Jacqueline "Jacqui" Benton was the beautiful wife of Emmett Benton and the biological mother of Jerrica and Kimber. She died in a plane crash in 1979,[1] an event that would eventually lead to the creation of Synergy, and consequentially, of Jem and The Holograms.
She was voiced by Marlene Aragon and her singing voice for the song "Starlight" was provided by Angela Cappelli.
History[]
Jacqui became a foster girl at a young age. Having lived on her own, she understood the hardships of being an orphan, which inspired her to dedicate her time ensuring that other homeless girls didn't suffer the same fate.
She also had another passion in life: singing. By the time she became an adult, Jacqui was a proficient songwriter and already had a promising singing career. Fate intervened, however, and she fell in love with a clever entrepreneur named Emmett Benton, a caring and good-hearted man who shared her vision of the world. They eventually got married and had two daughters: Jerrica and Kimber.
Jacqui decided to put her singing career on hold to focus on her family. Together, she and Emmett decided to start adopting orphan girls to give them a home and a family. Their own house served for this purpose, which from then on would be known as Starlight House. Aja was their first adopted daughter, followed by Shana, Lela and Becky.
When Jerrica was 11 years old, Jacqui finally decided to resume her music career. Together, she and Emmett launched their own record company: Starlight Music. Shortly after, Emmett started the Starlight Foundation, an organization intended on using the profits generated by Starlight Music to support the girls from Starlight House.
Death[]
On January 31, 1979,[1] Jacqui and her band had a scheduled performance out of town. It was a stormy night and her plane was about to take off. After saying goodbye to the rest of the girls, she took a moment to ask Jerrica why she was so upset. Jerrica confronted her for being absent from home so frequently. Jacqui explained that a career like hers demanded that she dedicated almost full time on it and then she asked her to give her a hug and a goodbye kiss, to which Jerrica refused. Little did she know fate had a tragic outcome prepared for them that night.
Disheartened, Jacqui boarded the plane never to be seen again. That same night, the flight No. 909 crashed into the woods. The next morning, Emmett and the girls arrived at the site of the crash only to be informed by a rescue squad worker the fateful news: there were no survivors...
Aftermath[]
After Jacqui's death, Emmett found a new purpose in life by trying to continue Jacqui's legacy and procuring to give the girls everything they could need. His various business were doing great and he continued adopting more homeless girls. Four months after Jacqui's passing, he started working on a new supercomputer that could link music and tridimensional holographic images. He programmed this computer with Jacqui's recordings and likeness; however, not being able to bear the sight of his dead wife's face just as a computerized image, he decided to give her her own personality and image, thus Synergy was born.
Being advised by his doctor he hadn't much time left to live, Emmett programmed Synergy to become a friend, mother figure, teacher and guide to Jerrica, Kimber and the rest of the girls, trying with this to fill a little the void Jacqui left that fateful night.
Legacy[]
Jacqui wrote hundreds of songs. Supposedly, the only copies could only be found in some thought-to-be-lost master tapes. These tapes, however, somehow ended up in Eric Raymond's possession. After trying to exact a million dollar ransom from Jerrica or force her to sign over controlling interests of Starlight Music, Eric ultimately destroyed the tapes and Jacqui's songs were lost forever... or so they thought.
Jerrica and the rest of the the girls found a passage in Emmett's diary which mentioned that a copy of the tapes could be found hidden deep within Synergy's memory bank; so deep that even Synergy herself maybe didn't know of their existence. Aja was able to retrieve the songs and a new Jacqui Benton album was released shortly, called Starlight.
Discography[]

Jacqui Benton - Starlight
- Starlight (released posthumously)
Known songs written by Jacqui Benton[]
- Starlight
- First Love (performed by Jem and The Holograms)
- My Heart (unpublished)
- Oh. Jo (unpublished)
- Jerrica's (unpublished)
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Jacqui's biological daughters were Jerrica and Kimber. However, she was a legal guardian of Aja, Shana, Lela and Becky.
- The last time she saw Jerrica, she was denied a hug and kiss, not knowing that would be the last time they would ever see each other.
- Jacqui was a housewife but had great musical talents, such as singing and playing the keyboard.
- Jacqui taught Kimber how to play the keyboard.
- Jacqui died in the plane crash of flight 909 on January 31, according to Emmett's diary.
- The way Jacqui and her band died, on a plane crash while heading to perform a concert on a stormy night, is notably similar to the way Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson died in 1959, an event that came to be known as "The Day the Music Died".
- If this is indeed a reference to that fateful day, then this would be the second time the show made a reference to it, the other being the episode named The Day the Music Died.
- Jacqui's personality and physical appearance were the base foundation for the holographic, audio/visual entertainment system called Synergy.
- Jacqui usually wore a necklace that resembled the Jemstar earrings.
- According to Integrity Toys, Jacqui has an additional name which is Jacqueline O'Rion. This may hint that her maiden name is O'Rion.
See also[]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 The Jem Series Timeline
- ↑ Pictured only.