Entertainers Priscilla Presley’s life begins again at 41

Press, 18 February 1987, Page 14

Entertainers Priscilla Presley’s life begins again at 41

A new husband and a baby on the way have means happiness at last for Priscilla Presley. At 41, she has got out from under the spell of Elvis, (The King of Rock). The DUO writer, JOHN SMALLWOOD, charts the life of the schoolgirl who was allowed to live with the mega-star until she was old enough to marry him, who kicked over the traces and battled her way to stardom in TVs “Dallas,” and who brought up her daughter in a no-nonsense style.

It was no secret in Tinsel Town that wedding bells were due to mingle with the chimes of Christmas in the Priscilla Presley household. Most of Hollywood knew also that the patter of tiny feet would come in the Northern spring when -the blue-eyed Presley, aged 41, expected her second child, nearly 19 years after her first-born came into the Elvis Presley mansion in Tennessee. The bridegroom and father-to-be is a Brazilian film-maker, Marco Grimaldi, 11 years younger than Priscilla, and only 12 years older than Presley’s daughter, Lisa Marie. Grimaldi met Presley when he visited the set of TV’s "Dallas” on business in 1983, soon after she had joined the cast in her search for stardom in front of cameras.

She said, "When I was introduced to Marco it was like being hit by lightning.” It was not very long before Grimaldi moved in with the Presley mum and daughter. “Thank goodness Lisa is just crazy about Marco,” said Presley. “The two of them have helped me through some recent hard times. Since we’ve been living together Marco has changed my life. I don’t take things so seriously now, and I find myself laughing a lot. I’m a one-man woman. I don’t like fly-by-night involvement.” Grimaldi came on the scene after the dimissal from the Presley home of boyfriend Michael Edwards, after seven years of being a live-in lover. He was a male model-cum-actor who appeared in “Mommy Dearest,” the film about the actress, Joan Crawford. Presley game him the order of the boot when the teenage Lisa Marie entered the boyfriend age and commented acidly on her mother’s lifestyle. By coincidence, just as with Grimaldi, her affair with Edwards was like love at first sight. Especially for him. He said: “When we met my heart jumped around my ears; my eyes were spinning around on stalks.” When it was all over he said he had no regrets or bitterness towards Presley. AFFAIR Edwards had followed the karate instructor, Mike Stone, into Presley’s affections. One day in 1972, when she had been married for five years, Elvis took her to watch him taking:: karate lessions: Mike Stone was the teacher, and Presley was set for an affair. 1 Mrs Dee Presley, widow of

Elvis’s father, said, “I can’t really blame Priscilla for a lot of things.

“She thought she was something special being Mrs Elvis Presley, the wife of the rock’n’roll king, but it wasn’t exactly the best thing in the world, just sitting in the house while he was the centre of attraction.

“Elvis would go mad if Priscilla wasn’t at his beck and call. She gave it her best. Then she openly rebelled.” Presley packed her bags, gently broke the news to Elvis that she was leaving him, and, with Lisa Marie in tow, moved into the home she was already renting with Stone. Soon after her $2 million divorce settlement in 1973, Presley left Stone. Although Presley has lived with luxury as her best friend nearly all her life, she has had peaks and troughs of happiness. When Priscilla Beaulieu was a schoolgirl, aged 14, living with her parents in Germany where her step-father was a United States Air Force colonel, she met Elvis Presley, already the idol of screaming girls round the world. He was doing his national service in the United States army and at the same time giving concerts. With other entertainers, Elvis had been invited to the Beaulieu home for a party. Presley couldn’t believe her luck, especially when she realised that the great man had fallen for her in a big way right from the start. He had a liking for young girls fresh out of puberty. Every walking moment her thoughts and talk were of him; her schoolwork suffered, she lost weight. All the time, Elvis was coaxing her parents to allow him to take their daughter back to America with him. They finally agreed. Elvis promised he would see that she got the best education, ‘and that he would marry her when she came of age. He kept his word. But Presley , found that life in Graceland, the huge Elvis Presley mansion near Memphis,

Tennessee, could be like a prison. While Elvis would sleep all day, Presley attended school. She also tried hard to follow her own interests.

