Forever Young, Always Beautiful (E.P)

Chapter 3 - The Big Time: The World Stage

On January 10, 1956, Elvis made his first recordings for RCA. He’d been signed to RCA several months previously, and was so excited and nervous about the prospect of becoming a big star all over the country. I was allowed to travel to Nashville for the recording session, but parents wanted a phone call every night. We both sat in the back seat; this was an unusual thing for two kids who were used to sitting up front in a car. As we drove along, Elvis’ leg shook rapidly; it was almost like all the nerves in his body were building up in that one limb. I rested my hand on his leg and he looked down at me. “I’m so nervous, Annie.” He whispered, taking told of my hand. I shook my head at him. “There’s nothing to be nervous about, Elvis. You’ve done this plenty of times before.” “But not for a big record label like RCA. What if I mess up? What if they realise I’m no good?” He sounded like a little boy, so scared and unsure. It broke my heart; he was my best friend and I feared he wouldn’t even make it into the hotel, let alone the recording studio.

Eventually, after stopping by our hotel and unpacking a bit, we got to the studio. I watched from the control room as Elvis was told what was going to happen. He nodded, his face a picture of calm. However, I knew better than to believe his face. Elvis was a good actor, but he couldn’t fool me. I looked at his hands and sighed; they were clutching the guitar attached to him so tightly, his knuckles were white. I watched for 2 hours as Elvis slowly overcame his nerves and slipped back into his routine in the studio. Eventually, I was let into the main studio with him. “Mr Presley tells us you take good photos.” Stephen H. Sholes, the producer, said to me in passing, as he led me into the studio. I shrugged, looking down at my camera. “I take some okay photos.” I replied. “You mind taking some now? They’ll be good for his fan club packs and you’ll be well paid, even once you get your half…” Stephen asked. I looked up at him, stunned. “Why’d you look so shocked?” He asked. “I’ve never been paid to take photos of Elvis. And I don’t expect to be. Who said I’d be paid?” I demanded. “Oh, the Colonel just said…” I was mortified and furious. Colonel Tom Parker, or the Colonel to his friends and business associates, was Elvis’ new manager. I hadn’t had an opinion on the man up until that moment. The photos I took of Elvis were for pleasure, not for profit. I was so angry that he would try and make my hobby another moneymaking machine. Elvis was already making him enough; why did he need my photos too? Once I was left alone with Elvis, I immediately told him. He sighed, scratching the back of his head. “Gee, Annie, I didn’t know about that. I just mentioned that you liked to take photos. I showed him a few but I didn’t think for a minute he’d do that. I’ll talk to him, okay?” Now, Elvis wasn’t one to be pushed around, but he couldn’t speak his mind with the Colonel. At only 21 years old, he had yet to find the courage to stand up for himself when it came to Colonel Tom Parker. But I nodded and went along with it all anyway, starting to snap pictures of Elvis as he went back to work.

In the following months, Elvis went from local celebrity, to national celebrity. And soon, Hollywood came knocking. He was so excited at the prospect of being a big time movie actor, just like his heroes James Dean and Marlon Brando. One of our favourite past times when we were at home in Memphis was to go see all our favourite movies. We’d wait until late at night or even the early hours of the morning and sit in the empty theatre, just the two of us, and stare up at the giant screen. And, pretty soon, it seemed it was going to be Elvis’ face on that very screen.

When we first read through the script for the movie that became known as Love Me Tender, we were both extremely excited. Elvis couldn’t believe that this was all happening to him, and I was so thankful that he was taking me along for the ride. I stayed on the set with him for little over a month, taking photos as I went and making friends with all the actors Elvis was blessed to work with on his first motion picture. But then a telegram arrived which shattered our happiness: my parents wanted me home. Immediately. Elvis was as devastated as I was. “Why do they want you home? They don’t need you there! Annie, they practically ignore you, you said so yourself! You’re having fun here, aren’t you?” I nodded, avoiding eye contact with him; he hated to see anyone cry. “Of course I am. I love sitting with the boys, watching you do your thing, taking photos of you… They’re doing this on purpose. They’re doing this because I said no to Joey.” Joey Black was my first real boyfriend. He was the son of my father’s best friend and my parents adored him. I liked him enough to go steady with him, but only because I couldn’t imagine anything better coming along… And Elvis encouraged me to date him. But, just two days before I was due to leave with Elvis for the filming of the movie, Joey had asked me to marry him. I told him no. My parents didn’t find out until I’d been gone a week; they were furious and disappointed, all their dreams for me shattered. They later told me they were convinced I’d done it because of Elvis; they thought we were doing things behind everyone’s backs. But it wasn’t and we weren’t. When the question left Joey’s lips, a light bulb went off over my head. It occurred to me, there and then, that marriage wasn’t for me. Not at that point, maybe not ever. Since I’d been taking more and more photos of Elvis, and getting paid for them, I’d been toying with the idea of going professional. Elvis loved the idea, as long as he was my priority, as far as photographs went anyway. I just laughed and accused him of being an envious jackass. So, after my time in Hollywood, I went home. That’s when things began to spiral.