A long sniff from the other end of the line.
‘We’ll be together, and everything will be fine.’
‘Yes, Mama.’
‘There, there, baby.’
‘There, there.’
She doesn’t hang up until his tears have stopped.
That night, Gladys sleeps well, and the following morning she feels lighter. Elvis may be in the army. He may be the nation’s number-one entertainer. But he still needs her. She sits in her garden chair beneath the shade of the large oak at the back of the house, flipping through Good Housekeeping and sipping her coffee, and her legs don’t give her a moment’s bother until lunchtime.
A week later, she can already feel the morning’s heat as she steps outside to check on her chickens. It’s a shock after the cool of her air-conditioned house, and she reaches back inside the kitchen to reduce the dial. At least when it’s warm all the time, you know what you’re in for. And if it’s hot in the house nobody can expect her to get dressed quick or go to the gate to greet the fans, many of whom have been weeping on the sidewalk since Elvis left. Gladys hasn’t had the strength to go down there, fearing she will say something she shouldn’t about Tom Parker, or the army, or Elvis himself.
Today Vernon will drive her and his mother through Texas to join Elvis in Killeen, near his base at Fort Hood. Alberta will follow them by train a few days later. Taking a flight is not something Gladys will consider. She’d rather be on the road, even in the heat of July, than up in a plane with nothing between her and death but the air.
She crosses the grass to the coop which Elvis had built as far away from the highway as possible. The dew clings to her slippers and the tall trees stand perfectly still in the humid air. She looks back at the mansion, softly white in the early-morning sun. She won’t miss this place. Elvis called last night saying he’d found them the perfect luxury trailer, and Gladys thought that sounded just fine. Small enough for her to walk from end to end without pain, anyhow.
She sidesteps chicken shit with the practised moves of an expert, still light on her feet despite her weight, unlatches the wire door, and reaches for her favourite bird, Marmalade. She’s a fat, ginger, speckled hen with the softest feathers and the neatest turn to her beak. Cradling her to her chest, Gladys coos, ‘Don’t you die while I’m gone, you hear? Don’t let them old maids kill you.’
She lets the hen go and scatters corn on the dry grass. ‘Mama will be back,’ she says, ‘won’t she?’
The chickens gurgle and squawk in reply, and Gladys lets each one out of the coop to roam the lawn. With Elvis gone, nobody can tell her not to.
Wiping her hands on her dress, she walks quickly back to the house.
Vernon enjoys driving fast, and he settles himself into the seat of the Lincoln, making small contended noises as they race towards Texas. All the windows are down and warm air batters their heads. Minnie Mae snores softly in the back, one hand on her pocketbook. Gladys removes her shoes, not caring about the smell. She closes her eyes and, for a moment, with Vernon singing along to the radio, she feels like a girl again, being driven someplace in the woods in that truck he used to borrow. He always had a rug in the back, ready for her to lie beneath the pines. She wonders if he still has one in the trunk, just in case one of his women would rather do it under the boughs of an old oak than in some motel room.
‘Teddy Bear’ comes on, and Vernon sings along, tapping the steering wheel in time to the beat. She’s never liked this one too much. When she first heard it she didn’t understand why Elvis had made a record for children.
‘That’s a good ’un, ain’t it?’ says Vernon. ‘Ain’t heard it in a while.’
‘You know who that was!’ says the disc jockey. ‘U.S. Army Private Presley! And we want to know what you think of Elvis joining up! Does this mean the end of Elvis the Pelvis? We’ve got Marie on the line …’
Gladys reaches for the off switch, but Vernon clasps her wrist. ‘I wanna hear this,’ he protests.
‘I reckon Elvis is serving his country like a good American citizen and we all oughta be right proud of him and he’ll be just as popular when he gets out,’ says Marie.
‘That’s two years from now, Marie. Which is a heck of a long time in show business,’ warns the disc jockey.
‘Well, I’ll still love him!’ says Marie.
‘Course you will, girl!’ adds Vernon, grinning.
Steve is on the line now. ‘Presley is finished!’ he says. ‘He can’t keep his career going and be in the army! He was getting kinda long in the tooth anyhow.’
