Kat Graham has shed light on the reason her scenes were cut from the newly released Michael Jackson biopic, Michael.
Back in 2024, it was announced that The Vampire Diaries star would portray Diana Ross, which at the time, Graham described as a “privilege”, saying it was an honour to be “supporting the retelling of such a pivotal era in our music history”.
However, on Thursday (April 23), a day before the film hit UK cinemas, Graham took to her official social media pages to explain why she no longer appears in the Antoine Fuqua-helmed film.
“I want to share that certain legal considerations affected a few scenes, including ones I filmed with an incredible cast,” she wrote.
“Unfortunately, those moments are no longer part of the final cut, though the team worked hard to preserve as much of the story as possible.”
— Kat Graham (@KatGraham) April 23, 2026
The film underwent major reshoots after the third act of the film was deemed unusable. According to a recent Variety report, the film’s third act was initially supposed to explore how Jackson was impacted by multiple allegations of child molestation.
However, Jackson’s estate reportedly had to pay around $15million for reshoots after it emerged that the singer’s out-of-court settlement with Jordan Chandler, the first of his accusers, included a clause barring Chandler from being depicted on screen. While Graham didn’t specify, her part in the film was likely axed due to those changes.
NME gave the film three stars, with Nick Levine noting that the omission of key figures in Jackson’s life, including Ross and his sister Janet, was “bizarre”.
“Michael feels like a job well done: it’s a slick, accessible advert for Jackson’s incredible imperial phase,” he continued. “But if the singer’s estate wanna be startin’ somethin’ bigger like a film franchise, they’ll have their work cut out.”
Jackson shared a close relationship with Ross after the pair met during his time as a child star with the Jackson 5, and she defended him after the release of Leaving Neverland.
The HBO documentary focused on allegations made by Wade Robson and James Safechuck, who both said the late pop star sexually abused them when they were children. Jackson denied any wrongdoing until his death in 2009.
After the film’s release in 2019, she took to social media to say: “This is what’s on my heart this morning. I believe and trust that Michael Jackson was and is A magnificent incredible force to me and to many others.”
More recently, Leaving Neverland director Dan Reed has criticised the new biopic and claimed that the musician was “worse than Jeffrey Epstein”.
English (US) · 