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♪ MTV ♪
All right. Hold it, fellas, while we do this.
Just a moment. - Standing by.
All right, places everyone, please.
Don't roll tape yet, please.
Quiet, please. [shushing]
You wanna get the slate here?
Roll.
All right, here we go.
♪ ♪
[acoustic rock music]
♪ ♪
Welcome to NBC
and "The Elvis Presley Special."
[applause]
♪ ♪
I've got an audience now that we put together.
I've got my whole camera crew ready to go.
We're getting ready to roll tape.
We have Bob Finkel, our executive producer,
going to do a warm up for the audience.
Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Elvis Presley.
[cheers and applause]
And then, next thing I know, he's announcing Elvis,
and there's no Elvis. [chuckles]
[buzzing]
My stage manager called me and said,
"Uh-oh. We're in trouble, Steve.
You've gotta go see Elvis in the makeup room."
Elvis asked everybody in the makeup room to leave
'cause he has something really important
he wants to talk to me about.
He looks at me and he said, "Steve, I hate to do this,
but I'm not going out there. I can't."
And I said, "What are you talking about?"
He said "My mind is a blank.
I can't go out there. I'll embarrass myself."
I was stunned.
Elvis and I had been working so closely together.
By the late 1960s, he had become irrelevant.
I was hired to direct and produce
a TV special that would help resurrect
his once great career.
Along the way, we had a few obstacles to overcome.
Most created by Elvis's notorious manager,
Colonel Tom Parker.
Now, everything we were working so hard to achieve
felt like it was about to fall apart.
I said, "Elvis, I haven't asked you
to do anything that you didn't wanna do on this special.
I'm not asking you this time.
I'm telling you, you have got to go out there."
I turned my back on him, I walked out,
and I went to the control room,
freaking out, saying, "He's not going to come."
♪ ♪
[upbeat rock music]
♪ ♪
[tense music]
♪ ♪
I think all artists go through a real period of insecurity
when they're asked to perform in front of audiences.
I certainly feel that as a director.
Every time I went in to direct anything, I was wondering,
am I a fraud?
It's just human nature.
This was having Elvis walk out there cold
after not performing for years in front of a live audience.
He was scared to death.
And walked up to the control room
not knowing if he was going to actually come out.
And then, one of my cameramen said,
"Steve, look at camera four."
[cheers and applause]
All right. All righty.
[strumming guitar]
[applause continues]
Here's Elvis.
Here we go, buddy.
Come look at this.
[band laughs] - OK.
Well, good night.
[laughter]
And then, it was that old vaudeville thing
of get the hook.
I couldn't get him off the stage.
♪ ♪
♪ You got me peepin' you got me hiding ♪
♪ You got me peep, hide, hide, peep ♪
♪ Any way you wanna roll ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ You got me doin' what you ♪
♪ Baby, what do you want me to do? ♪
♪ ♪
♪ We're goin' up, ahh, ahh ♪
♪ We're goin' down ♪
♪ We're goin' up, down, down, up ♪
♪ Any way you wanna let it roll ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ You got me doin' what you want me ♪
♪ Baby, what do you want me to do? ♪
♪ ♪
I think he knew that this special was going to be
his make or break special.
Aw, yeah!
♪ ♪
- All right! - Yeah!
To see Elvis come out in a leather suit
looking cooler than anybody's ever looked, right,
and singing with such passion,
it's so cool to see,
especially in the context of where he was
in his career at the time.
You have Elvis performing in a way
that you hadn't seen him perform in a decade.
As soon as he starts singing, he's just,
right back in the groove.
And it's a killer performance.
You could see his antenna go on--ding--
and he was just there.
And after that, he never looked back.
♪ ♪
[vocalizing]
For many reasons, I was really excited
about this sequence.
It wasn't easy to get Elvis or the Colonel
to agree to even do it.
In fact, nothing about this production was easy.
♪ Yeah, yeah, yeah ♪
♪ You got me doin' what you what you want me ♪
♪ Baby, what do you want me to do? ♪
♪ You got me doing what you want me ♪
♪ Baby, what do you want me to do? ♪
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause] - You got it!
[Donvan's "Season of the Witch"]
♪ ♪
♪ When I look out my window ♪
♪ Many sights to see ♪
♪ And when I look in my window ♪
♪ So many different people to be ♪
In the 1960s, the bigotry in the South is heinous,
the politicians are heinous.
All through the Southern zone,
it's still colored-only restrooms, water fountains,
but also, the seeds of the Civil Rights Movement
in the air.
And then, cities on fire.
Riots going on,
Vietnam with napalm and chemicals,
wounded soldiers,
protesting in the streets.
That became the beginning of this great divide,
and that divide kept growing.
It really tore the country apart.
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Must be the season of the witch ♪
♪ ♪
When you look at the Elvis movies of that time
and contrast that with what's going on in the real world,
it's almost as if Elvis is living in a parallel universe.
[crowd screaming]
And then The Beatles came along
just at the time the movies were so dreadful,
and all of a sudden, Elvis looked old hat.
What do you think of the comment that you're nothing,
but a bunch of British Elvis Presleys?
It's not true! It's not true!
[laughter] - Oh!
Part of what's bittersweet about Elvis in the late '60s
is that in a certain sense, he's--
everyone knows who he is
and everyone regards him as a godfather
of this rock and roll thing that's happening,
but at the same time, he's a little bit
on the outside looking in.
And so Elvis is trying to figure out,
like, how do I relate to this thing that's happening?
If The Beatles are the new thing,
does that mean I'm the old thing?
I think, on some level, he had to have felt threatened
because The Beatles put out a movie,
and it's called "The Citizen Kane of jukebox musicals."
No one was saying that about any of the Elvis movies.
And now, the Spinal Twist.
[mystical music]
The Spinal Twist!
♪ ♪
Now, back to the Lotus.
Can we go someplace and talk?
Sure, come on.
And you think of not just The Beatles,
but all the other acts that came in their wake--
the British Invasion, and Dylan,
and the later groups in the '60s.
Elvis was a music fan, and we know he had records
by a lot of those artists.
He was listening to that stuff.
And I think as the decade went on,
he could see the music industry passing him by.
[tense rock music]
♪ ♪
Singer presents "Elvis,"
starring Elvis Presley in his first TV special.
His first personal performance on TV in nearly 10 years.
There were a lot of factors that came together
in having the special happen.
It began when Elvis's manager, Colonel Parker,
is trying to cut another movie deal.
And he liked to get his million dollar deal,
and he couldn't get one because no one wanted
to put up a million dollars for an Elvis movie--
not anymore.
Finally, he gets a deal with NBC
where they will put up the money
for a movie and a TV special.
So that's why we have the special
because his film career had gone so far below the water
that Parker realized, we need something
so I can save face and get my million dollar deal.
♪ ♪
Welcome to NBC, and "The Elvis Presley Special."
[cheers and applause]
You can do better than that.
I'm gonna say it all over again.
I wanna really hear something.
Anybody have to go to the bathroom?
[laughter]
Welcome to NBC, and "The Elvis Presley Special!"
[louder cheers and applause]
My father was Bob Finkel,
and he was reaching the pinnacle of his career
as a musical variety special producer.
His style was very hands-on.
He was a classy guy, he was smart, and he was innovative.
Tom Sarnoff, who was the head of NBC at the time,
called in my dad and said, "I wanna do this show,
and I want you to do it."
My father said, "I can't direct this and produce it,
"but I'll come on as executive producer,
and let me find somebody."
And he had been noticing the career of kind of
a young guy in town.
His name was Steve Binder.
♪ ♪
I'm in my office, and the telephone rings.
It's Bob Finkel.
And he said, "Look, Steve, we may be doing
"an Elvis Presley special, and I would like you
to produce it and direct it."
I was not a fan of Elvis Presley.
To tell you the truth, I was a West Coast guy.
I was into The Beach Boys, Jan and Dean,
and The Fifth Dimension, all those West Coast acts.
But what really sold me
was meeting Elvis Presley in person.
♪ ♪
The first time that Elvis and I met was at my office.
And the first question out of Elvis's mouth is,
"Steve, what do you think of my career?"
And I said, "Truthfully, I think it's in the toilet."
[laughs]
And there was this moment.
Elvis just stared at me.
I couldn't tell if he was hurt, angry
or how he was going to respond.
Then Elvis burst out laughing.
And he said, "Finally, somebody's
talking truth to me."
♪ ♪
[explosion booms]
The 1950s was the advent of the nuclear age,
and it became a mad race for nuclear supremacy.
The Cold War dug in quickly.
And this battle between the United States and the USSR
provided a consensus here at home.
You might have different views on different issues,
but we all hated Russia together.
♪ ♪
There was a new consciousness of a generation in the 1950s.
There's gotta be more to life than just
wanting to have bigger bombs than the Russians.
♪ Now, the bellhop's tears keep flowin' ♪
♪ And the desk clerk's dressed in black ♪
♪ Well, they've been so long on Lonely Street ♪
♪ They'll never, never look back ♪
♪ And they're so lonely, baby ♪
♪ Well, they're so lonely ♪
♪ They're so lonely, they pray to die ♪
[audience screams]
♪ ♪
I see him as somebody who was a pioneer
and smashing up some of the conformity
of the Eisenhower '50s.