‘Aw, eat dirt, Steve!’ says Vernon, clearly enjoying himself.
‘Man could be right,’ says Gladys, quietly.
‘When he comes back,’ Steve continues, ‘nobody will remember what all the fuss was about.’
‘Who’ll they be listening to instead, Steve?’ asks the disc jockey.
‘Jerry Lee Lewis, maybe,’ Steve replies. ‘Or Pat Boone.’
‘Pat Boone!’ spits Vernon.
‘He’s a good singer,’ says Gladys.
‘Jerry Lee’s all right,’ says Vernon. ‘But not a patch on our boy. And he’s too rough round the edges to get real popular.’
‘I don’t like him one whit,’ says Gladys.
‘Presley’ll be all washed up, two years from now!’ Steve declares.
Vernon clicks off the radio. ‘What’s wrong with these folks?’ he asks.
‘Well,’ says Gladys, ‘maybe when he comes home again Elvis will think about doing something else.’
‘Damn well hope not!’
‘It ain’t like being an entertainer is a stable kind of career.’
‘Are you out of your mind? Think of the money!’
‘Boy’s made enough to last a lifetime,’ says Gladys.
Vernon tuts. ‘You don’t know shit,’ he says, not quite low enough for her to miss.
‘I know he’ll be dead before thirty if he don’t slow down.’
‘You gotta quit saying that.’
‘I’ll quit saying it when I know it ain’t true.’
Vernon puts his foot to the floor, and Gladys closes her eyes, trying to imagine what a luxury trailer might look like.
RIOT: 1956
1956
Even the air is different in Hollywood. Drier, thicker, dirtier, despite the bright spring sky. It is also rich with the scent of Colonel Parker’s cigars. Elvis breathes in a lungful, and starts to cough as his manager steers him towards his screen test at Paramount Pictures. He often smells the Colonel before he sees him. The sweet, woody scent precedes him, and when Elvis gets a whiff of it, he knows he’s got to look sharp.
‘You’re gonna be terrific,’ the Colonel says. ‘All Mr Wallis will want to know is that you can take direction without any bullshit. What he won’t want is some hotshot who thinks he knows it all already. So you gotta show him you’re real good at listening. You can do that, can’t you?’
‘I reckon so, sir.’
‘I know you can, son. Like I always say: you do your thing, I do mine.’
Every building is squared off, and the same light cream colour. The dry atmosphere means his hair stays in its sculpted shape. There is a new tightness around his mouth and eyes, but he cannot tell if this is down to the Los Angeles air, or all the smiling he’s doing. Maybe it’s just nerves at the thought of acting for real Hollywood folks, or exhaustion from being on the road. When he collapsed a few weeks ago after a show in Florida, the doctor told him he had to rest up or risk serious illness, because what he was doing onstage amounted to a full day’s labour crammed into twenty minutes. Ever since, Elvis has been proudly telling everyone that story, and every time he tells it, the Colonel’s eyes grow rounder and brighter, like prized marbles.
A young man wearing pale pants strides past with a clipboard beneath his arm and the Colonel raises his hand in crisp salute. ‘Fine morning!’ he says.
The man shoots an interested look at Elvis, nods, and walks on.
; Colonel Parker leans close to Elvis and hisses, ‘Don’t mix with these Hollywood guys any more than you got to. They’re all Jews and faggots. Which is their business, of course. But you need to keep your wits sharp.’
Elvis nods.
‘I’m watching your back, but you gotta do your bit, too.’
‘Understood, sir.’
‘So why you wearing blue jeans, son?’ asks the Colonel, looking straight ahead, his short body waddling confidently.
‘I figured it’d be more … actorly.’
‘Like James Dean?’
‘I guess. Colonel, do you reckon they’d let me do that speech from Rebel Without a Cause?’ Elvis knows all the words to his favourite film and often performs bits of it for his manager.
‘You know the one, don’t you?’ he continues. ‘The one about him feeling so ashamed? Like he don’t belong no place?’
