Pat Boone says Elvis Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker, was a “spoiler”.
The ‘Ain’t That A Shame’ hitmaker has detailed how the man believed to have defrauded Elvis out of millions stopped him from using the King of Rock’n’Roll’s name on an album cover page
After being asked if he knew Elvis’ famous manager, who was brought to life in Baz Lurhmann’s 2022 biopic ‘Elvis’ by Tom Hanks, the 88-year-old singer told the US edition from Closer magazine: “I knew him well. I made a record in the early ’60s that was going to be called ‘Pat Sings Elvis.’ But Colonel Tom was a swindler. He wanted royalties for using Elvis’ name. So he ‘we called “Pat Boone Sings Guess Who?” On the cover, I’m in a lame gold dress with a guitar doing the Elvis pose, but I never mention Elvis’ name.’
Pat recovered.
He said, “Well, it became a big hit. Tom Parker sent me a membership card to a club he started called the Snowmen’s Club. It’s for people who snow or rush other people. He was the best snowman trickster and I lifted him up.”
The ‘State Fair’ star also shared the times she met Elvis – who died aged 42 in 1977 after suffering a heart attack – even ‘at a sock hop’ in the ’50s when he missed her ‘ social grace”.
He said: “He came about eight months after me, and we were the same age. In the last half of the ’50s, I had 41 chart records, and he had 40. I was introduced backstage in a store of socks in Cleveland, October 1955. He let me shake his hand, but he didn’t shake my hand. [with confidence] because his mother and father had not taught him this social grace. I could tell he wasn’t comfortable talking to me.”
The “I Almost Lost My Mind” hitmaker shared how they later “became really good friends” while making their foray into acting.
Pat said, “We met two or three years later when we were both doing movies at 20th Century Fox. We would visit each other back and forth. We were both renting houses in Bel Air and we got really good. friends”.