There was something about him,
an aura, that he created,
and it made him one of the revolutionary figures
of Cold War America.
♪ If your baby leaves you and you've got to tale to tell ♪
♪ Well, just take a walk down Lonely Street ♪
♪ To Heartbreak Hotel ♪
♪ Where you'll be so lonely, baby ♪
♪ Well, you'll be lonely ♪
♪ You'll be so lonely you could die ♪
♪ Well ♪
[cheers and applause]
[upbeat rock music]
♪ ♪
No artist ever exploded on the national scene
with the volcanic impact of Elvis Presley.
I always say to people who weren't alive
when this happened in 1956,
you cannot imagine the way the world changed.
Changed the way we think, the way we felt,
changed the youth culture.
It brought about the whole focus
on teenagers who had music and films
to separate themselves from their parents.
It was as if we went from black and white to Technicolor.
♪ ♪
That's where I actually got my--
my style of singing from, was rhythm and blues
and gospel mixed with country and Western.
He had all these influences.
We know he drew on R and gospel and country,
but he fused them into something else in a way
that no one had done before.
He was innovative.
Part of what made that Elvis explosion so influential
is that moment of fusion.
That detonation, that sense of a Big Bang
of things coming together.
♪ ♪
He's a spark that creates this explosion.
[audience screaming]
There's a part of Elvis that gets on stage
and people go absolutely crazy.
That kind of frenzy is something that nowadays,
you see in hip-hop.
The idea that there's gonna be someone who emerges
from youth culture, who captures
everyone's imagination, whom parents hate.
Elvis was emerging in mainstream celebrity culture.
He was an outlaw hitting the stages.
And yet, nobody knew what to do with him because
he was so likable and so lovable.
♪ ♪
Not everybody loved Elvis Presley
when he first came on the scene.
Some people thought he really was a threat
to the National Security.
When he played Louisville in November of 1956,
the police filmed the show for the FBI.
When he played Jacksonville, Florida,
Judge Marion Gooding sat in the audience
just daring him to be lascivious.
The PGA, the YMCA, or somebody, they thought I was--
[chuckles]--something. [laughter]
And they said, "Man, he's gotta be crazy."
So, they--
the police came out, and they filmed the show.
So I couldn't move, I had to stand still.
The only thing I moved was my little finger like that.
♪ You ain't nothin' but a hound dog ♪
♪ Cryin' all the time ♪
You know, for the whole show. [laughter]
♪ ♪
People don't realize that
for a white person to be singing songs
that were African-American compositions
that came deep from Black culture,
Elvis was seen as betraying the white race
to a lot of bigots in the South.
You could burn his records,
you can hang them in effigy,
you could flip him off,
you could say he's a communist, say he's a radical,
but you still had Elvis.
He was a kind of prince of that particular moment
in American life.
♪ ♪
Elvis matters because he's the king of rock and roll.
I think the reason Elvis matters,
there are two sides to this.
One, there's just Elvis the performer
and the great music he did.
But in a sense, now, maybe even the greater legacy
is the influence he had
because he inspired so many people
that went on to do music that inspire
the next generation and so on.
♪ Well, since my baby left ♪
♪ I found a new place to dwell ♪
♪ It's down at the end of Lonely Street ♪
♪ It's Heartbreak Hotel ♪
♪ And I'll be, I'll be so lonely, baby ♪
♪ I'll be so lonely, yeah ♪
♪ I'll be so lonely, I could die ♪
For me, it was the music and his voice.
It's just absolutely amazing.
When he opened his mouth to sing, you know,
all you could say was, "That's Elvis."
He was original.
I mean, he's one of those artists
that 100 years from now,
they're still gonna be talking about Elvis.
He's influenced everybody.
I mean, I'm talking about rappers,
I'm talking about country singers,
I'm talking about everybody.
I mean, we're all influenced by Elvis.
We might not know it, but we are.
[upbeat Latin music]
I'm from Dominican Republic,
and I'm supposed to be listening to salsa,
bachata, merengue, like--
[vocalizing]
Then, here you go, I'm introduced to Elvis.
[singing in Spanish]
♪ ♪
What made Elvis' sound unique is, it was like,
this is how I see it.
I think he was Dominican in the other life
because the way he moved while he was playing his songs
and that African feel, that's what really resonated to me.
With the soul and the spirit of what Elvis used to do,
it's like he created something that never existed.
Elvis's music, I felt it.
I didn't see it. I felt it.
And that's what I apply in my music at all times.
When I'm creating, when I'm songwriting,
when I'm producing, I make sure that my heart is there, first.
♪ Well, it's one for the money ♪
♪ Two for show ♪
♪ Three to get ready now, go, cat, go ♪
♪ But don't you step on my blue suede shoes ♪
♪ Well, you can do anything but lay off my blue suede shoes ♪
Most people's idea of Elvis is the caricature of Elvis.
Right, they know the jumpsuit, they know the sideburns.
They don't necessarily know how, I think, great
Elvis was as a performer and as a singer.
Because I've obviously borrowed a lot from Elvis.
I've studied him my whole life, and there's
a lot that I just kind of instinctually now,
you know, I kinda go back to some of those Elvis-isms,
you know, and try to steal some of that.
'Cause it's great. It was him feeling the music,
and that's how I approach it.
I mean, always, my goal is to feel music like Elvis did.
♪ Yeah, blue, blue, the blue suede shoes ♪
♪ Blue, blue, the blue suede shoes ♪
♪ Well, you can do anything, but lay off ♪
♪ Of my blue suede shoes ♪
Oh!
[song ends]
Whoo!
♪ ♪
The sensational adventure
of the notorious Reno Brothers
and the girl they fought over.
Starring Richard Egan as Vance Reno,
Debra Paget as Cathy,
and introducing Elvis Presley as Clint Reno.
Elvis did four movies before going in the Army.
The first one, he's really more of a secondary player.
He's not even the lead.
The other three, is a lead character.
And they always made him a singer in those.
His character was a singer, I mean, a performer.
So they weren't really trying to push him too much
and have him do something else outside of that.
As far as favorite Elvis movies,
I'm always kind of tied between "Jailhouse Rock"
and "King Creole."
Here we go.
You'll be great tonight.
I heard you rehearsing before.
What kind of songs are they you're singing?
Folk songs?
I guess so.
That's what I thought.
What planet?
Just laugh it up, kid.
No offense. [chuckles]
[chuckles]
"King Creole," it's a fun movie, but it's also dark.
And that was Elvis's favorite movie because he was
able to act in that one.
Listen, Mr. Evans, we moved into this neighborhood
three years ago.
In the three years that I've been going to school here,
I've shined shoes and dusted people off in a barber shop.
I've done towel duty in four different men's rooms.
I've stacked chairs and bottles and swept the floor up
of every joint on Bourbon Street.
It's gotten so I look longer at a dame
with clothes on than one without.
I'm not a hoodlum, but I am a hustler.
[militaristic music]
♪ ♪
His lucrative career as rock and roll king
interrupted for a while.
Elvis Presley begins his military service
at Fort Chaffee, Arkansas.
Yeah, hurl it-- oh, wait a minute.
Everybody ready?
Rock and roll music, if you like it and if you feel it,
you can't help, but move to it.
That's what happens to me, I--
I can't help it.
There's quite a group of people who don't sort of
approve of the thing you do.
They seem to think that it contributes
to juvenile delinquency and all sorts of things.
I've tried to figure it out.
I don't see how they can think that it would contribute
to juvenile delinquency
if someone saw me singing and dancing.
I don't--I don't see that.
I think it was important for Colonel Parker
to get Elvis drafted-- and he did,
he negotiated the whole thing--
for a couple of reasons.
One, Elvis was still being seen as kind of
a dangerous hooligan by one segment of society.
And the Colonel had plans for him
to assimilate, to be an establishment figure
when he came back from the service.
Do you feel that rock and roll,
the popularity of rock and roll,
will diminish in any way while you're in the Army?
That's hard to tell.
The only thing I can say is I hope not.
Oh, there's no question, Elvis Presley going
into the military hurt his musical career,
but it helped his public persona
because Elvis was seen as a good boy.
It sent a larger message that Elvis loved America.
And it seemed like Uncle Sam
was saving Elvis from debauchery,
but it robbed us of great years of Elvis.
Oh, Waihila, I think I'm scared.
He's been gone for two years.
What if he's changed?
Just be patient with him.
Some boys need time to get adjusted to being back home.
[playful music]
♪ ♪
Some of 'em get the hang of it right away.
♪ ♪
Elvis' going into the Army basically ended
his career as an innovator.
He never lost his talents,
but he wasn't doing anything innovative.
And it wasn't taking rock to the next level,
the next stage.
He became, you know, just more of an entertainer,
which is fine if you're happy doing that.
Except, he wasn't happy doing that.
♪ ♪
Elvis made the series of movies throughout the '60s,
and they just kinda went downhill.
Now, wait a minute. Wait a minute.
There's something wrong with my lip.
[laughter]
[laughs] You remember that, don't you?
[laughter]
[applause]
I've got news for you, baby.
I did 29 pictures like that, man.