They’ve reached the studio now, and the Colonel pauses to look directly at Elvis. Those round eyes make Elvis fear that his manager can read his mind. Elvis has seen the Colonel hypnotise men; once he had his assistant rolling on the floor and barking like a dog. He’s never sure if this is a trick or a real power. Certainly, there seems to be nothing his manager cannot do. When they’d first met, he’d told Elvis that he would never be more than a regional star without a bigger record label, and he’d made that happen. Then he’d got him on TV. And now here they are, in Hollywood.
‘You’re a smart boy,’ the Colonel says, cocking his head. ‘Mr Wallis will want somebody to replace Dean. And you’re his ticket to the youth market. But don’t forget he’ll want something new, too. He doesn’t want a number-two James Dean. He wants a number-one Elvis Presley. Wallis called me. He’s been calling me ever since he saw you on the Dorsey Show. He’s desperate for your talent, son.’
‘Yessir, but—’
‘You’re my boy, and you’re already a star. Got it?’
‘Thank you, Colonel.’
‘So do the script they sent you, OK?’
‘Yessir.’
‘And when I’ve got you a million-dollar contract – which I will – then you can do whatever the hell script you like.’
‘Yessir.’
The Colonel chews on his cigar and pats Elvis’s shoulder. ‘You could make money in your sleep, son. In fact, you are!’
Elvis laughs.
Holding the door open for him, the Colonel adds, round eyes popping, ‘And if you ever do anything to shame me, you’re finished.’
The following day, Elvis and his manager have an appointment to meet producer Hal Wallis. Mr Wallis’s office is as big as the whole studio at Sun Records, and his desk is an enormous marble table set on a raised platform, like an altar. There’s nothing on it except a black telephone, a pad and a gold pencil. Behind the desk is a shelf reserved for Academy Awards, and Elvis can’t help but imagine what it might be like to hold one of those glinting statuettes in his hands.
Catching him gawping, Mr Wallis says, ‘I see you’ve noticed the spoils of my art! So difficult to know where to put these things …’
He’s wearing powder-blue suit pants and a silk tie, and is deeply tanned. Leaning back in his padded chair, he smiles.
‘So, young man, what do you make of our little set-up here?’
‘I can hardly take it in, Mr Wallis,’ says Elvis, shifting in his seat. ‘I mean, it’s happened so fast and all.’
Mr Wallis nods thoughtfully. ‘I can imagine,’ he says in a soft voice, ‘that it’s quite overwhelming. Of course, the real strength of our system here at Paramount is that we look after our stars. It can be a pretty tough business, being famous. And we have plenty of experience in managing that process.’
‘Boy’s already a star in his own right, of course,’ says Colonel Parker, dabbing his brow with a brightly patterned handkerchief. ‘Do you know how many records he’s sold, Hal? Did I give you the update on that?’
‘I don’t believe you did, Tom.’
‘“Heartbreak Hotel” – that’s his latest, out just a few weeks – is already over a million, and still climbing.’
‘That is truly impressive.’
‘I’m fielding calls from the TV networks, night and day. Everyone wants my boy, Hal.’
Mr Wallis forms a steeple with his fingers and breathes across it.
‘I’ve watched your screen test, Elvis, and I’ll be honest with you: I haven’t seen any male actor whose test impressed me quite as much since Errol Flynn.’
Elvis beams. ‘Why, thank you, sir.’
‘It’s not so much your acting ability – although you do have that – it’s more your magnetism. The camera sees it, and magnifies it, and that’s the thing that makes stars. And, frustratingly for us, it’s the thing that’s absolutely impossible to manufacture.’
‘Millions of girls across the nation agree!’ says the Colonel, slapping Elvis’s shoulder. ‘And their mamas and grandmas, too!’
‘What did you make of the role you played in the test, Elvis?’ asks Mr Wallis.
Putting his hands to his knees to stop them jumping up and down, Elvis says, ‘Well, it was all real interesting, sir, and everyone was so helpful and all, and I had fun. But – can I speak honestly?’
‘Please.’
The Colonel sits forward, gripping his cigar in his teeth. He’s warned his client never to speak his mind without first checking that his mind is in full agreement with his manager’s. But Elvis can’t keep quiet on this, and he feels he can trust Mr Wallis to understand. Although he rates the Colonel as just about the smartest man he has ever met, Elvis suspects that his manager knows little about acting in real movies.
