Highlights
- Before her passing, Lisa Marie Presley expressed her strong dislike for Sofia Coppola’s film Priscilla, believing that it portrayed Elvis Presley in a negative and manipulative light.
- Sofia Coppola, the filmmaker, had an email exchange with Lisa Marie Presley, where she defended her intentions to honor both Priscilla Presley and Elvis Presley in the film and hoped that Lisa’s opinion would change upon seeing the final product.
- Priscilla Presley, on the other hand, was involved in the film as an executive producer and praised Sofia Coppola’s work.
Lisa Marie Presley, daughter of the famous singer Elvis Presley, was absolutely horrified by Sofia Coppola’s film Priscilla. Lisa sadly passed away in early 2023, but not before she expressed her hatred for the film. Priscilla was meant to better depict the life of the wife of Elvis, as filmmaker Coppola thought her story was important to share with the world. It certainly was not easy being the wife of Elvis Presley.
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Though the Presley family adored the film Elvis, starring Austin Butler as the late singer, Lisa Presley did not have the same positive feelings for the movie focused on her mother. In the following, we address why Lisa felt the film’s attempt to properly tell Priscilla’s story, painted a horrid picture of Elvis. Now that Priscilla has been released in theaters, here is how Lisa Marie Presley really felt about the Sofia Coppola movie before her passing.
How Lisa Marie Presley Felt About Priscilla Movie
Lisa Marie Presley is the daughter of Priscilla Presley and Elvis Presley. Lisa was only nine years old at the time of her father’s passing, but she maintained a strong vision of what Elvis was like. She was pleased by the depiction seen in Elvis, and even had a friendship with Austin Butler.
Sadly, Lisa Marie Presley passed away in January 2023.
Though she was unable to see the film Priscilla, as it was not released until late 2023, Lisa had already given her two cents on the film.
Lisa Marie Presley’s thoughts about Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla were not positive.
In an email exchange with filmmaker Sofia Coppola, obtained by Variety, Lisa Marie Presley expressed how upset she was about the portrayal of Elvis Presley in Priscilla.
“My father only came across as a predator and manipulative. As his daughter, I don’t read this and see any of my father in this character. I don’t read this and see my mother’s perspective of my father. I read this and see your shockingly vengeful and contemptuous perspective and I don’t understand why?”
This email exchange occurred in September 2022, and Priscilla had not yet begun production. It can be assumed that Lisa had been given an early draft of the script.
“I will be forced to be in a position where I will have to openly say how I feel about the film and go against you, my mother and this film publicly.”
Sofia Coppola may have been disappointed that Lisa Marie Presley was not on board with the project, but she did not let that show. Instead, Coppola expressed her desire for Lisa Marie Presley’s opinion about Priscilla to change and assured her that the film was being made in an honorable way.
“I hope that when you see the final film you will feel differently, and understand I’m taking great care in honoring your mother, while also presenting your father with sensitivity and complexity,” Coppola stated in the email exchange.
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What Priscilla Presley Thinks About Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla
Lisa Marie Presley seems to be the only member of the Presley family who took such great issue with Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla.
Priscilla Presley herself, as previously mentioned, was very involved with the film. Not only is the story based off her 1985 memoir Elvis and Me, but she was also an executive producer on the project.
After watching the premiere of the movie at the Venice International Film Festival, Priscilla Presley was very emotional about the film.
“It’s very difficult to sit and watch a film about you, about your life, about your love,” she said at the festival. “[Director] Sofia [Coppola] did an amazing job. She did her homework, we spoke a couple of times and I really put everything out for her that I could.”
In regard to the age difference and predatory claims, Priscilla argued that she had a strong connection with Elvis and that it never felt wrong to her.
“Even though I was 14, I was actually a little bit older in life–not in numbers. That was the attraction. People think, ‘Oh, it was sex.’ No, it wasn’t. I never had sex with him. He was very kind, very soft, very loving, but he also respected the fact I was only 14 years old.”
Even Sofia Coppola defended the age gap between Priscilla Presley and Elvis as well. Her defense shocked many fans after they had read Lisa Marie Presley’s interpretation of the film.
“I can go back to being that age and remember having a crush on an older guy and a rock star,” Coppola said at the film festival. “I just imagined myself in her point of view.”
If this is the case, maybe changes were made to Priscilla after Lisa Marie Presley’s comments, and maybe she would have been happier with the final product.
What Is Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla About?
The film Elvis was a huge success. Starring Austin Butler as the late singer and Tom Hanks as his manager, that film told the exciting story about what it was like to be a worldwide sensation. On the heels of the film’s success, filmmaker Sofia Coppola was inspired to tell a slightly different story about the Presley family.
Coppola began to work on the film Priscilla, which would tell the story of Elvis Presley’s wife. Both a love story and a heartbreaking one, Coppola hoped to put a lense on a different aspect of the Presley history, as Priscilla was not considered to be a major character in Elvis.
Coppola tagged Cailee Spaeny to play Priscilla, and chose Jacob Elordi to appear in the film as Elvis.
The inspiration for Priscilla specifically comes from Priscilla Presley’s memoir, Elvis and Me. The memoir was released in 1985 and told the story of her life and how it connected to Elvis Presley.
The story has been under scrutiny, as the beginning of their relationship was in 1959 while Priscilla was only 14 years old. Elvis was 24 at the time.
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Sofia Coppola claims she intended to create a love story with Priscilla while staying true to the story told in Elvis and Me. Priscilla Presley herself even joined the project as an executive producer in order to keep the story accurate and a true representation of her time with Elvis.
While Priscilla was on board for her story to be told, before her death, Lisa Marie Presley expressed she was strongly against the film being made.
Source: NewsFinale
