1. Michael X, born Michael de Freitas, was a Trinidad and Tobago-born self-styled black revolutionary, convicted murderer, and civil rights activist in 1960s London.
16 Facts About Michael X
1. 2.
Michael X was known as Michael Abdul Malik and Abdul Malik.
3.
Michael X professed to dislike the role, but it paid for his lifestyle.
4.
Michael X was sentenced to 12 months in prison, having been arrested on the accusation of using words likely to stir up hatred "against a section of the public in Great Britain distinguished by colour".
5.
Michael X's bail was paid by John Lennon in January 1971.
6.
In February 1971, Michael X fled to his native Trinidad and Tobago, where he started an agricultural commune devoted to Black empowerment 16 miles east of the capital, Port of Spain.
7.
Michael X had met Michael X through her relationship with his associate Hakim Jamal.
8.
Michael X was then captured in Guyana and charged with the murder of Skerritt and Benson, but was never tried for the latter crime.
9.
Under the name Michael Abdul Malik, Michael X was the author of the autobiography From Michael de Freitas to Michael X, which was ghost-written by John Stevenson.
10.
Michael X left behind fragments of a novel about a romantic black hero who wins the abject admiration of the narrator, a young woman named Lena Boyd-Richardson.
11.
Michael X is the subject of the essay "Michael X and the Black Power Killings in Trinidad" by V S Naipaul, collected in The Return of Eva Peron and the Killings in Trinidad, and is believed to be the model for the fictional character Jimmy Ahmed in Naipaul's 1975 novel Guerrillas.
12.
Michael X is a character in The Bank Job, a dramatisation of a real-life bank robbery in 1971.
13.
Michael X plays a part in Make Believe: A True Story, a memoir by Diana Athill.
14.
Michael X is the eponymous title of a play, by the writer Vanessa Walters, that takes the form of a 1960s Black Power rally and was performed at The Tabernacle Theatre, Powis Square, London W11, in November 2008.
15.
Michael X is portrayed in a scene opposite Jimi Hendrix in the 2013 film All Is By My Side, based on Hendrix's early years in the music industry.
16.
Michael X is a subject in the 2021 Adam Curtis documentary series Can't Get You Out of My Head.