Priscilla Presley

Priscilla Presley
Priscilla Presley, September 2003
Born	Priscilla Ann Wagner
Other names	Priscilla Beaulieu
Occupation	Actress/Businesswoman
Years active	1977–present
Spouse	Elvis Presley (1967–1973)
Partner(s)	Elvis Presley (1959–1967) Mike Stone (1972–1975) Michael Edwards (1978–1984) Marco Garibaldi (1984–2006)
Website	http://www.priscillapresley.com/

Priscilla Beaulieu Presley (born Priscilla Ann Wagner on May 24, 1945) is an American actress and businesswoman. She is the ex-wife of singer and actor Elvis Presley, and the mother of singer/songwriter Lisa Marie Presley. Priscilla is the founder of Elvis Presley Enterprises, where she served as chairman of the board from 1982 to 1998. As an actress, Priscilla is best known for co-starring with Leslie Nielsen in the three successful Naked Gun films, and for her five-year run playing the character Jenna Wade on the popular television series Dallas.

Ancestry and early life

Presley's grandfather, Albert Henry Iversen, emigrated from Egersund in Norway to the United States in the beginning of the 1900s. He married Lorraine Davis, who was of Scots-Irish and English descent. They had three children: Albert junior (March 1922), James Richard (March 1924) and Anna Lillian Iversen (March 1926). Later she was called, or her name was changed to, Ann. She was called Rooney (short for Annie Rooney) as a child. At the age of nineteen she became mother of Priscilla. Both Presley and her mother still have cousins in Norway. In a letter to the City Hall of Egersund, Ann asked for information about their relatives, and wrote that Priscilla was very interested in knowing about them. Presley's parents visited family members in Norway in 1992; Ann said their daughter was supposed to join them, but was busy at the time.

Presley has her "own place" in Egersund – Priscilla Presleys plass. When she was told about this tribute being planned, by a visiting Norwegian relative (summer 2007), and asked what she thought, she answered: "Oh, it's marvellous!". The area is outside the house, Kirkegaten 23, where her grandfather was born in 1896, and lived. Presley and her family were invited by the lord mayor of Egersund to the opening ceremony of Priscilla Presleys plass, which took place August 23, 2008, but were unable to go due to Lisa Marie Presley being pregnant.

Priscilla Presley's biological father was US Navy pilot James Wagner (called Jimmy or Jim). His parents were Kathryn and Harold Wagner. 10 August 1944, at the age of 23, he married Presley's mother; they had been dating for more than three years. He was killed in a plane crash when Priscilla was six months old.

In 1948 her mother met a man from Quebec, Paul Beaulieu, who was a United States Air Force officer. The couple were married within a year. Beaulieu took over the raising of Priscilla and was the only father Priscilla would ever know. Over the next few years, Priscilla grew up quickly, helping to care for the growing family as her father's Air Force career moved them from Connecticut to New Mexico then to Maine. Priscilla later recalled that she felt uncomfortable moving so often because she never knew if she could make friends for life, or even if she would fit in with the new people she met on each move.

In 1956, the Beaulieus moved to and settled in Austin, Texas.

Personal life

Presley is a devoted member of the controversial Church of Scientology, and speaks publicly for the religion's anti-psychiatry front group, the CCHR.

Life with Elvis

Main article: Elvis and Me

Elvis and Priscilla met in 1959 at a party in Bad Nauheim, Germany during his stay in the army. She was 14 years old at the time. They quickly began a romantic relationship and were frequently together until Elvis left Germany in 1960. In her autobiography, Elvis and Me, Priscilla says that Elvis refused to have sex with her until they were married. However, biographer Suzanne Finstad writes that Priscilla and Elvis slept together on their second date, and that she wasn't a virgin when she met him. Priscilla later filed a lawsuit against Currie Grant for his claim in Finstad's book that he had sex with her in exchange for introducing her to Elvis and won. However, neither Finstad nor her publisher was a party to the lawsuit, and Finstad says she stands by the account in her book.

