Sofia Coppola’s Priscilla has garnered much praise for exploring the rocky relationship between Priscilla Presley, played by Cailee Spaeny, and the king of rock and roll, Elvis Presley, played by Jacob Elordi. However, the film was not without criticism, especially concerning the portrayal of Elvis, as the movie depicts scenes of Elvis’ abuse toward Priscilla. In one particular scene, Elordi’s Elvis is shown violently packing Priscilla’s bags after a fight about love notes Priscilla discovers from another woman.
Coppola spoke to Richard Curtis at London’s BFI Southbank about her experience depicting Elvis’ character, “I really tried not to make it black-and-white. I really tried not to make him the villain. But that scene was the hardest one, it was really hard to do that. We only did a few takes. I couldn’t see her being treated in that cruel way. But it’s a love story to her and it had a lot of highs and lows, so I tried to balance it so that it had exciting times and dark times.”
Staying true to Priscilla’s experience was very important to the director. Coppola, who wrote and directed the movie, based the screenplay on Priscilla’s memoir Elvis and Me, published in 1985; Coppola also spoke with Presley when writing the script.
“It’s all based on how she describes her life in the book. I was really surprised that she expressed all that in the book, and no one seemed to notice,” Coppola told Curtis, “like, no one seems to know about her. Just for her to be so young- their relationship power dynamics were already complicated, but then to be so much younger and he could just send her away if she didn’t like something. She was in a really hard position, I thought, and the fact that she got through that and had the strength to leave and make her own life and wasn’t beaten down by that, I think that’s really impressive.”
One of the most outspoken critics of the movie was Priscilla and Elvis’ late daughter, Lisa Marie. Marie sent emails to Coppola after reading the script, expressing her displeasure with the portrayal of her father in the script. In an email obtained by Variety, Marie wrote, “My father only comes 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?”
Despite Marie’s objections to the film, her mother, Priscilla Presley, showed full support of the script, and the movie was successful at the box office, earning Coppola enthusiastic praise for her film.
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