‘Elvis’ Director Baz Luhrmann on His Leading Man’s Transformation: ‘The Austin Butler That Was in Disney Shows Doesn’t Exist Anymore’
thewrap.comlittle too much sway over the King of Rock ‘n Roll. Sure, he helped elevate Presley in the public consciousness but also trapped him in a gilded cage.True to form Luhrmann gives the story an extreme stylistic overlay; songs bleed and warm into each other, remixed frenetically with modern artists and current sensibilities. (Elvis and Priscilla fall in love to a cover by Kacey Musgraves, for example.) It’s overwhelming in all of the best ways and fits thematically with what Luhrmann is trying to accomplish – just as Elvis the performer warped all of pop culture around him, so too does “Elvis” the movie.TheWrap talked with Luhrmann while he was promoting the movie at Graceland, and spoke openly about his decision to center the film on Colonel Tom Parker, whether or not Austin Butler will talk like himself again (and offers a solution for how that could be accomplished) and Guillermo del Toro’s unlikely connection to “Elvis.”You were first announced on this project back in 2014.
What was the biggest change that the movie went through from when you were initially attached to where we are now?Well, if I remember correctly, I took it on not to do a biopic, but I always thought Elvis would be this great canvas to explore America because he’s sort of at the center of everything in the fifties, sixties and seventies.
And then I stepped away from it because I was doing a Chinese film, actually, a film set in China. I was working on it and I couldn’t find a way in.
And then I can’t remember when, but things started to change. And I learned more about Colonel Tom Parker, never a Colonel, never a Tom, never a Parker – plot twist! – and I thought, Oh, this is like “Amadeus.” “Amadeus” isn’t really about Mozart.
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