Donny Osmond Reminisces about Michael Jackson

"I think he had so much pressure in his life to obtain the success of Thriller; it was impossible, and that is what broke him," Donny says.

Donny and Michael were working on an exclusive story for "The Insider" for Michael's upcoming concert dates in London, and it wasn't the first time the two former teen idols had planned to collaborate.

"We were planning on doing something together, a few years ago, before the trial," Donny recalls. "We were going to do a song together [Stevie Wonder's "I Wish"]. Then he called me and said, 'The trial is coming up, it is ugly, I have to back out.'"

Donny also tells Lara that he never saw Michael take drugs, but he doesn't discount that possibility, admitting there was a time in his life when he, too, was taking prescription meds.

"I will be honest with you," Donny tells Lara. "In my stage-fright era in the '90s, I had to take prescription drugs just to get through life -- and it is something you deny. If somebody asks you, you say, 'No, no. no. I am not doing that.' Michael went through the same thing. He probably wouldn't admit it. I never saw it. It is sad that people in show business get caught up in that whole drug problem."

Donny has yet to speak to any of the Jackson family, but he says: "I feel sorry for the entire family, but mostly the kids."

Published 6/26/09 by