A first-person YouTube monologue in which the speaker recounts becoming close friends with Michael Jackson (and mutual friend Uri Geller) and recalls a London hotel conversation where Jackson advised him to expand his martial-arts business via franchising. The speaker credits Jackson's advice with pioneering a controversial franchising model that disrupted the martial-arts sector.
I became best friends with the late superstar Michael Jackson. Michael and me got on very, very well. We had a mutual friend called Uri Geller. He saw me on tv. But boy becomes a millionaire and he wants to introduce me to his best friend, who is Michael Jackson. I remember having this conversation in a hotel in London with Michael. We were bored, we couldn't go out. Michael turns around to me and he said, man, how's the business going? How many martial arts you got? So I got five. He said, why have you only got five? I said, michael, I can't find people to work for me. It's like staring at me like I was a complete F. And he said, you do realize I've got the biggest selling album in the world. It's called Thriller. Have you heard of it? Matt, be sarcastic. So yeah, yeah, I know about Thriller. Of course. I set out stadiums all around the world, Matt. My records all around the world. If I could figure out how to do that. Surely you can figure out how to get someone to travel 40 miles and get rid of this mind block that you have. You're just not thinking big enough. You read in the wrong books. You're not studying the greats. And I said, well, how am I going to do that? He goes, well, it's called franchising. And I said, well, no one's ever done that in a martial arts before because that's exactly. I remember this very well. He pointed at me with big eyes like, that's exactly why you got to do it. You got to be a pioneer, not a follower. And it became the biggest, most controversial thing in my sector. I disrupted the whole martial arts sector.