There got to be a sort of template for what we think of
as the Elvis movie.
Basically, you had Elvis as an individual character who
very much stands on his own.
And he's in some kind of rugged, manly profession...
As the explosive ordnance disposal man.
For the last three days, I've been a full-fledged employee
of the Hawaiian Tourist Guide Service.
I'll fill in for El Trovador
if you give me a job as a lifeguard.
Thanks, Sam. I'm still a fisherman.
You're a good pilot.
Now you're a roustabout.
Is that good?
And, you know, a bit of a tough guy.
You better move.
Why don't you move me?
[percussive rock music]
♪ ♪
He was always very much an individual
and needing to make his own way.
And there's a young woman who he's interested in
who, in some of these, they're sort of
confrontational at the beginning,
but he wins her over at the end by doing it his way.
♪ ♪
Did you ever?
[romantic music]
And somehow, he's a singer on top of that, too.
That's where it gets a little crazy.
A race car driver and a singer.
And the Navy frogmen, oh, and he's a singer.
And a cowboy and, you know, he's a singer.
They're just silly, and the scripts aren't good.
[dogs barking] - Behave yourself!
[barks]
Ahh!
You don't eat out much, do you?
Good afternoon. This is The Barrow Gang.
Now, if everybody would just take it easy,
nobody will get hurt.
Well, 1967, it was one of
the high water marks in Hollywood history,
when you were bringing this sort of
gritty social realism into play.
What we've got here is
failure to communicate.
With movies like "Cool Hand Luke"
with, you know, Paul Newman,
or Sidney Poitier, you know,
"Guess Who's Coming to Dinner,"
you're dealing with race relations in an intense way.
In "The Graduate," you're bringing in
a youth culture story.
These are movies dealing with societal issues
that are complex.
♪ ♪
There's still something wrong.
I mean, Elvis Presley's movies of the 1960s,
they were brainless.
That bugs you, doesn't it?
It's just good business.
A single girl sells more tickets.
- I'll keep it. - Where?
It's just, he was a much greater artist than that.
It's a good thing you weren't wearing a charm bracelet.
The pity, the reason people laugh or mock Elvis's films
is that we all know he was better than the movie.
Would you like me any better if I hated money,
grew a beard, and stood on my head?
Any change would be an improvement.
[exhales]
[dark tone]
By 1968, Elvis needed a comeback for many reasons.
One, to regain his footing in the marketplace,
but also to save his own soul.
♪ ♪
I had three meetings with Colonel Parker,
and Colonel Parker was an enigma.
He could be charming and kind
or he could be harsh and dismissive and humiliating,
often within the scope of a very short period of time.
His personal motto was, "you either con or you get conned."
So as long as you kissed the ring,
you got along well with him, but if you challenged him
or questioned him, look out.
♪ ♪
I've learned that nothing in Elvis' world is too bizarre.
Colonel Tom Parker was not
from Huntington, West Virginia.
He wasn't a Colonel. His name wasn't Tom or Parker.
He was born Andreas Cornelis van Kuijk in Holland in 1909.
Then in 1929, he left under mysterious circumstances.
He just left in the dead of night.
He didn't take his clothes.
No money, no identifying papers.
He left all of it behind.
He cut off all contacts with his family.
We do know from a very reliable researcher
that he had a police file.
He has been implicated in a murder.
A murder of a woman who was the wife of the greengrocer.
This was a shop that was on the street
where his mother lived and that he frequented.
We don't know for sure that he killed this woman,
but we can say he lived his life as someone on the lam.
There's almost no paper trail for him,
not even a marriage license.
He never became a U.S. citizen.
This is a guy who had something to hide,
and he disappeared in the very window of time
that this woman was killed.
He also had a peculiar quirk.
He would take bets about how much pepper he can eat.
He would pour spoonfuls of pepper into his hand
and then he would eat it all.
And they would take bets on how many spoonfuls
he could ingest before he just couldn't do it anymore.
Now, that may just be some kind of parlor trick
for the Colonel, but I do find it interesting
that the woman who was killed in Holland,
whoever killed her--
and I do think that she was killed in an act of rage
rather than a premeditated situation
because she was beaten to literally, a pulp--
whoever did that had presence of mind
before he left to sprinkle pepper around the apartment.
Why pepper?
Because, perhaps, the Holland Police Department
used dogs in 1929 who might have picked up a scent.
Now, who would have known to do that?
Maybe, somebody who trained animals, right?
Guess what Colonel Parker was doing
when he wasn't loading big rounds of cheese onto ships?
He trained animals.
So there's no real proof, hard proof,
that he killed that woman,
but there's a lot of circumstantial evidence.
There were other suspects.
He was never actually named, except implicated
by a family member many, many years later.
Something awful had to have happened over there.
Something he could not fix, and he could fix anything.
[upbeat acoustic guitar music]
♪ ♪
In the beginning, Elvis was very dependent on the Colonel,
and it was Parker who turned him
into a national phenomenon.
That much is true.
I've always thought of Parker as a great promoter,
but not necessarily the best manager.
The Colonel turned Elvis into the first
really branded artist.
The first artist that had, you know,
it was Elvis' name and face was printed on everything,
and you never had that before.
The Colonel was really a pioneer in that.
I saw the reaction this boy received from the people,
and I knew I could help him.
- Well, what has been your-- - I think my experience
and, in a small way, handling his future
with making contracts where, perhaps,
someone would offer a certain amount of the money
and I thought this artist was worth more,
and I held out for my price.
Colonel Parker prided himself on getting
the best deal for his client,
but he didn't have a lot of vision.
And he didn't seem to know how to develop Elvis's talent.
It's kind of like, once he had a good thing,
he was just gonna keep working it.
He has a tremendous amount of personality.
They admire him. They like his singing.
I don't have the answer, why, and I don't think
I wanna find out because business is good.
Elvis knew that the Colonel jump-started his career,
and he knew that he wouldn't have gotten to
where he ended up without the Colonel.
And I think Elvis was loyal to that.
The Colonel knew that he was loyal to that.
I think the Colonel may have taken advantage of that
and knew how to push Elvis's buttons.
In a lot of ways, Elvis was trapped by his dependency
on Colonel Parker.
He was forever stuck because he didn't
have the emotional backbone to buck him.
You know, in the beginning, the Colonel and Elvis
had a pretty good relationship.
Elvis considered him a father figure.
And he needed a strong father figure
because his own father was weak.
Elvis really thought, the Colonel could
lift them out of poverty.
Vernon, his father, said, "Don't screw this up.
Us Presley's have been poor forever."
And so, Elvis did what he was told to do.
But if somebody else actually bucked
the Colonel for him, like Steve Binder,
he was very happy about it.
I got a phone call from Bob Finkel
saying, "OK, it's time for you to meet Colonel Parker."
First thing the Colonel does, he shakes my hand
and hands me a little box with Elvis' picture
on the front cover, and inside is
this 1/4 inch tape of him singing
about 20 Christmas songs.
He tells me, "This is our gift to disk jockeys
"all through the United States,
and this is what Tom Sarnoff and I want you to do."
The Colonel wasn't interested in doing
anything imaginative in a Christmas special at all.
He just wanted your typical Christmas special
like you could have seen from anyone else at that era--
You know, with Andy Williams or Perry Como--
nice and comfortable.
And Steve thought to do a show like that would
be squandering Elvis' talent.
If you have a performer like Elvis,
don't you want to do something better with him
than put him in a fuzzy sweater
and sing the Christmas songs?
From the first minute of meeting Parker, in my head,
I'm saying, "I'm not doing this."
After that meeting, I go back to my office
and my secretary says, "There's a message
for you from Bob Finkel."
I called Finkel up at NBC and Finkel says,
"I don't know what you did to charm him,
"but the Colonel loves you.
"He's approving you.
"Elvis will be at your office tomorrow
at 4:30 in the afternoon."
The first thing he told me was
he didn't wanna do television.
It wasn't his turf.
And I said, "Elvis, what's your turf?"
He said, "My turf is making records."
And I said, "Great, then you make a record
and I'll put pictures to it."
That's the very line that made him feel comfortable,
aside from seeing our offices with all
the gold records on the walls.
At the time, I had partnered up with a very
talented, successful record producer named Bones Howe.
So Elvis felt comfortable that he was in hands with people
who spoke his language.
Years later, Priscilla Presley said to me,
"You know, Steve, I don't know if you ever knew this,
"but when Elvis came home from your first meeting with him,
"he told me, 'You know, I had this meeting
"'with this young guy, Binder,
"'and I don't care what the Colonel says,
"'I'm gonna go with Binder.
I'm gonna do whatever he asked me to do.'"
It was really, the first time that Elvis had an ally.
Somebody who really understood him
and could move mountains to help him achieve
what he wanted artistically.
And who had the cojones to face the Colonel.
Elvis could not do that.
And so the Colonel was greatly threatened by Steve Binder,
who not only had Elvis's trust,
but knew how to take him in new creative ways of thinking
that would rejuvenate him.
But then, of course, that meant that the Colonel
would lose control, and the Colonel
could not take that risk.
♪ ♪
Well, Steve Binder had a long career in television.
He knew music and he knew entertainment.
He had his own way of doing things.
