ELVIS AND THE BEAUTY QUEEN

US, 1981, 120 minutes, Colour.
Stephanie Zimbalist, Don Johnson, Ann Dusenberry, Rick Lenz, Ann Wedgeworth.
Directed by Gus Trikonis.

Elvis and the Beauty Queen is a telemovie capitalising on the continued interest in Elvis Presley and his mystique. This film was made only a couple of years after his death and highlights the popularity of the person, his songs and the details of his life. John Carpenter made a more elaborate telemovie on Elvis, with Kurt Russell as the star.

Don Johnson gives a reasonable performance as Presley. Stephanie Zimbalist is good as the beauty queen. The film focuses on Elvis at the time of his divorce from Priscilla Presley and his relationship with Linda Thompson, Miss Tennessee. It also focuses on his decline and his growing reliance on drugs.

The film is average of its kind - but indicative of the Presley industry.


1. The impact of Elvis Presley on the music world? On the American public over several generations? The interest in Elvis after his death? His untimely death?

2. The film as telemovie - popular entertainment, mini-series and popular styles in terms of situations, characterisation, issues? For the popular home audience?

3. Audience interest in Presley? fact and legend? An exploitation? The blend of fact and fiction?

4. Don Johnson's performance as Elvis - presence, image, singing style? Audience knowledge of Elvis' past, of his career? Elvis as a person? His image, abilities? The songs chosen for the film? His decline? Relationship with his wife, the divorce? Relationship with women? His entourage? The influence of his mother? Presence of his father? Bodyguards? His idiosyncratic lifestyle - Tennessee boy, fans, watching martial arts films? Las Vegas life? Illness, drugs? The attention of women? Fidelity and infidelity? His relationship with Linda Thompson, love?

5. Linda as the beauty queen, the Tennessee background, proper, Southern Baptist? The values of her mother and father, her friends? The glamour of the beauty quest? Discussions about virginity, sex, Elvis? The relationship between experience and talk? The glamour of Elvis? Her family knowing him and going to school with him? A reaction against her parents and their values, especially her mother seeing her as her little girl? Interest in Elvis, going to the film? Elvis' attention to her, the phone calls, the reaction of her girlfriends? Her going out, taking a stance? Proper? The invitation to go to Las Vegas - his not meeting her at the airport, her reaction to the casinos? Her friendship with the bodyguards? With David Briggs? The parties, the drinking? Her reaction against her mother? The beginning of the relationship, the beginning of an affair? Five years of companionship for Elvis? The pace, the songs, her enjoyment of life on the road, of performances? The strain, his reliance on drugs and her reaction against this? Rehearsals? Collapse, hospital? Her reaction against other women e.g. the nurse in the hospital? The growing tension?

6. Elvis and his entourage, his relationship with his father, his father's presence, David and his musical arrangements, friendship, clash, the various guards and his friendliness with them, his reliance on them, their protection of him, their helplessness with his changing way of life, drugs?

7. The portrait of the friends - Jeannie and her support of Linda, her being more outgoing, her understanding Linda, the support over the years?

8. The sketch of Linda's family - their proper behaviour, codes of conduct, religion? Baptist religious people? Her mother's reaction to her liaison with Elvis? The family trying to support her? Elvis adapting to their visit - and singing 'Amazing Grace'?

9. The use of music throughout the film? Don Johnson's impersonation of Elvis's performance? The use of popular songs to illustrate themes of the plot - e.g. 'The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face' with Elvis singing it to Linda, 'Amazing Grace' for Linda's mother, 'Find Another Lover' as the affair collapsed?

10. An interesting film - in plot? As a portrait of Elvis? As another presentation of American values and the American dream?