Janet Jackson’s first marriage to James DeBarge remains one of the most talked-about chapters in the pop icon’s personal life, and now DeBarge is opening up about their whirlwind romance while teasing major revelations in an upcoming documentary.
The brief but intense relationship between the Jackson family princess and the R&B crooner has captivated fans for decades.
In a recent candid appearance on Wild Moguls TV, DeBarge shared intimate details about how their love story began and why it ultimately ended, while hinting at explosive revelations to come. The story began in the early 1980s when DeBarge’s brother Bobby was dating Janet’s sister LaToya. What began as phone conversations between an apparently 13-year-old Janet and 18-year-old James blossomed into something deeper.
“My brother Bobby introduced me to Janet over the phone. He was dating Latoya. Of course he is going [to hook up] his little brother,” DeBarge revealed.
“At the time she’s doing ‘Good Times,’ when we talk to each other we [like each other] automatically and she called me, every day all the time. I had the phone on lock,” he said.
The couple didn’t meet in person until five years later, when Janet was 18, but their bond had already been cemented through endless conversations.
When they finally met, DeBarge described their connection as all-consuming, saying they “fell in love and got married. Snuck off and got married.”
The secret 1984 elopement in Grand Rapids, Michigan, was Janet’s attempt to gain independence from her controlling father Joe Jackson, though the marriage would face immediate challenges, the “Control” singer revealed in her own documentary.
Joe Jackson’s disapproval created additional strain on the young couple. When asked about Janet’s formidable father, DeBarge admitted, “Yeah, and no. he didn’t like me or the relationship. Most daddies don’t. I know I don’t like like my daughters’ boyfriends.”
However, he clarified that Joe never physically threatened him.
The marriage lasted only a year before being annulled in 1985, and DeBarge attributes the failure to timing.
“Put it like this. It was the right love at the wrong time. I was young. She was young. She’d been on the road you’ve been on the road we didn’t have enough time to be together to work things out a lot of interferences from you know company she was with and their father not agreeing with it,” he explained.
When Golden Era posted a clip from last week’s Wild Moguls TV interview, its followers weighed in, with one person writing, “He didn’t fumble JANET he lost JANET.”
However, others showed compassion, with one comment reading, “Janet still gets emotional till this day talking about their relationship.”
The marriage’s demise was complicated by DeBarge’s developing drug addiction, something Jackson addressed in the A&E documentary series.
She claimed that on their wedding night DeBarge left her alone in their hotel room for three hours. Janet later spent countless nights searching the streets for her husband, sometimes fighting him for pills as she tried to flush them down the toilet.
One social media user seemed aware of the addiction issues, commenting, “He was already in his addiction way before Janet married him, he was good in covering it up.”
Another was more direct, writing, “James, she had to leave your home in the middle of the night to find you. Nah, fam. It wasn’t your age. I do wish you well though.”
The most persistent rumor involves allegations of a secret child.
DeBarge has long maintained that Janet gave birth to their baby and gave it up for adoption.
However, Jackson has denied this.
In her documentary, she said, “I could never keep a child away from James. How could I keep a child from their father? I could never do that, that’s not right.”
The rumors gained new life in 2017 when a woman named Tiffany Whyte claimed to be their secret daughter. According to RadarOnline, the Detroit native agreed to a DNA test, but results have not been made public.
Now DeBarge is promising major revelations in his upcoming documentary project. When asked about the secret daughter rumors, he cryptically responded, “I’m doing a movie right now … and I’m I’m going to disclose a lot of things, so that I can end it all once.”
The enduring fascination speaks to what might have been, with one social media user capturing the sentiment: “Bro…. These two families…. Coming together…. Would have taken over.”
Whether DeBarge’s upcoming documentary will finally put the decades-old rumors to rest remains to be seen, but one thing is certain: the brief marriage between these two music royalty families continues to captivate audiences nearly four decades later.
