Elvis is Baz Luhrmann's cinematic tribute to the cultural phenomenon of Elvis Presley, a phenomenon that Presley's former studio, Sun Records, cashed in on with a masked singer known only as Orion. Luhrmann's movie tells the story of Elvis Presley, from his modest childhood to his untimely death, from the perspective of his former manager, Colonel Tom Parker (Tom Hanks.) Parker is a rare villain role for the supremely likable Hanks, who appears to relish the chance to play Presley's controlling and manipulative manager.
Parker saw Elvis Presley as the ultimate "Snow Job", a carnival term that referred to an attraction that would convince audiences to part with their cash. Parker dubbed himself The Snowman, an unashamed profiteer and conman. Luhrmann's movie exposes Parker's business practices as what they were later deemed to be by the courts, the financial abuse of Elvis Presley. However, Colonel Tom Parker wasn't the only industry conman who sought to profit from the Presley myth, as the story of Sun Records and Orion proves.
The story of Orion picks up in the wake of Elvis' untimely death from a heart attack in 1977. With a nation in mourning for the King of Rock and Roll, bereft fans flocked to Graceland to pay tribute to Presley, and spoke on camera about their wish that he was still alive. The Elvis ending doesn't linger too long on the public outpouring of grief for Presley, but another film, 2015's documentary Orion: The Man Who Would Be King becomes a spiritual sequel of sorts, and tells the eerily similar story of Orion and his own controlling and manipulative manager, Shelby Singleton, who sought to profit off Elvis' ing via Orion himself.
Who Was Orion? The Masked Man Who Sounded Like Elvis
The genesis of the artist known as Orion actually began long before the death of Elvis Presley, with a singer by the name of Jimmy Ellis. His career aspirations were both helped and hindered by his voice, which was uncannily similar to that of Elvis Presley, and he emphasized this similarity when he sang Elvis songs. Close friends of Jimmy's have even suggested that because he was adopted and never knew his father, he may have been the King's half-brother. One friend even claims to have seen Jimmy's birth certificate which listed his biological father as simply Vernon, which is also the name of Elvis' father.
Hearing of Jimmy's uncanny singing voice, record producer Shelby Singleton edited Ellis' vocals into old recordings by the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, releasing and promoting them as "lost" Elvis tracks from the Sun Studios archive. At the same time novelist, Gail Brewer-Giorgio was writing Orion, a fictional story about a singer, heavily based on Elvis Presley, who fakes their death to escape the public eye. Brewer-Giorgio's novel, Jimmy Ellis' career aspirations, and Shelby Singleton's business converged to create Orion, the masked singer who allowed Jimmy to essentially perform as Elvis Presley for those grief-stricken audiences who wanted to believe he was still alive.
Orion released a staggering number of records between 1979 and 1981, and toured up and down the United States, and beyond. The royalties for the records and public appearances sadly never trickled down to Jimmy Ellis. Growing increasingly frustrated with Singleton's control over his career and identity, Ellis publicly tore off his mask and vowed never to wear it again. It proved once and for all that Orion and Elvis Presley were two separate people, and immediately severed Ellis and Singleton's working relationship. The parasitic relationship between Singleton and Ellis is eerily similar to the dynamic between Tom Hanks' Elvis role and Austin Butler's Presley, proving that Jimmy Ellis and Elvis Presley had far more in common than their vocal range.
