of her natural timidity and because her mother was so opposed to Elvis, Debra kept her feelings to herself, even from Elvis. “I was
very
shy then; I hardly talked.”
Elvis continued to carry a torch for Debra. After
Love Me Tender
wrapped and before he went into the army, sometime in late 1956 or early 1957, he called Debra from El Paso, where he had stopped while driving home to Memphis from Los Angeles, and asked her to marry him. Debra told him it wasn’t possible. “I know it’s your mother and father,” she remembered Elvis saying. “And if it takes twenty years, I’ll get them to like me.”
“I knew it was hopeless,” Debra recalled. “My parents would never relent. It was an impossible situation. I’m not sure I ever told him how I felt, but he could feel it.”
Elvis could not get Debra Paget out of his system. Willie Jane Nichols and her husband, Carl, accompanied Vernon and Gladys Presley to Hollywood in 1957 to watch Elvis shoot his second movie,
Loving You.
His sight-seeing tours always included one stop in Beverly Hills. “Elvis carried us around and took us past Debra Paget’s house,” confirmed Nichols. “I think Debra saw us and remembers that.”
Debra Paget’s version of the tale is both romantic and sad. She and Elvis continued to have feelings for each other but were kept apart by circumstances (her mother). “I did
The Ten Commandments
,” she recalled. “We had to see each other in passing on the Paramount lot, and we looked longingly at each other.” Just before Debra’s mother died, she confessed her regrets to her daughter. “She said she wouldn’t have stopped me if she’d known I felt so strongly.” By then it was too late; both Debra and Elvis had married other people. The actress kept the truth to herself, even after Elvis died. “There was no need to tell others,” she explained. “I don’t like to talk about Elvis; I’ve always felt it was private.”
Priscilla Beaulieu did not know the intimacies of Elvis Presley’s relationship with Debra Paget when she saw
Love Me Tender.
She only knew that Elvis was smitten with the actress,and if Elvis fancied her, Priscilla wanted to see more of her. She was learning how to actualize her fantasies, an endeavor that required homework and careful study. While she did not put that kind of effort into her schoolwork, if she had a goal, Priscilla could move mountains.
Priscilla was not the only female in the Beaulieu household who had a crush on Elvis Presley. As soon as
Love Me Tender
hit the marquee at the Majestic in downtown Austin, Ann Beaulieu was on the phone with Dora Keen, president of the Bergstrom Officers’ Wives’ Club, saying, “Let’s go see Elvis!” They went to a matinee with two other air force wives.
“It was her idea!” recalled Dora Keen. “When we went to see it, she was crazy about Elvis. Ann was a big Elvis fan. She was following his career, you know, starting in movies. Ann was impressed with him. She could see something in him. We were all acting so stupid about the young man! And I know she was very fond of Elvis.”
Who knows whether Priscilla was aware that her mother harbored a crush on her teenage idol? It was impossible to tell, since years later—for reasons that would soon become clear—Priscilla and all the Beaulieus would reconstruct history, claiming that Ann disapproved of Elvis Presley before Priscilla started seeing him.
More secrets, lies, and cover-ups in the house of hidden truths.
6
Secrets Revealed
T he apparent existence of “two” Priscillas became more evident as Priscilla Beaulieu entered junior high in 1957. She was still outwardly demure, with the same catlike inscrutability—a facade her boyfriend Mike Edwards would later refer to as “the mask,” because it so adeptly hid what was really going on. But just below the surface lurked the “naughty” Priscilla.
“She’d ask me to go to the movies with her,” recalled Taylor Keen, “and then ditch
very
shy then; I hardly talked.”
Elvis continued to carry a torch for Debra. After
Love Me Tender
wrapped and before he went into the army, sometime in late 1956 or early 1957, he called Debra from El Paso, where he had stopped while driving home to Memphis from Los Angeles, and asked her to marry him. Debra told him it wasn’t possible. “I know it’s your mother and father,” she remembered Elvis saying. “And if it takes twenty years, I’ll get them to like me.”
“I knew it was hopeless,” Debra recalled. “My parents would never relent. It was an impossible situation. I’m not sure I ever told him how I felt, but he could feel it.”
Elvis could not get Debra Paget out of his system. Willie Jane Nichols and her husband, Carl, accompanied Vernon and Gladys Presley to Hollywood in 1957 to watch Elvis shoot his second movie,
Loving You.
His sight-seeing tours always included one stop in Beverly Hills. “Elvis carried us around and took us past Debra Paget’s house,” confirmed Nichols. “I think Debra saw us and remembers that.”
Debra Paget’s version of the tale is both romantic and sad. She and Elvis continued to have feelings for each other but were kept apart by circumstances (her mother). “I did
The Ten Commandments
,” she recalled. “We had to see each other in passing on the Paramount lot, and we looked longingly at each other.” Just before Debra’s mother died, she confessed her regrets to her daughter. “She said she wouldn’t have stopped me if she’d known I felt so strongly.” By then it was too late; both Debra and Elvis had married other people. The actress kept the truth to herself, even after Elvis died. “There was no need to tell others,” she explained. “I don’t like to talk about Elvis; I’ve always felt it was private.”
Priscilla Beaulieu did not know the intimacies of Elvis Presley’s relationship with Debra Paget when she saw
Love Me Tender.
She only knew that Elvis was smitten with the actress,and if Elvis fancied her, Priscilla wanted to see more of her. She was learning how to actualize her fantasies, an endeavor that required homework and careful study. While she did not put that kind of effort into her schoolwork, if she had a goal, Priscilla could move mountains.
Priscilla was not the only female in the Beaulieu household who had a crush on Elvis Presley. As soon as
Love Me Tender
hit the marquee at the Majestic in downtown Austin, Ann Beaulieu was on the phone with Dora Keen, president of the Bergstrom Officers’ Wives’ Club, saying, “Let’s go see Elvis!” They went to a matinee with two other air force wives.
“It was her idea!” recalled Dora Keen. “When we went to see it, she was crazy about Elvis. Ann was a big Elvis fan. She was following his career, you know, starting in movies. Ann was impressed with him. She could see something in him. We were all acting so stupid about the young man! And I know she was very fond of Elvis.”
Who knows whether Priscilla was aware that her mother harbored a crush on her teenage idol? It was impossible to tell, since years later—for reasons that would soon become clear—Priscilla and all the Beaulieus would reconstruct history, claiming that Ann disapproved of Elvis Presley before Priscilla started seeing him.
More secrets, lies, and cover-ups in the house of hidden truths.
6
Secrets Revealed
T he apparent existence of “two” Priscillas became more evident as Priscilla Beaulieu entered junior high in 1957. She was still outwardly demure, with the same catlike inscrutability—a facade her boyfriend Mike Edwards would later refer to as “the mask,” because it so adeptly hid what was really going on. But just below the surface lurked the “naughty” Priscilla.
“She’d ask me to go to the movies with her,” recalled Taylor Keen, “and then ditch
Similar Books