He'd established himself, and because the work was good,
he was allowed to do things the way he saw fit.
Steve was one of those directors that cared.
A lot of directors, they're on a clock.
They just want you to do your thing.
And if they don't hate it, they just flip you off
and move on, you know?
Whereas, Steve did not do that.
I watched him. He was very patient.
He would talk to the talent.
I was impressed by Steve.
Steve had such a way of communicating calmness
and confidence.
In whatever you were doing,
you felt that it was gonna be good.
He never yelled at people.
He just did his job so beautifully.
Oh, yes.
There are so many things I like in this big, huge world.
I like blue oceans and dark green woods,
crashing waves and swaying branches.
I like orange and red lollipops
and spinning carousels,
wooden horses and puppy dogs.
I like milk white clouds and falling rain,
babbling brooks and baseball games.
I like to run and jump, laugh and cry.
I like the sky above, the Earth below, and God.
I wonder why some people don't like me?
♪ ♪
Three gentlemen approached me
about producing and directing a one-hour Freedom Spectacular
celebrating the integration
of white schools with Black students.
I would have total creative free hand to do anything
I wanna do for an hour.
And the vision these guys had was to project them
not on television, not in theaters,
but in arenas all across the country
to raise money for the NAACP.
Up to this point, the Freedom Spectacular
was the biggest production of my career.
One of the producers of the Spectacular, Bill Sargent,
hired me to direct his next production,
the first rock and roll feature film,
which came to be known as the "T.A.M.I. Show."
[upbeat rock music]
♪ ♪
It was an incredible opportunity
for me to experiment
and also to direct some of the top rock and roll
talent of the day.
[cheering]
It was historical.
♪ ♪
[percussive music playing]
♪ Feel that beat coming strong ♪
♪ Feel the beat wanna tap along ♪
♪ Jump for joy ♪
♪ We're telling you, it's Hullabaloo ♪
I went to New York to direct a show
called "Hullabaloo" for NBC.
It was one of the first prime time
rock and roll shows on network television.
It was kind of the opening of my idea of saying,
I would really like to specialize
in specials so the word means something
and it just isn't a gimmick.
I want to take one artist at a time
and create a show for them that nobody else could do.
It would be built around their music
and their personal experiences.
The first one was Leslie Uggams,
who was on Broadway at the time while I was doing
"Hullabaloo," starring in a Broadway hit
called "Hallelujah, Baby!"
When I started directing in television,
there was a real segregation
in media in general, even films.
There were stories of Southern theater owners
cutting out Black artists.
I didn't intentionally set out to make
any noise in terms of wanting to integrate my casts.
It all seemed to just, happen organically.
[lavish music]
♪ ♪
I'm making this tailor-made special for Petula Clark.
And we build a segment for her guest star, Harry Belafonte,
where he sings and dances
and then Petula coming in to finish the segment,
singing a song she wrote, which is an anti-war song.
I told Petula just, when you come out, just go up to Harry,
stand shoulder to shoulder with him, and see what happens.
♪ They will die for their country ♪
♪ They will die for you and me ♪
♪ Amid the pungent smell of death ♪
♪ That's on the path of glory ♪
Once Petula was alongside of Harry
and the chemistry was starting to boil between the two
of them, Petula is the one who reached out to Harry,
touched his forearm.
Now, I hear a commotion in the sponsor's room.
He evidently is going nuts.
Saying, "They'll never use that on the air.
We're gonna use one of the other takes."
And storms out of the sponsor's room.
Now we finish the segment.
Claude Wolff, Petula's husband, says, "Come on, Steve.
We're going down to the editing room."
He was behind me 100%.
So we go down the NBC corridor to the editing room
and I order the editor to erase all the other takes.
And the editor was shaking.
He had me sign a release saying that I gave him permission
to erase the masters.
But thank God we made the decision
to do that or for sure, they would have aired
one of the non-touching takes.
And all hell broke loose.
It became an international incident.
It was really hard for me to imagine in 1968
that the audience or the sponsor
would be offended by seeing a white woman touch a Black man.
I didn't realize, at the time, that the real impact that
that moment would have.
When Bob Finkel hired me to direct and produce
the Elvis special,
he said, "I saw your Petula Clark special
"and loved it and the controversy
"that it stirred up.
"That and your reputation in the business as a young rebel,
"the fact that you're around the same age as Elvis,
makes me think you guys would make a perfect combination."
[cheers and applause]
To me, the importance of the entire special
was Elvis Presley rediscovering Elvis Presley.
I think he had lost confidence in himself.
Well, I gotta do this sooner or later,
so I might as well do it now, baby.
["Heartbreak Hotel" playing]
♪ ♪
♪ Since my baby left me, I found a new place to dwell ♪
♪ And it's down on the end of Lonely Street ♪
♪ At Heartbreak Hotel ♪
He walked up there and he started singing,
and it was just-- the air came out of the room
because everybody was just flabbergasted
that this was Elvis.
Elvis the way Elvis should be.
I wanted to get back to raw, wild,
the guy who was chased by the vice squad
whenever he appeared for fear that he would totally destroy
the youth of America with his obscene gestures.
♪ Well, you ain't never caught a rabbit ♪
♪ And you ain't no friend-- ohh ♪
♪ You ain't nothin' but a hound dog ♪
♪ Cryin' all the time ♪
♪ You ain't nothin' but a hound dog ♪
♪ Crying all the time ♪
♪ Well, you ain't never caught a rabbit ♪
♪ And you ain't no friend of mine ♪
♪ Right, go, baby ♪
I called Allan Blye and Chris Beard, my writers.
Allan and Chris really came up with
the entire concept for the show.
We spoke to Elvis for weeks.
He came down to Steve's office.
It was exciting as hell.
He understood himself very well.
He had a great sense of humor about himself.
We wrote the show about him,
the great reflection of Elvis's life
at this point in his career.
They definitely said we wanna do a gospel segment
with a lot of gospel songs.
We wanna do a guitar man segment of a boy who comes
from nowhere and nothing,
gets all his fame and fortune playing the big arenas
and making the big bucks and realizes
he wants nothing in life more
than to be home playing on his old guitar just having fun.
We'd written a script based on what Elvis had said to us.
We pitched him the idea that we wanted to do
and he loved them.
His reaction was, "I love it.
I love everything you've done."
And I said, "Elvis, I've never done a show with a star
"who didn't comment something about the concept
"or the rundown.
Isn't there anything you wanna add or change?"
He said, "Nope, let's just do it."
♪ ♪
♪ If you're looking for trouble ♪
♪ You came to the right place ♪
♪ If you're looking for trouble ♪
♪ Just look right in my face ♪
♪ I was born standin' up ♪
♪ And talkin' back ♪
♪ My daddy was a green-eyed mountain jack ♪
♪ Because I'm evil ♪
♪ My middle name is misery ♪
♪ Whoa, whoa, whoa ♪
♪ Well, I'm evil ♪
♪ So don't you mess around with me ♪
["Guitar Man" playing]
♪ ♪
When you see all these other Elvises in silhouette
behind him, my first thought was,
is this like an intimidation thing?
Being like, Elvis is back.
He's got an army. He's got a crew.
Like, don't mess with Elvis and the Elvises.
♪ Well, I quit my job down at the car wash ♪
♪ I left my mama a goodbye note ♪
♪ By sundown I'd left Kingston with my guitar under my coat ♪
♪ I hitchhiked all the way down to Memphis ♪
♪ Got a room at the YMCA ♪
♪ And for the next three weeks, I went ♪
♪ Hunting them nights just looking for a place to play ♪
♪ Well, I thought my picking would set them on fire,
♪ But nobody wanted to hire a guitar man ♪
He's just--he's on fire from start to finish.
♪ And if you ever take a trip down to the ocean ♪
♪ Find yourself down around Mobile ♪
♪ Make it on out to a club called Jack's ♪
♪ If you got a little time to kill ♪
♪ Just follow that crowd of people, you'll wind up ♪
♪ Out on his dance floor ♪
♪ Digging the finest little five piece group ♪
♪ Up and down the Gulf of Mexico ♪
♪ Guess who's leading that five piece band ♪
♪ Well, wouldn't you know, it's that ♪
♪ Swingin' little guitar man ♪
♪ ♪
One day I was in my office prepping for the work
we were going to do that evening
when Elvis arrived with his entourage.
And I noticed he was staring out the window
looking down on Sunset Boulevard.
And I was curious what was going on
in his mind at the time.
I said, "Elvis, what do you think would happen
"if you and I walked out on Sunset Boulevard--"
which was directly in front of our front door
of the office building--
"What do you think would happen?"
And he looked at me and he said, "Why?"
I said, "I'm just curious.
"Do you think they'd rip your clothes off,
"or do you think they'd attack you,
or do you think they would ignore you?"
About two or three days later, he comes in the office.
He says, "We're going down on Sunset Boulevard,
and we're gonna test your question from the other day."
And it's now, maybe, 5:00 in the evening
and the traffic's starting to build up.
We're out doing small talk on the curb.
After a little while, he's starting
to get impatient and nervous, I can tell.
He's starting now to focus his attention on cars driving by.
Every once in a while, there'd be a pretty girl sitting
on the passenger side and he'd try to get her attention
and so forth, and nothing-- and I mean, nothing.
