Special Screening for Jackson Jury?

Break out the popcorn and Jujubes--Santa Barbara District Attorney Tom Sneddon wants to take Michael Jackson's jury to the movies.

But Sneddon's not looking to take Jackson's peers to just any feature film. Specifically, the D.A. wants to treat jurors to their very own screening of Martin Bashir's 2003 documentary, Living with Michael Jackson.

The controversial look into Jackson's private life, viewed by millions when it aired in Europe and the United States two years ago, touched off the investigation leading to the child-molestation case against the embattled entertainer and the 10 felony counts he subsequently faces.

In the documentary, Jackson is shown holding hands with the boy believed to be his accuser and discusses his habit of sharing his bed with young children.

"I tuck them in..It's very charming, it's very sweet," Jackson said on camera, confirming that he had indeed shared his mattress with many youngsters, but denying that there was anything sexual about the practice.

Prosecutors filed a motion requesting to screen the documentary for the jury, arguing that its broadcast inspired Jackson and his unindicted underlings to hold the accuser and his family captive at Neverland Ranch and to "extort" a promise from them to appear in a "rebuttal" video.

"The jury cannot truly appreciate the strength of the motivation for the desperate actions undertaken by defendant and his coconspirators in response to Living with Michael Jackson without seeing what inspired that reaction," Sneddon stated in the motion, which referred to Living with Michael Jackson as a "public relations catastrophe" for the Moonwalker.

Sneddon also wants jurors to see comments from Martin Bashir and, as shown in the version broadcast in the United States, Barbara Walters.

True to his customary practice, Santa Barbara Superior Court Judge Rodney Melville blacked out several pages of the motion before releasing it on Wednesday.

Jackson's legal eagles pounced on the motion, accusing the prosecution of trying to influence the jury with a "slickly produced Hollywood hit piece."

"It is heavily edited in the most sensational fashion possible," said the defense motion, "and contains highly inflammatory material regarding matters such as Mr. Jackson's care of his own children, plastic surgery, Mr. Jackson's financial affairs and other prejudicial matters."

"Hollywood techniques were used to make the video more dramatic," defense attorney Robert Sanger stated in the motion. "Scenes are juxtaposed. The pace of the program is edited to build drama. It is not the kind of reliable evidence that should be presented to a jury."

In a separate motion, the prosecution argued that Bashir should be forced to testify about making the documentary--specifically whether any of the incidents on the video were "staged" or if its events unfolded spontaneously.

The journalist, who now works for ABC News, has balked at testifying, claiming his work speaks for itself and that he is covered by California's shield law, which states that reporters can not be made to testify about observations they make while reporting a story.

In still another motion released Wednesday, Jackson's defense team requested that each prospective juror be questioned separately, out of the presence of the remainder of the jury pool, because the recent leak of grand jury transcripts in the case had "created the maximum potential for prejudice to Mr. Jackson's right to a fair trial."

Melville is expected to rule on the motions at Friday's hearing. Jury selection in the trial is due to begin Monday.