Elvis Presley’s fourth movie, King Creole, is by most critics’ assessments his best. It was the last movie that Elvis made before he entered the army in the spring of 1958 – it was also his last film in black-and-white, as well as his final effort directed by a serious old-time filmmaker (Michael Curtiz, who also directed Casablanca). A good script, a strong supporting cast and an outstanding soundtrack contributed to provide Elvis with his best opportunity at serious film acting, and the King rose to the occasion. The legendary songwriting team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller contributed three songs to King Creole, among them the title track and « Trouble, » a number Presley would reprise with tremendous success during his 1969 comeback television special. « Hard Headed Woman » is the soundtrack’s biggest hit (it stayed atop the Billboard pop chart for two weeks), but the songs are uniformly strong throughout, and Presley sings with the mastery and dynamism characteristic of nearly all of his 1950s recordings. King Creole takes its name from a New Orleans night club where success as a singer comes to Danny Fisher, a rebellious young man on the verge of becoming a hood. Incidents and characters of the original novel are distorted, but the plot stands up well and the dialogue is salty and emotion-packed. Variety’s 1958 review stated that the film “shows the young star as a better-than-fair actor.” What all of Presley’s singing does accomplish, though, is to periodically break up what is a slow moving plot. Take out Elvis’s music from King Creole, and what you have left is a serious dramatic story that moves steadily forward, but with very little action until the film’s final 20 minutes. The bottom line, though, is that 50 years later, King Creole is still considered by most critics and Elvis fans alike as his best film. Why did it work so well for a young man who was still essentially an actor-in-training? It was more than Elvis’s acting job, good as it was. A number of factors came together to make King Creole an effective vehicle for Presley. In United States, the soundtrack album entered Billboard’s album chart on September 6, 1958, and reached Nº2. The United Kingdom’s first album chart appeared in November of 1958 and features Elvis’ Golden Records and King Creole at Nº3 and Nº4 respectively.
