Los Angeles: Zac Efron says he once shared an emotional phone call with one of his idols, Michael Jackson.
The 30-year-old actor, who never met the King of Pop in person, unexpectedly ended up talking to him when he was promoting one of his “High School Musical” films around 10 years ago. Director of the film, Kenny Ortega, who worked with Jackson on his documentary and concert film ‘This Is It’, received a call from Jackson while he was dining out with Efron.
In an appearance on “The Graham Norton Show”, the actor recounted the incident, “His phone rang, and I remember I got this look, like… ‘You want this phone call.’ I was like, ‘Okay,’ so I came over and was like, ‘What’s going on?’ He goes, ‘It’s Michael Jackson’.”
Efron answered the call and went on and on about how he looked up to the “Beat It” singer. “I was just at a loss for words. He (Jackson) said, ‘That’s really nice. Can you hand the phone back to Kenny?'” But when Jackson realised it had been Efron on the line, he asked Ortega to hand the phone to him and said, “Oh, this is Zac from ‘High School Musical’? I love what you do. I’m a huge fan.”
The actor said he “lost it”. “I lost my balance. I think I fell over into the wall… I just started crying. I was a mess,” he added. When Efron started praising Jackson about how he is “the reason I do what I do”, the “Baywatch” star said, “He (Jackson) ended the whole conversation with something along the lines of, ‘Hey Zac, isn’t it awesome? Dreams really do come true, don’t they?” Efron said.
PTI