GLENDALE -- Mourners gathered Thursday night at Forest Lawn Memorial Park for the funeral of Michael Jackson, more than two months after his death from an overdose of a powerful sedative.
The 50-year-old entertainer, who died June 25, was to be interred at Holly Terrace in the ornate Great Mausoleum. The funeral was to be a private ceremony restricted to family and invited guests.
Among the approximately 200 in attendance included longtime Jackson friends Elizabeth Taylor and Macaulay Culkin and baseball's career home run record setter, Barry Bonds.
Members of the Jackson family arrived shortly after 8 p.m. for the funeral which was set to begin at 7 p.m.
The cemetery is the final resting place of such Hollywood luminaries as Clark Gable, Humphrey Bogart, Carole Lombard, Jimmy Stewart, Mary Pickford, Walt Disney, Nat King Cole and Sammy Davis Jr.
Glendale police and Forest Lawn officials took extra measures to ensure that the service remained private. The cemetery was closed, security officers patrolled the grounds in search of trespassers, and police in helicopters kept a close watch from the air.
Streets around the cemetery entrance were restricted or closed. One print photographer and one video photographer was allowed to shoot pool photos for the media, but all other cameras were banned from the cemetery.
Flight restrictions over the cemetery were approved by the FAA to keep news media helicopters at bay.
All the costs for Jackson's funeral service will be covered by the family -- specifically by the singer's estate.
Attorneys for Jackson's mother, Katherine, and the administrators of the singer's estate were in court Wednesday looking for authorization to use funds from the estate to pay for the funeral. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff decided to leave the decision up to the estate's administrators, and they expressed no objection.
None of the attorneys at the hearing would specify the anticipated costs. Glendale police Sgt. Tom Lorenz told ABC7 the city costs alone could be about $150,000.
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