Elvis: The Sad Connection That Made Austin Butler's Casting Perfect
Elvis Presley’s story is coming to screens this summer in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis, with Austin Butler in the titular role and a tragedy in Butler's life sadly makes him the perfect casting. The film’s trailer exhibits Luhrmann’s trademark style with a beautiful, dream-like quality but it is Butler’s authenticity—his fragility—that is the trailer’s most captivating element. For that, there is good reason: Elvis’ Austin Butler (who is known for his role in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood) has a sad connection with Presley that made him tragically perfect for the role of a lifetime.
The Elvis movie follows Presley’s life from childhood, showing him as a young boy in Memphis in the 1940s. Mesmerized by the gospel music he discovered at the local Black church, Presley’s musical inspirations drew largely on the style along with his love for blues and rock. Presley was discovered in the early 1950s after his soon-to-be manager, Colonel Tom Parker, heard a recording Presley made for his mother. Luhrmann’s Elvis movie will closely follow the relationship between Presley and Parker (played by Forrest Gump’s Tom Hanks), from the 1950s until the later years of Presley’s career, which ended with his death in 1977. It is Presley’s relationship with his mother, however, that led to Butler’s casting as one of music’s biggest icons.
Related: Does Austin Butler Really Sing In Elvis?
Like Presley, Butler was extremely close to his mother, who he claims gave up her own career in support of his. Tragically, both Presley and Butler lost their mothers at the age of 23, a fact that haunted Butler as he dove further into Presley’s history during the audition process with Luhrmann. The connection was so powerful for Elvis’ Austin
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