Priscilla and Elvis stayed in contact over the phone, though they would not see each other again until the summer of 1962, when Priscilla's parents agreed to let her visit for two weeks. After another visit at Christmas, Priscilla's parents finally let her move to America for good. Part of the agreement was that she would be attend an all-girls' Catholic school, and live with Elvis' father and his stepmother in a separate house on the Graceland estate until she graduated high school. Priscilla's parents allowed her to live at Graceland only if Elvis promised to eventually marry her. Shortly before Christmas 1966, Elvis proposed to Priscilla. They married on May 1, 1967 at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas. Their only child, Lisa Marie, was born on February 1, 1968.

For the first few years, they were very happily married. However, when Elvis' career took off again, he was constantly touring and playing in Las Vegas. Due to Elvis being away so often and his ever-growing drug dependence, their marriage soured. Some of his health problems troubled his doctors and so they went undiagnosed until long after his death. Elvis was a keen karate student, and persuaded Priscilla to take it up. Priscilla thought it was a good idea as it would pass the lonesome time if she had a hobby to concentrate on. Priscilla was having an affair with a mutual acquaintance—Mike Stone, a karate instructor she had met in 1971 backstage at one of Elvis' concerts. It was Elvis who first suggested Priscilla should take lessons from Stone. Once the news of their affair came to his attention, he raged obsessively: "There's too much pain in me... Stone [must] die."

Elvis and Priscilla separated on February 23, 1972 after 13 years together. Elvis filed for legal separation in August 1972, and then filed for divorce in January 1973. In the following months, Priscilla visited Elvis in Las Vegas where she claims that he forced himself upon her in his hotel room and said "This is how a real man makes love to a woman.". They were divorced on October 9, 1973, agreeing to share custody of their daughter. They remained friends until Elvis died on August 16, 1977.

Later relationships

Presley has not remarried since her divorce from Elvis, although she has had long-term relationships.

Presley moved to Los Angeles after her separation from Elvis where she resided in an apartment with lover Mike Stone in the Marina Del Ray area. Stone was often away at Karate tournamnets in Hawaii, which eventually led to their breakup in 1975.

Presley purchased a large mansion in Beverly Hills in 1975. She had several brief relationships during the following years, and dated lawyer Robert Kardashian in 1976.

In 1978, Presley began a relationship with male model Michael Edwards. She invited Edwards and his daughter Caroline to move into her mansion. They were together for six years before breaking up in 1984. In 1988, he wrote a book entitled Priscilla, Elvis, and Me, in which he says he was obsessed with Elvis and was sexually attracted to Priscilla's daughter, Lisa Marie. In the book, Edwards claims that Priscilla had a one-night-stand with actor Richard Gere in 1983 and confirmed tabloid stories that Priscilla had dated singer Julio Iglesias.

In late 1984, Priscilla began dating screenwriter Marco Garibaldi. They were together for nearly 22 years. The couple has one son, Navarone, who was born on March 1, 1987. In 2005, Navarone was arrested for possession of magic mushrooms. Presley and Garibaldi broke up in March 2006. At the beginning of their relationship, Priscilla and Marco signed a promissory agreement that if they should break up, he will not write a book about her.

In 2007, Priscilla was romantically linked with Nigel Lythgoe. In March 2008, she told Access Hollywood that she was not dating anyone.

Priscilla has 4 grandchildren: Riley (born May 29, 1989), Ben (born October 21, 1992), and twins Harper and Finley (born October 7, 2008).

Career

Business in Graceland

Main article: Graceland

After the death of Elvis' father Vernon in 1979, Presley served as co-executor of his estate. Marty Lacker, a close friend of Elvis, says he was approached by Priscilla after the singer's death "to help talk Vernon into naming her [in his will]."

Graceland itself cost $500,000 a year in upkeep, and expenses had dwindled Lisa Marie's inheritance to $5 million. Priscilla examined other famous house-museums, and hired a CEO to turn Graceland into a moneymaker. She became the chairwoman and president of Elvis Presley Enterprises. It cost $536,000 to open Graceland, a massive gamble at the time and one which was certainly not guaranteed to pay off, but that money was earned back in the first 38 days that it was open to the public. After Graceland opened to the public in 1982, the enterprise's fortunes soared and eventually the trust grew to be worth over $100 million.

