Outback Elvis

by John Connell

  Too cool for school. A youthful tribute artist rocks the Royal Hotel, 2010

  John Connell

  Gnarnayarrahe Waitarie (Black Elvis) poses with a friend in the 2010 street parade

  John Connell

  Reservoir Elvii on Festival Boulevard: John Collins, Paul Fenech, Justin Shandor, Alvis and Luke Nash

  Jen Li

  ShElvis: ‘I really believe I’m pioneering things ... I bring something different, I show Elvis’s feminine side.’

  Sheryl Scharkie

  By 2012 there were more than 150 events, from Elvis at the Trots to exhibitions of alpacas and (blue suede) ewes. A vast number combined food, drink and Elvis. The Poets’ Breakfasts, the staple of many folk festivals, arrived to join the Hunka Hunka Pancake Breakfast, the Thank You Very Much Big Breakfast and Breakfast at the Dish. Choosing and crowning Miss Priscilla was a growing feature of every festival – as was Miss Priscilla’s hair, creating active competition between Parkes’ beauty salons and hairdressers. Cutting, colouring, teasing and the more than liberal application of hairspray and eyelashes were all essential. The winner, who had often spent months in preparation, was revealed at the irresistible TransTank Miss Priscilla Dinner and Big Hair Competition. For quieter moments – hangovers, perhaps – there were Elvis trivia contests.

  The King’s Castle: Elvis meets The Wiggles

  A member of The Wiggles, whose most significant creation was probably Dorothy the Dinosaur, would not have seemed an obvious source of Elvis memorabilia. In an earlier 1980s life, The Wiggles had been a local Sydney band, the Cockroaches, with a rockabilly legacy. The Wiggles’ massive global success took a personal toll and Greg Page – the original Yellow Wiggle – left the band in 2006, using his payout to expand his Elvis collection. He had only recently become an Elvis fan, but a highly enthusiastic one, playing in Las Vegas, recording in Nashville with Elvis’s Taking Care of Business band (‘They had grandkids, so they knew who The Wiggles were,’ he said) and meeting Priscilla Presley. In his autobiography Page says that, at Graceland, ‘I immediately felt a connection with the kind of person that Elvis had been ... It left me wondering whether I’d come across the spirit of Elvis himself’, and he began his collection with the specific intention of starting an Australian museum. At one point, while cataloguing the collection,

  I put my hand on the uppermost item. I felt this incredible presence right behind me and then all the lights in the house went out … I really felt that the presence behind me was that of Elvis Presley. Eventually I went back to the cupboard and put my hand on the item that I had touched before … it was a copy of Elvis’ last will and testament.

  Parkes was the obvious place to put his private hoard on public display, because of the festival and because his first wife came from Parkes. So Parkes now has the finest and most valuable collection of Elvis memorabilia in the southern hemisphere. Parkes has become home to the gold lamé suit designed by Nudie of Hollywood (worn by Elvis on the cover of 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can’t Be Wrong), Elvis and Priscilla’s marriage certificate, the first management contract signed between Elvis and his manager, Colonel Tom Parker, the original blueprints for Graceland, two pairs of Elvis’s trademark Aviator sunglasses, and the last Cadillac that he owned. One of Elvis’s capes, weighing 20 kilograms, is there too. Like all museums, it offers memorabilia and other goods for sale: amid the standard postcards, mugs and T-shirts are jumpsuits and wigs. But there are also rather more sacred relics:

  Sealed in a plastic case this short length of Elvis Presley’s hair was acquired from the April 2003 Mastro Net Auction and was originally obtained from Homer (Gil) Gilleland who was Elvis Presley’s personal hair stylist for over 20 years … a unique opportunity to acquire your own authentic piece of Elvis DNA.

  The King’s Castle is open daily and a little bit of Elvis never leaves the building.

  Sometimes Elvis was simply glued on to what was happening anyway, an essential imprimatur for this very long weekend. Indeed one ‘event’ was described as Hunka Hunka Health Needs (‘Whatever your Elvis needs are, the Parkes pharmacy can help you out’). Out of town, CSIRO sponsored ‘Elvis at the Dish: The Brightest Stars in Heaven’ and, in a different direction, ‘Dinner in the Vines with Elvis’ took place at Twisted River Wines.