And finally, Elvis said, "OK, you proved your point."
We went back upstairs and I sensed
a sort of air of trusting me more coming from him.
I can't put my finger on it, but it just seemed,
we got closer after that.
We're supposed to do a little thing right now
and it's supposed to fit into the show,
just a part of a song.
It cuts some of the show.
So if you'll just bear with us until we
get this thing out of the way.
You ready, Steve?
I think over the course of their relationship,
there certainly was a bonding between Steve and Elvis.
When he saw the depth of what they were
gonna do on the special, that he was involved
in the creative process and that what he was being given
to do was good and compelling
and something he enjoyed doing.
I think Elvis knew he could relax
and be comfortable with Steve.
[applause]
Steve, you wanna the other thing?
It'll just be one second, Elvis.
All right.
Ready when you are, Steve B.
I think he just, trusted Steve
to make all those decisions.
And I think Steve was the middle man
between him and the Colonel.
That Steve was the person
that could relate to what Elvis wanted
and work with the Colonel
to get that fabulous end result.
[playing "Tiger Man"]
[vocalizing]
[audience cheering]
♪ I get up on mountain and I call my bear cat back ♪
♪ Well, I get up on the mountain ♪
♪ And I call my bear cat back ♪
♪ My bear cat comes running and the hound dogs ♪
♪ They stay way back ♪
♪ Way back, way back, way back ♪
♪ Ain't no end to the song, baby ♪
[cheering]
I'm a great believer in luck and timing.
I couldn't have been luckier than when I took Elvis
out to NBC for the first time.
He asked me, "Steve, do you think
"it would be possible for me to live
out here when we do the show?"
And I said, "What do you mean?"
He said, "Well, you know, I've rented a home for Priscilla
"and the new baby in Beverly Hills.
"It's going to take me at least 40 minutes
"going each way back and forth every day.
"And I could save so much time and be so much
more relaxed if I lived out here."
I said, "Yeah, I don't think there would be a problem."
We offered Elvis the dressing room
right next to Stage 4
where we'd be taping the entire production.
I called up the person in charge at NBC
and I said, "Do you think it's possible we could get
a bed in that dressing room?"
He arranged it, and we had two pianos.
We had an upright and we had a baby grand in there.
We would finish rehearsals early
in the evening around 6:00 or 7:00 probably, at the latest.
He had the rest of the evening to himself.
So he'd go into his dressing room
and his entourage was there, and they would jam
until 2:00, 3:00 in the morning.
It was like looking through a keyhole and saying,
"I'm not supposed to be seeing what I'm looking at."
One more time, Johnny.
- One more time. - Ahh!
We got it. [playing guitar lick]
- Oh, yeah. - You got it.
♪ ♪
You had it.
I remember how much joy it brought to Elvis.
Elvis on his own was wonderful, but when he most came alive
is when he had the guys around.
♪ The bell hop's-- ♪ [laughs]
Wait a minute. Wait a minute.
I forgot the lyrics.
Wait a minute, wait a minute.
I forgot the lyrics.
Uh--
♪ The-- ♪ [laughs]
It was magical.
And I said, this is more important than all the money
we're spending on all these extras, dancers, singers,
costumes, sets, et cetera.
This is the magic.
I've gotta capture that in the dressing room,
but the Colonel wouldn't let me.
He was adamant that nobody go into the dressing room,
let alone with a camera.
I think Parker was always trying to convey the message
that, "However well you think you know Elvis,
I'm the one that really has control."
But I knew I had to do it.
I mean, there was no special without that.
So I kept hounding him and finally,
I guess, I hounded him enough where
he finally, out of aggravation, said,
"Steve, I'll tell you what.
"I won't promise I'll let you use it,
"but I'll let you recreate it on stage
if you're that passionate about having him do it."
♪ ♪
The Colonel emphasized
that it would be would be a waste of my time.
"Remember," he said, "This is only
"a one-hour Christmas special, and there's
no time to put this crap in."
♪ You got me doing what you want me ♪
♪ Baby, what do you want me to do? ♪
The minute that I locked in to recreating
the improvisation segment on stage, Elvis asked me,
"Do you think I could bring my drummer and guitarist
in to do it with me?"
This guy over here has played guitar for me for 104 years.
[laughter]
For the last 14 years.
His name is Scotty Moore.
Scotty. [applause]
And the loudmouthed guy over here--
[laughter]
he's been my drummer for a long time.
His name is D.J. Fontana.
[cheers and applause]
He's been a friend of mine for something like
10 or 12 years.
Alan Ford is with his back to you.
[applause]
Uh, this is old, what's his name here.
- [laughs] - You know.
This is Charlie Hodge. [applause]
That was brilliant because it immediately
put him in a relaxed position.
And he's going to sing songs that he sang
when they started out.
[playing "That's All Right"]
♪ Well, that's all right, mama ♪
♪ That's all right with you ♪
♪ That's all right, mama, just anyway you do ♪
♪ That's all right ♪
♪ That's all right, now, mama, anyway you do ♪
♪ Well, Mama, she done told me ♪
♪ Papa done told me, too ♪
♪ Son, that girl you're fooling with ♪
♪ She ain't no good for you ♪
♪ But that's all right ♪
♪ That's all right ♪
♪ That's all right, now, mama, anyway you do ♪
When I see Elvis doing unplugged,
it's like, wow, he's brave, you know.
And it's like you're naked.
You're naked to the world.
It's just that soul, that roughness,
of singing with your heart and giving it all.
And Steve, coming up with that idea,
I think it was just, genius.
♪ Anyway you do ♪
Take it, boys.
♪ ♪
The Elvis that I knew was happy when he was singing.
I know in the "Comeback Special," I saw so much joy.
I finally saw pure joy
when he was sitting around with the guys.
We might do one more song for you
because we have another audience waiting to come in.
[audience groans]
Man, I just work here.
[laughter]
Most of the special would be shot movie-style--
scene by scene, one or two cameras,
and without an audience.
But for the improv segment,
I felt it was critical to inspire Elvis
with the kind of excitement and energy
that only a live studio audience can bring.
I went over to Colonel Parker
and I said, "Colonel, how many tickets
will you need to watch Elvis do the improv?"
And the Colonel said, "Bindle--"
he would call me Binder on certain occasions,
but other times, Bindle--
he said, "You haven't understood the Colonel ever.
If I take the tickets,
you have to give me all of the tickets,
not just some of them.
I can deliver you young girls who are fanatic Elvis fans."
So I gave him all the tickets.
Now, on the day we're going to tape it,
I'm expecting thousands of people
to be standing outside NBC Studios in Burbank
waiting in line.
I get a phone call from NBC saying,
we've added personnel to handle the crowd.
And Steve, it's eerie out here because there's nobody here.
Should have known he was lying to me again.
He was trying to sabotage the improv segment all the time.
And so, Bones Howe, my partner, and I
called a couple of disk jockeys we knew personally
and asked them to-- on the radio--
say, "If you wanna come see Elvis for free,
get your asses to Burbank."
We went to a very famous iconic restaurant
called Bob's Big Boy.
And we went to customers asking,
would you like to see Elvis Presley?
We told everybody at NBC--
invite your girlfriends and boyfriends and wives.
I think intern is a more glamorous term for the fact
that I was working my father's office for a summer job.
And I was pulled out of the office.
My dad's secretary was pulled out of the office.
They called my sister who was a sophomore in high school--
come on down.
And they sat us around this stage,
not knowing what we were getting into.
And it was bright lights, and it was hot.
And what is happening?
[cheers and applause]
And then the other thing that strikes you
is just, how good he looks.
I mean, especially-- what does everyone remember?
People that aren't Elvis fans--
You know, the black leather suit, they all know that.
So my first thought was, he's really confident
in how he looks.
He can wear a full leather suit
and every bulge is out there for the world to see.
Oh, my God.
No woman who ever saw that will forget that.
I really thought it was just, perfect.
I mean, it was a touch of rebel in him
to be wearing that rather than what we'd seen
him wear in the movies, which were more conservative.
And it was like the old Elvis is back.
I thought it was coolest thing I've ever seen.
And I just remember thinking, when I was a kid,
why didn't he always wear that?
There's one thing about this--
this TV special I'm doing.
They're going to--they're going to let me do
what I wanna do, which is sit down.
[laughter]
Not really.
But--well, I'll think of something.
Just give me the time.
He seemed very nervous,
but there was somehow, some kind of
happiness behind that.
He was smiling, and it was, like, exciting for him.
Even though, he was a little shaky, maybe.
And then he started playing the guitar
and started singing, and he just relaxed.
And he was great.
♪ Well, lawdy lawdy lawdy, Miss Clawdy ♪
♪ Girl, you sure look good to me ♪
♪ Well, please don't excite me, baby ♪
♪ I know it can't be me ♪
♪ ♪
What was I thinking?
I think, I just, I don't even want to blink.
I don't think--
I don't think I was thinking other than just
I've got to take this all in to keep this in a memory.
It was a one in a lifetime for me to be there.
[audience screaming]
♪ I'm going to tell, tell my mama ♪
♪ Lord, I swear, oh, what you've been doing to me ♪
♪ I'm going to tell everybody ♪
♪ That I'm down in misery ♪
I was a diehard Elvis fan, even through those movies.
