Today, May 4, 2023, marks Star Wars Day (May the Fourth be With You). And while countless celebrities have fallen in love with the science-fiction franchise over the past 50 years, one of its earliest supporters was none other than the King of Rock and Roll himself: Elvis Presley.
The Blue Suede Shoes singer was a massive film nerd. He dreamed of being a Hollywood movie star. And, although he sort of achieved his dream, he was never satisfied by the film career he curated – a journey mostly made up of romantic comedies and musicals.
At one point he was even tied to the 1976 reboot of A Star Is Born with Barbra Streisand; a project that fell through when his boss, Colonel Tom Parker, made massive demands for the movie.
So, as a movie lover, he was keen to stay up to date with the latest pictures dominating the box office. At the time, Star Wars (A New Hope) was the number one movie in the world, after being released in the USA months prior on May 25, 1977.
On August 12, 1977, Elvis decided he would take his daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, to the local cinema he regularly rented out and watch a copy of Star Wars. However, disaster struck.
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Elvis apparently couldn’t get ahold of the Star Wars reels to watch with his nine-year-old daughter and his girlfriend, Ginger Alden.
It is unknown whether the King struggled to get the movie because it was so popular, or if the logistics to get the film to the movie theatre just south of Graceland simply didn’t work out. Either way, he was left dejected.
With few options left, he decided to acquire the reels for another recently released blockbuster hit: Sir Roger Moore‘s third James Bond move, The Spy Who Loved Me.
Elvis sent his pals in the Memphis Mafia to get the 007 movie’s reels, and before he knew it, he was watching Moore’s classic spy movie.
Just four days after this wonderful family outing with Lisa Marie and Ginger, on August 16, 1977, Elvis was found dead in his bathroom in Graceland.
The King was just 42-years-old when Ginger entered the bathroom in the middle of the afternoon and found the star keeled over next to the lavatory, cold.
Elvis’ half-brother, Billy (the son of Elvis’ father, Vernon Presley, and his second wife, Dee Stanley) previously looked back on how much the King loved film.
He explained in an interview that Elvis would try to get movies to show at his local theatre ahead of time.
He said: “All the movies we saw weren’t actually in the theatres at the time. They were just in transit around all over and Memphis had a big hub going to all these cities and I would go and pick them up and take them back.”