  For a festival where many visitors were far from youthful, sport fared well. Apart from the golf, there was Barefoot Bowls with Elvis and, given the impetus for the festival, it was perhaps inevitable that rugby should return. In one of the maddest activities of the festival, 30 jumpsuited Elvises packed down in sweaty scrums and played rugby, a sport that Elvis most likely never heard of. It was not a pretty sight, so being tucked away on a rugby pitch on the edge of town probably worked. Former local boy Daniel McIntyre dreamed up the idea, made a pilgrimage from Darwin and imported 50 Elvis suits from Cambodia: white suits that nicely collected the grass stains. While the Guinness Book of Records was unlikely to be interested, it was undoubtedly the first Elvis versus Elvis rugby match in the world. It was claimed to have been described by Australian coach Michael Cheika as the ‘most entertaining 5-all draw I’ve ever witnessed’. In place of water bottles, cask wines kept the Elvises lubricated throughout the match. Only one player was forced from the game through injury; he explained, ‘The beer went up my nose instead of in my mouth’. The Boars would have understood and sympathised.

  Elvis at the Trots was usually boosted by many visitors, partly because it took place at the showground, where people were staying. However, when the Parkes Gun Club put on an Elvis shoot in 2010, the same local crowd came but just three Elvises turned up. The art exhibition began in 2006; a $2 entry fee and Devonshire teas raised money for cancer patients. Paintings by local artists made money, including local Aboriginal art – a rare example of direct Aboriginal participation, though Indigenous people were as much part of the crowd as everybody else. Art and cake competitions, with just two entrants in 2015 and 2016, struggled somewhat and were best left for the Parkes Show. By contrast, smartphones meant there was no shortage of entrants for the photographic competition, which gradually took the place of the art.

  Dancing competitions seemed inevitable. ‘Best Rock ’n’ Roller’ was an obvious one but at different times there were prizes for ‘Best Twister’ and ‘Best Limbo’. Aging bones might be troubled, but rock ’n’ roll dances were enthusiastically supported. Look-alike and sound-alike competitions dominated the main stage. Music workshops were initially absent; it wasn’t the best time or place to learn or train, although classes in blues and how to rock ’n’ roll were somewhat successful. Big Al’s Rock & Roll Dance Class was an early starter, Barrier Rockers came from Cairns to provide workshops and by 2016, dozens of miscellaneous couples sweated it out in Cooke Park to a repeated ‘one step, two step, back step’.

  More serious moments occasionally intervened. Lectures have been given. In 2016 Steve Binder, the director of the famous Elvis ’68 Comeback Special, talked about his friendship with Elvis and the secrets behind the comeback. Some visitors sought more, wanting it to be like, for example, the Woodford Folk Festival. One said, ‘They should have some talks on Elvis to try and put him into the wider context of American music. You want to tap something a bit deeper than just the superficial impersonators. But that’s my view. I might be totally wrong’. Experience suggests that he was wrong, especially when the Parkes Services Club hosted a talk entitled ‘Flaming Star’ that linked Elvis’s personality to the ‘sixteen personality types described by Carl Jung and Isabel Myers’, by ‘one of Australia’s most experienced trainers in Jungian–Myers personality theory’. It was not repeated. Nor was the Darling Sisters’ Charm and Deportment Salon’s invitation to ‘Learn how to order the perfect martini, look like a screen goddess on a budget and leave a lasting impression with your devastating charm’.