I believed in him totally.
It was not cool.
My high school friends thought I was crazy
so I didn't tell anybody.
Nobody knew that I'm going to go see Elvis.
But this was it.
I mean, I had waited 12 years to see Elvis in person.
I had no idea what I was going to see.
And we got the first "MTV Unplugged."
And it was astonishing to be
10 to 12 feet away from Elvis,
and the energy and the feeling of those musicians
and the rawness.
♪ I said, bye, bye-bye baby ♪
♪ Girl, I won't be coming no more ♪
♪ Goodbye to little darling ♪
♪ Down the road I go ♪
[vocalizing]
[cheers and applause]
And he was doing the songs that I remembered
and none of the movie ones
that were kind of interchangeable.
These were the songs we remembered and had energy.
It was very exciting.
It was so--it was really overwhelming, yeah.
[applause]
I was seated right next to the stage, the front row,
for the first take.
My sister was on one side.
If you split it, we were looking at each other.
And he came and he sat down on the edge of the stage
between me and my sister.
["Memories" playing]
♪ Memories ♪
♪ Pressed between the pages of my mind ♪
It was Elvis Presley. I mean, he was huge.
As nervous as he was, he was in his milieu.
♪ Just like wine ♪
It was truly awe. He's right there.
And it was--he was very sweaty and everything,
which was kinda great, you know. [laughs]
♪ Like golden Autumn leaves around my feet ♪
♪ I touched them and they burst apart ♪
♪ With sweet memories ♪
♪ Sweet memories ♪
♪ Of holding hands and red bouquets
♪ And twilight trimmed in purple haze ♪
♪ And laughing eyes and supple ways, and quiet nights ♪
♪ And gentle days with you ♪
I think it's "The Hollywood Reporter"
that says, "It looks as if someone had accidentally
taped the rehearsal at times."
And there is that sense of looseness to it, right?
The sense of, like, is this the finished product?
And I think that was a really smart choice that they made.
Instead of doing something that felt like a spectacular,
a gala that they'd practiced over and over again,
it did, sometimes, feel like you were eavesdropping.
Without question, it was a segment
that towered over every other.
It was the most electrifying, animalistic rock and roll.
And I think it blew everybody away.
Watching that in the round and that broken down
really unplugged performance is inspiring.
It's inspiring to see people just sitting around
and playing music.
No production on it.
Just playing music, feeling it,
cutting up with his buddies,
messing up, doing it again, and giving it his all.
[playing "One Night"]
♪ ♪
♪ Always lived a very quiet life ♪
♪ I ain't never did no wrong ♪
♪ Now I know that very fine life ♪
♪ Has been too lonely too long ♪
I love Elvis singing "One Night."
You know, he's got the electric guitar.
♪ One night with you ♪
You know, he's just-- he's just jamming out.
And Elvis's rhythm was great.
Talk to any guitar players in town
and have them watch that video of Elvis singing that,
and they go, "That is cool."
Like, his pocket is great.
And that was all Elvis's band really
ever did was just follow Elvis.
♪ One night with you, whoo ♪
♪ Is what I'm now praying for ♪
♪ The things that we two could plan
♪ Would make my dreams come true ♪
[cheers and applause]
[tense music]
♪ ♪
I know that there was drama because I felt it
coming from Steve because he was normally
in charge and the person making the right decision.
Or if it wasn't right, he would say, "Eh, try it again."
And you knew he was gonna fix it.
And I don't think that he was free to make every decision
on his own on that special.
The Colonel was the enemy.
He was a bully.
He was dishonest.
I could tell you a lot of stories.
We insisted that if I produced and directed
the television special, I would be paid royalties
if a soundtrack album of the special was ever released.
The Colonel blew his stack.
He calls me at home and he says,
"Steve, you have nothing to worry about.
"I give you my word.
"There's never going to be a soundtrack album
so you can go ahead and do the TV."
Which I did, like a fool, and didn't get it in writing.
The next thing I know, not only did the album come out,
but he made the deal with RCA
before he made the phone call to me.
I mean, he loved doing things like that.
I didn't know anything about him.
Nothing.
But when I met him and said hello to him,
I had this chill.
I didn't care for him.
I did not like him.
I didn't know why.
Later, I figured it out.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Colonel.
I always say, it's nice to be important,
but it's more important to be nice.
And that's the way I like to live my life.
And he did not have that philosophy, the Colonel.
[chuckles] Did not have that.
[cheery Christmas music]
The Colonel constantly throughout the production
kept asking where his Christmas songs were.
One day, he was furious,
and he called Elvis and I off the set
to come to his office.
His office incidentally, he was offered the Dean Martin
dressing room, but he turned it down in favor
of a broom closet next to Stage 4.
And had two William Morris agents
dressed as soldiers standing guard
in front of his little doorway.
So we walk in there.
The Colonel's sitting behind this little desk
looking ridiculous.
Elvis is standing there with his head bowed.
Colonel spoke directly at me and he said, "Bindle,
"it's been called to my attention
"that there are no Christmas songs in the show.
"Elvis wants a Christmas song in the show.
Right, Elvis?"
And Elvis sort of mutters, "Yes, sir."
And I said, "Elvis, if you want
a Christmas song in the show,
all you have to do is tell me."
The Colonel then interrupts and says,
"So it's understood from this moment on,
'you will put a Christmas song in the show.
"OK, boys, you can go back to the stage now
and go back to work."
We walk out the door, we turn left,
no sooner do we turn the corner,
Elvis jabs me hard in my ribs and says, "Fuck him."
And that was the end of that.
After that, Bob Finkel, my executive producer,
did an incredible job of keeping Colonel Parker
out of my hair and I was free
to work with Elvis one-on-one.
Colonel didn't give a damn about Elvis Presley.
He didn't give a damn about anything but winning.
As far as I'm concerned, by this time,
I had known him a little bit and I knew,
it never was about art or the music or integrity.
He had to be the power guy.
Even when he realized he was losing battle after battle,
it was all about he had to have the final word.
The Colonel was a master con man, in my opinion.
[warbly guitar music]
♪ ♪
When we started the Presley project,
all the pre-production was done at my offices
on the Sunset Strip.
At 4:00 in the afternoon we started.
That's when Elvis would arrive.
And we'd work sometimes until midnight or 1:00 a.m.
♪ ♪
This particular night, we heard this strange
screaming reaction from the other room.
We all stormed in to see what the commotion was about.
And it was live on television,
the assassination of Robert Kennedy.
We watched it in horror.
I think Elvis, as the rest of us were, all in shock.
And we spent until almost the next morning talking about,
what the hell is going on in our country?
[CCR's "Run Through the Jungle]
♪ ♪
I shall not seek
and I will not accept
the nomination of my party
for another term as your president.
[bomb whistles, explodes]
♪ ♪
1968 is the tumultuous year in American history.
It begins with the Tet Offensive in Vietnam
meaning, there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
We're stuck in Vietnam. It's a quagmire.
Lyndon Johnson has to throw his hands up in the air and say,
I'm not running for reelection.
That's unusual for a president,
but Vietnam had him in a hole.
And then add to that, the killing in April of Dr. King
and then in June of Bobby Kennedy,
bloodshed in the streets.
I mean, when Martin Luther King Jr. was killed,
there were riots in over 100 cities in America.
People forget just, what a tinderbox the country was.
♪ Better run through the jungle ♪
♪ Better run through ♪
And then you cut to the summer of '68
and you had the Chicago Democratic Convention.
Holy hell breaks out.
Mayor Daley's police with dogs and clubs and tear gas.
The Democrats produce Hubert Humphrey, the vice president,
who had been perpetrating the war in Vietnam,
as their nominee.
And then George Wallace is running a third-party movement
all on racism and bigotry.
And then that Nixon, of all people,
is now becoming the face of how to heal the nation.
It became a bloody, ugly, sad year in American history.
♪ Better run through the jungle ♪
♪ Whoa, don't look back to see ♪
♪ ♪
We have speed. Quiet, please.
[shushing]
OK, here we go.
5-13.
In addition to the two sequences
shot in front of a live audience,
we had several big production numbers.
Each highlighting a different aspect
of Elvis's musical journey.
In one of these, Elvis as a young guitar man
hits the road to seek his fame and fortune.
There was also a scene set at an amusement park
that allowed Elvis to show off his martial arts skills.
Another was a gospel segment in which Elvis displayed
his spiritual side backed by The Blossoms
and The Claude Thompson Dancers.
["Where Could I Go But to the Lord" playing]
♪ Living below ♪
♪ In this old, sinful world ♪
♪ Hardly a comfort can afford ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Striving alone ♪
♪ To face temptation so ♪
♪ Won't you tell me, where could I go ♪
♪ But to the Lord ♪
When he does that song, that's a gospel performance.
You could hear church.
And not just a church, you could hear Black church.
The way he emotes and the way he just,
delivers it and gives it all from the soul.
You know that Elvis used to
sit outside some Black churches
and just be mesmerized by what was going on.
He's constantly thinking, "I wanna sound like that,"
and that's a beautiful thing.