In addition, in 2000, Presley was elected to the board of directors of MGM, with the prime vote coming from Kirk Kerkorian, who dated Priscilla in the 1970s.

Acting

Priscilla had ambition to be an actress since she was a child, but did not pursue an acting career until after Elvis' death. Though she had once been considered as part of the original lineup for Charlie’s Angels, her acting career began modestly with a co-hosting job on the ABC series Those Amazing Animals from 1980 to 1981. Her first appearance was a guest spot on The Fall Guy in 1983. Her first film role was in the 1983 TV movie, Love is Forever, opposite Michael Landon. She later graduated to a recurring role as Jenna Wade, Bobby Ewing’s first love and mother of his son, Lucas, on Dallas from 1983 to 1988. She departed the series after disagreeing with the direction of her character and the series, settling into a regular rotation of guest star roles and appearances on Elvis-related documentaries and specials.

In 1988, Priscilla starred opposite Leslie Nielsen in the action comedy The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!, which unexpectedly became a huge box-office hit. She returned to the role in the hit 1991 sequel The Naked Gun 2 1/2: The Smell of Fear, followed by Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult, in 1994.

Priscila's only other feature film has been the poorly received The Adventures of Ford Fairlane, in 1990. She hasn't acted in nearly a decade. Her most recent appearances have been on the television shows Melrose Place, in 1996, Touched by an Angel, in 1997, and in Spin City, in 1999.

Products

Priscila maintained a successful boutique from 1973 through 1976. Celebrity clients included Natalie Wood, Barbra Streisand, and Cher. She eventually signed with the William Morris Agency and landed a job as the national spokesperson for Wella Balsam’s line of hair products. Priscilla also launched her own fragrance, Moments, in 1988. Its popularity yielded a second brand, Experiences, in 1994, and Indian Summer followed in 1996.

Dancing with the Stars

Presley was a contestant on Season 6 of Dancing with the Stars. She was partnered with Louis van Amstel.

She referred, on air, to Dancing with the Stars as "the hardest thing she's ever had to do." She scored 24 out of 30 on the [foxtrot] on March 18, 2008, the second-highest score of the evening. The following week she scored 21 for her first Latin dance, the mambo. The third week she danced the tango and was highly praised by the judges, coming second on the leaderboard with a score of 26. The fourth week she danced the waltz and scored only 22. The judges lowered her score due to a lift in the routine. In the results show the following night, Priscilla found herself in the bottom two, but just managed to stay in the competition. The fifth week, Priscilla danced the rumba and scored 21, leaving her at the bottom of the leadboard. Priscilla found herself in the bottom two once again and this time she was voted off with the least amount of votes. The fifth week, she was eliminated.

Performances

Week #	Dance/Song	Judges' score			Result
		Inaba	Goodman	Tonioli
1	Foxtrot/ "Feeling Good"	8	8	8	Safe
2	Mambo/ "Bossa Nova Hand Dance (Deixa Isso Pra La)"	7	7	7	Safe
3	Tango/ "El Choclo"	8	9	9	Safe
4	Viennese Waltz/ "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man"	7	7	8	Bottom Two
5	Rumba/ "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face"	7	7	7	Eliminated

Portrayals

Priscilla has been portrayed by Season Hubley in the film Elvis (1979), Susan Walters in Elvis and Me (1988), Alyson Court in Elvis Meets Nixon (1997), Antonia Bernath in the CBS miniseries Elvis (2005) and Erin Chambers in Tears of a King (2007).

Bibliography

• Priscilla Presley, Elvis and Me (1985), ISBN 0-399-12984-7
• Priscilla Presley, Elvis by the Presleys with Lisa Marie Presley (2005), ISBN 0-307-23741-9
• Suzanne Finstad, Child Bride:The Untold Story Of Priscilla Beaulieu Presley (1997)

External links

• Official Site Priscilla Presley
• Priscilla Presley at IMDb
• Priscilla Beaulieu Presley Fansite