mother’s side. So is Tracy Chapman. So is Samuel Jackson.”
Janet was the youngest child of Katherine Jackson and the late Joe Jackson. The couple also shared daughters Maureen, 74 and La Toya, 68, and sons Sigmund, 73, Toriano, 70, Jermaine, 69, Marlon, 67, Randy, 62, and the late Michael Jackson. (Katherine, 94, and Joe also welcomed son Brandon in 1957, however, he died 24 hours after birth.)
Janet previously opened up about her family life in the documentary Janet Jackson, released on Lifetime in January 2022. The “That’s The Way Love Goes” singer noted that she was closest to her brothers Michael and Randy growing up, however, things changed around the time Michael debuted Thriller in 1982.
“For the first time in my life, that’s when I felt it was different between the two of us. That a shift was happening,” she explained in the documentary. “He would always come in my bedroom, neither one of us said a word to each other. And then he got up and left. That’s a time where Mike and I started kind of going our separate ways, we weren’t as close. And it may have been just because he was so massive, so huge.”
Michael died from a drug overdose in 2009 at the age of 50, which came as a big shock to Janet.
“At first it just didn’t seem true, it didn’t seem real,” she shared in the 2022 documentary. “I couldn’t believe it. It took a while for me to accept. It makes you think about life.”
Although Michael and Janet’s relationship changed after his fame, Janet still remembers her brother fondly — especially when the duo made their song “Scream” in 1995, which she continues to play at her concerts to honor her late brother.
“At first it just didn’t seem true, it didn’t seem real,” she shared in the 2022 documentary. “I couldn’t believe it. It took a while for me to accept. It makes you think about life.”
The song, which went on to win a Grammy in 1996 for best music video, short form, discussed Michael’s struggles with fame and public harassment about his life.
“I’m tired of injustice, I’m tired of schemes / Your lies are disgusting / So, what does it mean, damn it?” Michael shares in the song.