♪ Where could I go but to the Lord ♪
♪ Now, won't you tell me where could I go ♪
♪ But to the Lord ♪
When we look at the "Comeback Special"
and you're seeing Black dancers, white dancers,
and Black musicians and white musicians,
obviously, that does not seem shocking to us today,
but at the time, that was more unusual to see on screen.
Integration on television was not fully realized.
And Steve Binder, to me, in my opinion,
whether it started at the "T.A.M.I Show" in '64
or the NAACP Special and then the "'68 Comeback Special,"
obviously, I think that Steve Binder
sees the world as one color.
He really pushed the envelope in those days.
And Elvis had such a background from his upbringing
of soulful music and had such an influence
from African-American musicians.
And I think that was a part of Elvis' music
that was so important to capture,
and Steve saw that.
♪ I used to smoke, drink, and dance the hoochy-coo ♪
♪ I used to smoke and drink, smoke and drink ♪
♪ And dance the hoochy-coo ♪
♪ Oh, yeah ♪
♪ Now I'm standing on this corner ♪
♪ Praying for me and you ♪
One of the things that marks Elvis's contemporary
is his ear for this stuff,
is that he understood that yes, I'm a rock and roll singer,
but I have a debt to country music,
I have a debt to rhythm and blues,
I have a debt to gospel music.
And so, I suspect to some people
who had maybe slotted him as a certain kind of person,
a guy who makes silly teen movies in the '60s
or a guy who made those hits in the '50s,
to realize that his music is in dialogue with gospel music,
that he is in tune with this American roots music
because it's the time when lots of groups
are rediscovering rootsy American music.
♪ People let me tell you about kingdom come ♪
♪ I'm saved, I'm saved ♪
♪ Well, I can preach until you're deaf and dumb ♪
♪ I'm saved, I'm saved ♪
♪ I'm saved ♪
And of course, there was
the notorious bordello sequence.
♪ Oh, baby, I'm gonna teach you ♪
♪ What love's all about tonight ♪
Yes, I remember it like it was yesterday.
It was very racy for 1968.
And I remember showing midriff and showing
body parts that probably, TV wasn't real ready for.
♪ Enjoy yourself ♪
♪ And baby, don't fight ♪
And the dancing was very sexy.
It was very stylized.
That was an incredibly fabulous number.
Beautifully shot and choreographed.
Elvis always brought kind of a profound earthly manner
to his motion.
He moves fantastically.
He'd never say no to anything.
"Let me try it."
And he was so mild and easygoing.
One moment that was funny, the bordello scene,
and I got a really fine collection
of lovely, lovely fantastic ladies, really talented.
And he said, "Jamie?"
I said, "Yes?"
He said, "Oh, These girls are too good.
I'm getting excited." [laughs]
♪ You'll be ready for the grand finale ♪
♪ So come on baby, let's go ♪
♪ Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go ♪
Well, I was a virgin hooker.
I kinda take pride in that. [laughs]
That was my part that I had interviewed for.
All right, places everyone.
I walked into rehearsal.
We were to prepare how we were going to dance.
And he was standing in his jeans.
And it was, I mean, it was too tempting.
I hadn't seen him for a couple of months.
So I just kind of tiptoed up.
Ready here.
Give it a minute.
All right, Elvis is ready.
Okay, roll.
It wasn't work. NBC was paying me,
but I think it was apparent to everybody
that we, very much, enjoyed what we were doing.
And we had fun dancing and practicing and being silly.
That last one was a 19.
Just pick it up from there.
Standby. Here we go.
Let's just take one second.
I'm going to try something different on the opening
of Susan's face.
♪ ♪
Steve was one of the best directors I've ever had.
He definitely was in control of everything.
But he allowed that free liberty
for us to express ourselves.
It was just natural.
And I think allowing Elvis and I
to be natural and play how we did,
it brought out more in us.
Thank you, Elvis. See you tomorrow.
[man shouting]
Okay, let's do the dance segment.
Five, please.
When there is a chemistry, he was very sensuous,
very masculine, and it elicited the femininity and the flirt
and the coy and the tease in me.
And I think we played off each other.
♪ Now take a real deep breath and put ♪
♪ Your red lips on mine ♪
♪ Do like I tell you, everything's gonna ♪
♪ Be just fine, oh, yeah ♪
♪ Just kiss me nice and easy, take your time ♪
♪ Because baby, I'm the only one here in line ♪
♪ All you gotta do it just let yourself go ♪
Ultimately, that sequence proved
too risqué for the network and the sponsor.
Although, I fought tooth and nail,
they made the decision to cut it out of the show.
[all screaming]
Through a strange set of circumstances,
it appeared in the special nine years later
when it was rebroadcast after Elvis' death,
and it's been there ever since.
921.
♪ My daddy was a green-eyed mountain jack ♪
♪ Because I'm evil ♪
♪ ♪
Whoo! Run out of breath.
Huh?
Elvis was such a prankster.
He did not just rehearse.
He would, like, do funny things.
And some of it was just so off the cuff.
That's 922.
Plus tax.
[imitating buzzer]
Watch my clacker here.
You watch my clacker there.
That's 927.
[laughter]
His eyes would give him away.
I just knew, OK, he's gonna be silly.
And he just had that look that could just
really melt you and make you laugh.
Steve, you wanna do the other thing?
"Trouble" again?
- One second. - Well, I don't.
I'll see you tomorrow.
[laughter]
OK, are you ready?
No, but we'll try it anyway.
[laughter]
Let's get it. Let's rock and roll.
Well, I'm gonna have to do it sooner or later
so I might as well get on with it, baby.
Let's go.
["Trouble" playing]
♪ ♪
Better on with it, again. I missed it that time.
The most successful part of the "Comeback Special,"
I think, though, is the arena segment
where Elvis is out in that same seductive suit
prowling around the stage and singing a medley of his hits.
That's gold.
♪ ♪
♪ Uh, I'm all shook up ♪
♪ Ohh, uhh ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah ♪
♪ Well, a-bless my soul, what's wrong with me ♪
♪ 'I'm itching like a man on a fuzzy tree ♪
♪ My friends say I'm acting wild as a bug ♪
♪ I'm in love uh-uh ♪
♪ I'm all shook up ♪
♪ Ohh, uhh ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah ♪
Elvis was absolutely electric when he was on stage.
And I think he had a lot of that built up
for the "'68 Comeback Special."
I mean, you saw this guy who was like a caged tiger
just ready to pounce, right?
There's something touching, there's something sweet
about seeing someone who is such a big star
who's also working that hard.
♪ I met a girl that I love so ♪
♪ My heart beats so it scares me to death ♪
♪ When she touched my hand, what a chill I got ♪
♪ Her lips are like a volcano that's hot ♪
♪ I'm proud to say she's my buttercup ♪
♪ I'm in love ah-ooh-uhh ♪
♪ I'm all shook up ♪
♪ Ohh, uhh ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah, I'm all shook up ♪
♪ Ohh, uhh ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah ♪ - * I'm all shook up ♪
Ah! [cheers and applause]
What's interesting about the songs that they have him do
in both the sit down and stand up shows is they are
mostly songs from the '50s.
I mean, the '50s versions are great,
but he's matured.
I mean, well, obviously, he's 10 years older.
But he's also developed as a singer
and it's a much more powerful voice.
♪ The warden threw a party in the county jail ♪
♪ The prison band was there they began to wail ♪
♪ The band was jumping and the joint began to swing ♪
♪ Should have heard them knocked out jailbirds sing ♪
♪ Let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody, let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody in the whole cell block
♪ Was dancing to the Jailhouse Rock ♪
He didn't update them by making them psychedelic
or whatever the current trend was,
but he did reinvigorate them.
So they sound vital and contemporary,
and they don't sound like he's just doing oldies.
Those songs have to be interpreted the right way
and played the right way in order to get that energy
and that feeling across.
Every song, it was just, like, a marriage.
It was so perfect together within one.
And he executed it the right perfectly.
♪ Come on and do the Jailhouse Rock with me ♪
♪ Let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody, let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody in the whole cell block
♪ Was dancing to the Jailhouse Rock ♪
♪ Shifty Henry said to Bugs ♪
♪ "For heaven's sake's, no one's looking ♪
♪ Now's the chance to make a break" ♪
♪ Bugsy turned to Shifty and he said, "Nix, nix ♪
♪ I want to stick around I want to get my kicks" ♪
♪ Let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody, let's rock ♪
♪ Everybody in the whole cell block ♪
♪ Was dancing to the Jailhouse Rock ♪
♪ Dancing to the Jailhouse Rock ♪
♪ They were dancing rock ♪
♪ They were dancing to the Jailhouse Rock ♪
♪ Ahh ♪
All right. [cheers and applause]
Elvis has such a humble nature about him,
an innate humbleness to him, that you don't watch him
and go, "This guy is cocky."
You go, "This guy's having the time of his life on stage,
and so is everybody in the audience."
♪ Love me tender ♪
♪ Love me true ♪
♪ All my dreams fulfilled ♪
♪ For my darling, I love you ♪
♪ And I always will ♪
♪ ♪
[applause]
Thank you.