  So many events were happening simultaneously that not all could succeed. In 2008 a Bathurst entrepreneur had the idea of hiring the Parkes bowling green, setting up cha
irs and showing Elvis movies by moonlight; few turned up and the venture ended on the Sunday night when a brief but torrential thunderstorm threatened to destroy the equipment and resulted in the few dozen patrons fleeing for cover. (Five years later the bowling green had suffered the fate of so many others: it had become a supermarket car park.) The Golf Club tried several events but, after hiring a well-known entertainer who was too old to cut it, they had given up by 2016; as a member had earlier suggested, ‘Let’s stick to golf, not event management’. As the focus of events shifted to the centre of town, the Elvis Wall of Fame – a highlight of early days – was somewhat forgotten in suburbia. New plaques were placed there, with more recent Australian stars such as Molly Meldrum, Kamahl and Angry Anderson joining such legends as Johnny O’Keefe, Col Joye and Little Pattie, but it held little interest for most visitors.

  Increasingly, the Dish put on distinct festival events, and its restaurant was always full, but, irrespective of events, it proved a popular attraction. In 2006 as many as 45 per cent of visitors included a visit there in their festival experience; it was by far the most popular of the non-festival activities. Once again Elvis and the Dish were coming together. A few festival-goers visited lavender and alpaca farms, some went to the zoo at Dubbo and others to the Peak Hill gold mine. Manildra once offered non-stop Elvis films, but without much luck. It was too hot to move far.

  Suspicions vanquished?

  In most of Australia, including New South Wales, much of the 2000s was a time of serious drought, the worst since settlement. Farmers struggled, agricultural profitability collapsed, ‘drought-proofing’ entered the vocabulary, and shops and stores felt the pinch. The drift away from the land was accentuated. At the same time the festival thrived, which led some cynics and doubters to take it more seriously as a source of income and prosperity, and of hope, pleasure and escapism in difficult times.

  By 2003 change was obviously in the air, although the editor of the Post remained pessimistic, saying, ‘This could be the very last’. Kelly Hendry was still disappointed with local support: ‘We’ve walked Clarinda Street trying to summon involvement but it’s been pretty dismal’. None of the shows took in more than 200 people, despite the lack of competition, and the parade drew only a few thousand spectators. It was still decidedly homely; T-shirts, the first ones printed by the local Assembly of God minister, misprinted words like ‘revivial’. But after a decade, attitudes and aspirations were changing. Bigger sponsors arrived, and the festival received a grant of $10 000 for Regional Flagship Event Funding. Glossy programs followed. Professionalism was taking over.

  Many more local people and businesses entered into the spirit of the festival, to the delight of visitors. One commented in 2007:

  We found that the actual shop assistants are supporting it and they’re dressing up … in the chemist they were dressed like little Priscillas … you walk into a shop and they’re just so friendly. When we first came a lot of the shops weren’t dressed up and in our first year they only had one Priscilla in the competition … there’s been such a big change ... now there’s Priscillas everywhere!

  A visitor from Lithgow said, ‘I haven’t met one Parkes person that I have spoken to that doesn’t support it, who isn’t helpful’. Local resistance was melting away, but only slowly. A local resident interviewed in 2007 said:

  A lot of the locals don’t really like the festival … the fanatical ones that are on the committee and that, they’re great, but then there’s the old folk – they don’t like everybody coming into town. I think they don’t like lining up for their beers at the club. But a lot of shopkeepers love it and they realise it’s really good for the clubs and the pubs and things like that, because it brings in a lot of money into the town, you know, so they appreciate it from their perspective.

  A year later another observed: ‘Outside money coming in to town helps greatly because of rural downturn due to drought’. Economics mattered in what remained drought years and the festival was playing its part. Local involvement was increasing and, by the end of the decade, dressing up was being taken to a new level. Police officers in Elvis wigs and shades were routinely breath-testing drivers on the highway into town. Since Elvis had once professed himself in favour of drug control, and been duly decorated by President Nixon, there was some logic to that.

  Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On

  After a decade of struggle three people’s grand folly had begun to transform the whole nature of a country town. Ideas and incomes had changed. In drought years it provided a glimmer of hope, and a reason to smile and engage with the community. ‘If it’s good for Parkes’ brought people together, and opposition faded. As numbers increased, there were inevitable dissidents: ‘Hungover and drunk Elvises stumbling around the streets at breakfast time and in the parade on Saturday morning isn’t exactly a great image for the town’. A letter to the Post decried Parkes councillors in drag and a festival dedicated to someone who took drugs. But the majority had been won over.

