Do you think this is a role that will change your career?
I’ve never done anything like this before. It’s one of those things that’s such a responsibility to Elvis and to his family, and to all the people around the world who love him. There was an incredible amount of pressure I felt. And what goes along with that pressure is an immense amount of fear. I would be afraid that I don’t want to fall short and let everybody down.
I don’t want to let myself down, I don’t want to let Elvis down – I want to do him justice. So even on a very personal level, having to push through that every day and use it, use the fear where I’d wake up at 4am every morning with my heart pounding.
I’d just be terrified and I’d go, “OK, use that fear as energy and get to work.” It gave me this drive that I think the person that I am today is different than I was before I started this. I think not only does that shift things in a way that might affect my career, but it shifts me as a human.
What was the most difficult thing when you prepared for the role?
I think the most difficult thing is the fact that you look at Elvis and see these things that are larger than life, this icon or this god-like figure, and then [have to] find your way into the humanity and a way of getting specific that when you watch you feel the essence of Elvis, but where you don’t suddenly become an impression of him or an impersonation of him – where it feels like actual life is happening in the moment.
You were immersed in this character for three years. How hard was it to leave him behind?
It wasn’t easy. I feel incredibly privileged to have had three years of exploring his life and the subtleties of him as a human being, then to also do my best to embody that every day. Even the days that I wasn’t filming, it was there and it was a part of me, the fabric of who I was. I remember the day I wrapped, I went back to my trailer and I started crying. I had this moment where I kept repeating in my mind, “Who am I? Who am I? Who am I?’ I was weeping because I had been living within and with him, and suddenly I was going, “OK, how do I adjust to reality at this point?” So after that it’s just been a process of shedding, in a way. But what a joy to get to explore him for that time.
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Who was Elvis to you before this movie?
Before starting the process, I considered myself a fan ... so getting to explore his humanity and see tons of footage that I’ve never seen before, and hearing audio recordings that I hadn’t even scratched the surface of before, that was huge for me. I didn’t know how funny he was. He was an incredibly funny guy, had such a great sense of humour and one of the best laughs you’ll ever hear. That was something that now is one of my favourite bits of Elvis – hearing him laugh. The other thing was his generosity and how kind he was, how much he gave away.
Was there a specific point in time when you said to yourself, “Oh yeah, I think I’ve got him?”
The first thing we filmed as far as a live performance goes, was the ’68 [Comeback] Special. I was so nervous leading up to that because I’ve been preparing for a long time and now suddenly I’m going to have to walk out there in the black leather and do the ’68 performance, and we’ve got an audience of hundreds of extras and all the cameras are there set up.
The night before and in the morning, I just had these terrible nerves and, before going out, I had this moment with myself where I thought, “This is like Elvis would have been feeling.” This was a make-or-break moment for him in his career and in his life, and there was an incredible amount of pressure on him at that moment for his musical career. I thought it was not dissimilar to the amount of pressure I was feeling. So I took all that energy circulating inside me and I went out.
There was a moment onstage when I suddenly felt this rapport with the audience, where I looked down and saw a girl really blushing, and I see another girl laughing and she’s really laughing. It was so exhilarating. And then at the end they all cheered and, hearing this applause, I thought, “If I close my eyes, this is the same sort of cheer that Elvis would be hearing.” So I allowed my imagination to just really, truly accept that this is the ’68 Special and I’m doing it for this audience right now and my career is on the line, and suddenly it all kind of merged.
I went into the dressing room after and it was silent, and I looked at myself in the mirror and I’m dressed in the leather, I’m covered in sweat, and I looked at myself in the eyes and then I thought, “He would have had this silent moment afterwards, too.” And I just kind of closed my eyes, where suddenly I was like, “Yeah, OK, I can do this.” That was a special, very private moment for me right after this incredibly public moment.
Elvis hits cinemas on June 23.