Said Dee Presley: “She took ballet lessons, but she had to make sure she was right there when Elvis got up, or he’d go through the roof with anger.” ARMED BODYGUARDS “Everything was linked to his own time-table, and her whole life had to revolve around that. After a while she hardly went out of Graceland.” With its armed bodyguard „nd lack of freedom it seemed like a fortress, and she missed out on all the parties and fun that most teen-age girls enjoyed. He made her wear thickly caked make-up, large false eyelashes, and backcombed hair which stood many inches high. Elvis’s career came first, his fans came a very close second, and bringing up the rear was Presley. She was ordered to stay in the background. What she always found difficult to take in was her role in a traditional deep south family, where the wife is always in the home and is very protected. As she matured, she not only developed a curiosity to explore the outside world, but a will of her own, and became tired of being second fiddle to Elvis. At the back of her mind was the thought that if only she had the chance she, too, could be a big star.

In fact, Presley could have been an actress much sooner than was the case if it had not been for his chauvinism. His film producer, Hal Wallis, would have given her a contract, but King Elvis, true to southern form, wanted his wife at home. When Elvis died in 1977 his multi-millions were left to Lisa Marie; Presley was not given a penny in the will, but her father-in-law left her the $4 million his son had bequeathed him, plus

$250,000 interest, and Presiey headed to Hollywood..

“You’re steeped in such celebrity status when your name is Presley that you can literally get lost in it,” she said. “Then I thought, ’What is the point in changing; the executives and the gossip columnists will find out, and they’ll keep calling me Presley, whatever I do.’ ” While she acted in “Dallas,” Presley continued to work on her book about life with Elvis. It took her years of work and six draft manuscripts before the tell-all book, “Elvis and Me,” hit the shops at the end of 1985. There was plenty to tell. According to Presley in the 10 years she was with Elvis, they made love only 50 times. Presley delayed the book until she was certain that Lisa was old enough to understand and appreciate the no-punches-pulled words, and to withstand any adverse criticism of either her father or mother. Lisa said she enjoyed the book, and in fact had read it twice before publication. Whatever critics might say about Presley, there is almost univeral agreement that as a mother she has done a good job in bringing up Lisa, shielding her from unwelcome publicity, teaching her to appreciate "normal” values in life, and being ever-watchful, over personal friendship. This has not been easy, with the time taken up with the book, and her role of Jenna. That part has brought changes in her. She said; "Remember, only men write for 'Dallas.' Men like to portrary women in a certain way. Well, women have many faces.

It was when she was romancing with Edwards that she became hooked on acting. By 1980 they were both enrolled in acting classes. Presley studied under Milton Katselas. FILM DISASTER Her first venture into showbusiness was as one of three presenters in a short-lived TV series, “These Amazing Animals.” Her first film was a disaster called “Comeback,” filmed in Thailand. She insisted on doing her own stunts, but most of her work ended up on the cuttingroom floor.

Like a lot of aspiring actresses Presley did a stint as a photographic model, and was once rejected for an advertising assisgnment by a top agency because her bottom was too flat. Her main aim became to get into a TV series, but she turned down a chance to join the smashhit show, "Charlie’s Angels” because she didn’t want her daughter, Lisa, to see her cavorting around the small screem In a little figure-hugging bikini. Then came the day when Presley heard that the “Dallas” producers were looking for a fresh character to spruce up the love life of the Bobby Ewing character. When she expressed an interest in the role there was no mad rush to sign her up. The executive producer, Philip Capice, wouldn’t even give her an interview, for the legitimate reason that she hadn’t had much acting experience. So the resourceful Presley, with five years of lessons under her belt, put together a video tape and sent it to Mr Capice. Said Presley, “He realised then that I could act, called me in for a test, and I landed the part of Jenna Wade. It could have been made for me; Jenna had lost her husband and had a 13-year-old daughter to look after, just like me.”

Presley’s role had been offered first to Morgan Fairchild, who rejected it because she said it was too small. With Presley, the part grew. ACTING SUCCESS

That • was in 1983. Presley’s inital contract .was. for a year, but that was extended by another two years. Presley had made it, on merit as an actress and not because of the famous name. She had often seriously thought of changing to a stage name to overcome what she thought was a big obstacle to her career.

“It is hard for any man really to know who we are. I know I change all the time. But I think men are much more honest and direct than women. Perhaps that is why I have more men than women as friends. Women are inclined to play games. “From the time they are little girls they realise they can do that: charm their way, manipulate, be Daddy’s little girl. That’s why it takes girls longer to grow up, why women tend to feel more secure as they grow older. “All of a sudden you don’t want to play games. You want to take people, and have them take you, at face value; That’s where I am now; no more games.” With her book, her "Dallas,” stardom, her marriage to Grimaldi and the expected baby, Presley hopes she is finally getting out from under the giant shadow of her former husband. “It’s time,” she said. “It really is time.’” ■ Copyright, DUO, 1987.