Now, after decades in his shadow,Priscilla Beaulieu Presleygets the Hollywood treatment herself.
A fitting parallel given both women’s business acumen and ability to commodify and interrogate the expectations of femininity.
That’s precisely what Coppola is seeking to do here.
Cailee Spaeny as Priscilla Presley and Jacob Elordi as Elvis Presley in ‘Priscilla’.A24
Coppola doesn’t let him.
Instead, Elordi creates an Elvis who is more petulant and immature than the actual teenager he’s dating.
But her schoolwork also isolates her from the adults who surround her.
Jacob Elordi and Cailee Spaeny in ‘Priscilla’.Sabrina Lantos/A24
He builds her a gilded cage constructed out of hairspray, eyeliner, and amphetamines.
It sidesteps well-documented affairs Priscilla had, which is neither here nor there.
But most crucially, it gives us no clear sense of how or why Priscilla finds herself.
Jacob Elordi and Cailee Spaeny in ‘Priscilla’.Ken Woroner/A24
It is true that in so many ways the love between them never died.
Cailee Spaeny in ‘Priscilla’.Sabrina Lantos/A24
Cailee Spaeny in ‘Priscilla’.Sabrina Lantos/A24