  The train brought regulars, the festival secured a spot at the centre of the town and moved closer to the hearts of the townsfolk. By 2015 it had its own Facebook site and Twitter account, and a slick website with scores of sponsors’ logos. The council now had an Elvis Committee (so that lucky councillors could identify themselves on the council website as members of both the Elvis and waste facilities committees). The Tourism Office had a dedicated Elvis festival officer and, by 2007, had added an events officer to encourage other local events to emulate the Elvis Festival. The festival was established, and the statue of a sombre, lavishly bearded Sir Henry Parkes at the centre of the main street – Clarinda Street, named after his wife – seemed quite unperturbed, even when adorned with Elvis garb and photographed amid revellers.

  The festival slowly expanded geographically. Nearby Forbes no longer held a rival jazz festival on the same weekend, instead hosting its own Elvis events (such as Elvis by the Lake and karaoke at the Forbes RSL) and being willing, for once, to be subordinate. In any case, all its own hotels and motels were full. They were no longer competitors but beneficiaries. Others, too, were learning and earning from Elvis, and various local groups were seeking to bring other tourist events to Parkes. As Kelly Hendry remarked in 2004:

  They’ve seen what can happen with Elvis. The Country Music Festival is really looking to expand and to develop using the Elvis Festival as a catalyst … we’re never going to be another Tamworth but Elvis can be, since it’s got that uniqueness and no one else is doing it.

  Uniqueness was working. Other hopeful towns and festival organisers sent delegations to learn, or, if nothing else, enjoy a weekend out. Most visitors, whether performers or punters, certainly did, and the grand spectacle that no-one could ignore was the parade.

  Pretty in pink. A couple pose outside the Cambridge Hotel during the festival, 2015

  Brandon Sherman

  The Jacksons from Melbourne renewed their vows in the indoor Big W carpark, 2015

  Nic Walker/Fairfax Syndication

  A Sydney couple take centre stage in the renewal of wedding vows, 2016

  John Connell

  Chris and Mary from Sydney were renewing their vows – she in full bridal dress (not the original but, she stressed, the same size), he in a white Elvis jumpsuit, black wig and gold sunglasses. The pair had bonded over the King ever since they met. ‘We always wanted to get married by Elvis but it’s too expensive in America – 48 bucks in the Big W carpark: it’s a dream come true.’

  4

  SATURDAY MORNING FEVER

  Round about November every year, Al Gersbach, a Parkes Shire Council grader operator, starts growing his hair and sideburns out again. His hair is first coloured and styled: ‘I used to wear a wig once, but it was too bloody uncomfortable in 42 degree heat’. It then gets restyled daily, marking the start of the process of becoming Alvis. By January he is ready to slip on the jumpsuit – not so much of a strain for a man still playing competitive rugby in his fifties. Foot
ball jerseys hang alongside his three Elvis suits, ranging in price from $300 to $1500 and purchased in America. ‘The council needed help and I had the suit … I’m just a show-off, mate. I love dressing up’. Al can’t sing, but he looks the part of the official festival ambassador and Elvis-on-call that he has become, starting in 1995 as a Dial-an-Elvis for media calls. His tasks are meeting and greeting – at the station, in the main street, in the park – and posing for photographs. After a decade he’s surely the most photographed man in town, particularly after assembling and practising a range of ten classic poses to ensure that visitors get the best version. His wife has learned to live with the annual transition, while Al has coped with what he describes as the only hazard of the job: the occasional grope from overenthusiastic Elvis fans.

  Just as Al Gersbach gradually transforms himself into the most visible and approachable of the hundreds of Elvises, so the town takes on a new look at the start of the year. The main street metamorphoses into a boulevard, and fills up with colour, life and Elvis. If any single thing symbolises the vibrant colour and action of the festival it is the Saturday morning parade, the glamorous pageant that brings townsfolk and tourists together, and, for most people, gets the show informally underway. The town crier, in his blue jumpsuit, leads it off and provides the civic seal of approval.