Twenty years ago, the Weekly World News reported that Elvis Presley, allegedly deceased for more than a decade, was, in fact, alive.
Unlike its recent coverage of the John Edwards’ mistress scandal, a story that also broke in a supermarket tabloid, The New York Times ignored the bombshell.
The “Elvis is Alive” locomotive picked up steam in midsummer, as the Aug. 16 anniversary of his official death approached.
I was in a station wagon headed south on Interstate-81, Graceland bound with “The Sun Sessions” in the tape player when the WWN devoted it’s front page to a single headline: “Living Elvis Writes Letter to a Fan!”
At the same time, a book and audiotape with a voice claiming to be the still-alive King of Rock and Roll began appearing on convenience store checkout counters next to the lottery tickets and Slim Jims.
The paperback was “Is Elvis Alive?” by Gail Brewer-Giorgio and it was stupid fun in the way that a new piece of gum is fun for the first five minutes you chew it.
Brewer-Giorgio’s 1988 stunt (she’s now hustling a project that claims that Elvis worked undercover to send Mafia dons to prison) met this rebuke from Dr. Jerry Francisco, thecoroner at Elvis’ autopsy.
“If Elvis is NOT dead, he’s walking around without his major organs. … [his] brain and heart are still in storage at Memphis Memorial Hospital.”
At the time, Will Debley was a child of 10 with his first performance as the King of Rock and Roll long behind him.
Debley, who lives in Mount Airy and supports himself full time with a stage show called “Reflections of the King,” is one of tens of thousands of Presley fans heading to Memphis this week to observe the 31st anniversary of the singer’s death.
Would someone recognize Debley as Elvis if he walked by in street clothes?
“It all depends on how my hair is done,” he said. “The sideburns are usually a clue.”
Last year, more than 70,000 people hit Memphis, Tenn. for “Elvis Week” and Debley stood in intense Delta heat for nine hours to pass through the Graceland meditation garden where Presley and his parents — Gladys and Vernon — are buried.
Inching their way in line next to him stood a couple who had flown in from Japan to pay their respects.
[For a complete understanding of the love the Japanese have for Elvis, see the Jim Jarmusch movie “Mystery Train.”]
“I did my first Elvis show after seeing ‘Aloha From Hawaii’ on PBS when I was six,” said Debley, who said there were no Elvis records in the house he grew up in. “I taped that show and just watched it over and over and over,” he said.
In high school drama class, Debley chose an Elvis song for an assignment and “everyone went crazy.”
Now he wears costumes designed by Bill Belew — the man who dressed the King in leather for his 1968 “comeback” special — and Mrs. Debley worries less about Elvis impersonator groupies than someone getting lipstick on an expensive outfit.
In Memphis this week, Debley will perform at a benefit for Alzheimer’s research and compete in “Images of the King,” considered the World Series of Elvis impersonator contests.
“It’s not about the jumpsuit, you have to have a feel for who Elvis was — his humor and his generous nature, his charisma,” Debley said. “If you do it right, old ladies turn into young girls right before your eyes.”