‘Well, that character just wasn’t anything like me, you know?’ he says. ‘I mean, he was kinda heartbroken, and real happy at the same time. When I get my heart broke, I’m just sad.’
He’d played a halfwit clown. The director hadn’t said as much, but from the moment Elvis first read the script he’d known he was playing somebody not unlike his cousin, Gene. Maybe listening to Gene babble on for so many years had helped him get into the role.
Mr Wallis raises his eyebrows. ‘What kind of role do you think would suit you, Elvis?’
‘I guess just something a bit more like me, more suited to my experience and all … something that didn’t need so much—’
‘Acting?’ asks Mr Wallis.
There’s a pause before he bursts out laughing, his plump cheeks shaking with mirth. After a beat, the Colonel joins in.
Elvis looks into his lap. Before the screen test, his manager told him a story about Hank Williams. Hank made it to Hollywood, the Colonel said, only to blow the whole damn thing by getting uppity when he thought the producer was treating him like a rube. Hank had pushed back his chair and rested his cowboy-booted feet on the producer’s desk. The sound of Hank’s spurs digging into that fine maple had marked the end of his career in pictures.
Elvis shakes his head and manages to smile up at the two men. ‘You got my number!’ he says, as lightly as he can.
Mr Wallis dabs his eyes. ‘I’ll let you into a secret,’ he says. ‘The project I’m thinking of for you, Elvis, is what I’d call a classic Civil War picture, with plenty of love interest, and a real dramatic role for you. Do you think you could handle that?’
‘How many songs?’ asks the Colonel.
‘We can discuss that, but we’ll obviously be including some musical numbers … the character you’d play, Elvis, is a good farm boy, so that would in fact be closer to your own experience, am I right?’
‘Well, not exactly, sir—’
‘His daddy was a sharecropper,’ states the Colonel, without looking at Elvis. ‘Worked night and day. Real salt of the earth.’
‘So you’ll know what it’s like to toil the land,’ says Mr Wallis. ‘I bet you could chase a hog and catch it!’
Elvis looks at his shoes. They are made of crocodile skin, and too soft to make a dent in any item of furniture in this room.
�
��Yessir,’ he says, ‘reckon I could, if it was a slow ’un.’
Mr Wallis chuckles. ‘Elvis,’ he says, ‘I think we’re going to get along just fine.’
A couple of nights later, he is mobbed by girls after a show at the San Diego Arena, and an entire arm of his jacket is taken from him. He runs to the Cadillac, trailing threads of cloth. Slamming the door shut, he sees naked legs coming from his dressing-room window, and a couple of state troopers, together with his friend Red, who has started coming to shows with him to help out, trying to stuff them back in, as though dealing with a bucket of snakes.
Collapsing in the back seat, Elvis realises the police have become part of his family. His first sight now, on arriving anyplace new, or stepping from a hotel or limousine, is a uniform, a cap and a pistol. Wherever he goes, Colonel Parker sees to it that a band of state troopers are put to work, holding back the crowds. Elvis has thanked his manager many times for saving his life. He tells the Colonel that he is like a father to him, and that he hopes he can prove a worthy son.
Back at the El Cortez Hotel, his mama and his new steady, Barbara, are waiting. Barbara is a friend of Dixie’s, although slightly older; from some angles, she looks like Elizabeth Taylor. She and Gladys sit at opposite ends of the vinyl couch in his suite, both clutching their purses in their laps. What Elvis finds both appealing and unsettling about Barbara is her cool watchfulness. She reads books and talks about them, too. Sometimes she even reads him poetry, which he likes. Elvis judges her sophisticated enough to be seen with him, yet homey enough to please his mama.
He and Dixie split a few months ago. Sitting on her porch, Dixie had wept as she told him they’d grown too far apart, and she had to end it. His life was elsewhere, now, and his success was more than she could handle. They’d cried together for hours. By midnight, though, he knew her tears were a way of keeping him there in the hope that he’d promise to turn down the dial on his career. The look of desperate pleading in her reddened eyes had made him relieved to walk away.
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