[dark music]
♪ ♪
After I finished the edits and delivered the show to NBC,
the Colonel went to Tom Sarnoff, the head of NBC
at the time, and said, "I'm not allowing you
"to air this special until there's
a Christmas song in it."
So I'm ordered to get over to NBC and explain to them,
why I don't have a Christmas song.
I walk into the office.
There's all the executives sitting there,
and there's the Colonel leaning on his cane.
His eyeballs are on me.
So it was really a case of where I'm sitting there
inside panicked, and all of a sudden, I remembered,
wait a minute.
When Elvis did the improv,
I think he sang "Blue Christmas."
♪ I'll have a blue Christmas ♪
♪ Without you ♪
♪ I'll be so blue ♪
♪ Just thinking about you ♪
♪ ♪
♪ Decorations of red ♪
♪ On a green Christmas tree ♪
♪ Won't be the same ♪
♪ If you're not here with me ♪
I saw the Colonel make these super executives,
who probably had more money than Colonel Parker,
probably had more power than Colonel Parker,
I saw them bow down to the Colonel and kiss his behind.
They were terrified of him, and I was wondering,
where's all this power coming from?
The Colonel had great powers of intimidation.
And so the Colonel always tried to find out
where your soft spot was, where you were vulnerable,
and he would not hesitate to use that.
The Colonel brings to mind a mob boss man.
Parker would say, "It's better to be feared than to be liked."
He was a control freak.
And so he really didn't care,
as long as it had one Christmas song in it.
And that may have been just to save face.
♪ But I'll have a blue ♪
♪ Blue, blue, blue Christmas ♪
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause]
After Colonel Parker approved
the final edit of the special,
we were sitting in a screening room
with five or six of Elvis' entourage.
And the most uncomfortable feeling for every director
is having to sit through a screening
when everything you did you think is terrible
and you know this is a disaster and so forth and so on.
Now, you're sitting in a screening room
with your star and his friends,
and there's no reaction.
They're not laughing. They're not applauding.
They're not doing anything. They're just waiting to see
what Elvis does.
He finishes the screening, and he says, "OK, guys,
"I want you all to leave now.
Steve and I are gonna watch it again by ourselves."
I now show it to Elvis,
and here's a whole other human being.
There's a guy laughing, applauding himself.
I mean, he loved it.
It's been a long time, baby.
[cheers and applause]
Long time.
My boy, my boy.
I think he finally got to say to himself,
"Wow, you know, look what I can still do."
It must have just been a joy to have put so much of yourself
into something and then you see the end result
and it's just as good or perhaps
even better than you thought.
["Nothingville" playing]
♪ ♪
The last time I saw Elvis, he slips me a piece of paper
with a phone number on it.
And he whispers to me, "Call me."
♪ Phony little two-bit town ♪
When I called the number he gave me, somebody answered it,
and said, "He's not available."
When Elvis and Steve wanted to be friends
after the "Comeback Special,"
the Colonel got worried,
and so, Steve Binder must be banished.
And I do think with all my heart
that if Steve had remained in his creative life
that Elvis Presley would not have died at the age of 42
on the bathroom floor in his beloved Graceland.
He was so rejuvenated by that "Comeback Special,"
and the music that he made right after that
was some of the best he ever made in his life,
but then he went right back to doing
what the Colonel wanted him to do.
The Elvis and Colonel story is very much
a Shakespearean tragedy.
[fluttery music playing]
The following program is brought to you
in living color on NBC.
[upbeat rock music]
♪ ♪
It always seemed to me like some of the reaction
to the "Comeback Special"
was that people were surprised that it didn't suck.
Right, like, some of the reaction
to the "Comeback Special" is low expectations.
My mother wanted to watch it.
So, to keep my mother company, I watched the singer special.
And, oh, were my eyes opened.
I had no idea Elvis Presley was still in there,
the Elvis Presley I fell in love with as a little girl.
It did very well on the ratings.
For that season, it was the top-rated show.
It really rejuvenated Elvis.
It had been so long since anybody
had seen him in his glory.
It was a historic moment.
So here, 1968 is this year of bloody turmoil,
but yet, it ends on a high note.
When John F. Kennedy was murdered in 1963,
it was The Beatles going on "Ed Sullivan"
that brought the morale of America back.
By '68, with all the tragedy and sadness,
something about Elvis being on television
made Americans feel good about America.
We're still aiming to fulfill John F. Kennedy's
dream to the Moon.
The Apollo program is gearing up,
and we're getting photographs of Earth
as this whole blue-green planet
that people are looking at.
Elvis and the Moon now are the hopes of America.
♪ For I can't help ♪
♪ Falling in love
♪ With you ♪
[cheers and applause]
♪ ♪
Yeah!
[music crescendos]
♪ ♪
[cheers and applause] - Thank you. Thank you.
Whoo!
Colonel Parker kept telling everybody,
we were going to end the show with a Christmas song.
This was his Custer's last stand.
He thought Elvis should close the special
with a Christmas song or some kind
of saccharine thing like, "I Believe,"
which Steve was just determined not to do.
The thing is, he didn't have anything for Elvis to do.
He didn't have anything else to suggest.
I went to Billy Goldenberg, my musical director,
I went to Earl Brown, my choral director,
and I said, look, guys, we all now know Elvis.
Instead of him giving a speech at the end of the show,
which the Colonel would never ever approve,
put it into a song.
I mean, let the people know the inner Elvis
and how he feels about
the Martin Luther King assassination,
the Bobby Kennedy assassination.
[chimes playing]
I got a phone call a few days later.
It was Earl Brown who called me saying,
"I think we have it."
So I met him early one morning at NBC
where Elvis was having breakfast across the way
at the commissary.
They sat down at the piano.
Four bars in, I knew it was a hit.
Elvis came across.
I said, "Elvis, this is the song for your closing
of your special."
They played it.
Typically, in Elvis fashion, he said, "Play it, again."
And then after that, he said, "Play it, again."
I don't know how many times they played it
over and over for him.
In the meantime, the Colonel wanders in,
saying, in a loud voice, "Over my dead body
will he ever sing--"
I don't know if he called it a piece of crap or whatever.
But Elvis looked at me, hearing Colonel Parker,
and he said, "I'll do it."
♪ ♪
When Elvis first emerges in the 1950s,
it's not really the something to say era.
That's not necessarily, the expectation that we have
from rock and roll stars.
And even now, I think
reasonable people might debate about whether it's a good idea
to expect rock stars to have something interesting to say.
But this was his way of at least acknowledging that he's
living in a moment where people
are interested in the idea that a rock star
might have a message to send.
[sweeping music]
♪ ♪
From the very depths of his soul,
he brings out this performance that's remarkable.
I mean, it's a showstopping moment.
One of the best performances of all time by anybody,
especially in the context of the times.
I was born 20 years after Elvis died.
I can watch that and feel impacted
and feel inspired
and feel what Elvis was feeling at the time.
♪ ♪
For me, I was connecting with the reasons he did it--
the death of Dr. King, the death of President Kennedy,
the Civil Rights Movement.
It's Elvis really being real and telling you
about how he feels.
You could tell when he's singing
that he believes every word.
It is very crucial that we listen
to that song and those words.
It can speak to us today, yesterday, and tomorrow.
That song is a portrait and the sound
of a man saving his own life.
I get goosebumps very few times in my life,
but when I get 'em, I really get 'em.
To this day, I will never forget it.
Elvis gives the greatest performance of his life.
It was so raw and powerful, I tip my hat.
He is the King of Rock and Roll.
There is no doubt about it.
["If I Can Dream" playing]
♪ ♪
♪ There must be lights ♪
♪ Burning brighter somewhere ♪
♪ Got to be birds ♪
♪ Flying higher in a sky more blue ♪
♪ If I can dream ♪
♪ Of a better land where all my brothers ♪
♪ Walk hand in hand ♪
♪ Tell me why, oh, why, oh, why ♪
♪ Can't my dream come true ♪
♪ Oh, why ♪
♪ There must be peace ♪
♪ And understanding sometime ♪
♪ Strong winds of promise ♪
♪ That will blow away all the doubt and fear ♪
♪ If I can dream ♪
♪ Of a warmer sun where hope keeps shining on everyone ♪
♪ Tell me why, oh, why,
♪ Oh, why, won't that sun appear ♪
♪ ♪
♪ We're lost in a cloud ♪
♪ With too much rain ♪
♪ We're trapped in a world ♪
♪ That's trouble with pain ♪
♪ But as long as a man ♪
♪ Has the strength to dream ♪
♪ He can redeem his soul
♪ And fly ♪
♪ He can fly ♪
♪ Deep in my heat ♪
♪ There's a trembling question ♪
♪ Still, I am sure that the answer ♪
♪ Answer's gonna come somehow ♪
♪ Out there in the dark ♪
♪ There's a beckoning candle ♪
♪ Oh, yeah ♪
♪ And while I can think, while I can walk ♪
♪ While I can stand, while I can talk ♪
♪ While I can dream ♪
♪ Please, let my dream ♪
♪ Come true ♪
♪ Ohh ♪
♪ Right now ♪
♪ Oh, let it come true right now ♪
♪ Oh, yeah ♪
[chorus vocalizing]
[rock music]
♪ ♪
[rockabilly music]
♪ ♪