Elvis lives
“ Elvis is alive ” or “ The King is alive ” is a phrase that is known all over the world and refers to the rock singer Elvis Presley .
Origin and use
The phrase relates on the one hand to rumors after Elvis Presley's death that he was still alive. On the other hand, the term found serious use among followers, who primarily used it to express their loyalty to their idol beyond death. Early on, authors and journalists began using the headlines of books and articles on Presley.
The enormous spread of the saying in numerous media goes back to the cover story I've seen Elvis in the flesh! ("I saw Elvis in person!") Of the American periodical Weekly World News from the summer of 1988. At the center of the story was a Michigan housewife who Presley allegedly met at a Burger King store in Kalamazoo over a decade after his death . The issue in question sold 1.2 million copies, making it the best-selling in the history of the paper. It was only out of this meaning that “Elvis is alive” later developed into a catchphrase that is used to comment on incredible and unrealistic things.
In addition, the phrase is also used in relation to the complex afterlife of Presley , especially as an icon of pop culture commercialized beyond death.
Comedies
In recent years the phrase has also been used for comedy titles: the play Elvis is alive. And Schmidt can prove it (2007) by Harald Schmidt or the film comedy Elvis is Alive (2001) by Don Murray . Elvis lives is also the humorous title of a crime scene episode by Felix Mitterer from 2002. The authentic case of the poacher Pius Walder was turned into a crime film with a lot of sarcastic humor.
In the 1989 US TV series ALF , a man named Aaron King moves into the neighborhood in the episode Me and the King (season 3, episode 15). Alf, who consumed numerous gossip magazines in the WWN format in this episode, is convinced that the man is Elvis Presley and is stalking him. Whether the man is actually Elvis Presley is not unequivocally clarified because a conversation between him and Alf turns out to be a dream and he moves out a short time later.
In the SWR3 radio comedy Taxi Sharia , every episode ends with the running gag that the (always the same) passenger is "kidnapped" by taxi to Memphis at the end of the sketch because the taxi driver is of the opinion that "Elvis is alive" and he could thus prove it.
The American horror comedy Bubba Ho-Tep is also based on the idea that Elvis is still alive and spending his last days in a retirement home. The saying "The King lives!" adorns the car of an Elvis impersonator in the US thriller Upside Down in the Night .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Stern / Stern: Elvis is alive; Droemer Knaur 1987
- ↑ Allegedly 30th anniversary of death: Elvis is alive! in Süddeutsche Zeitung on August 29, 2007
- ↑ Elvis is alive! The Presley Conspiracy ( April 20, 2012 memento on the Internet Archive ) in Stern January 7, 2010
- ↑ No matter how you twist and turn it, he can't be killed: Elvis is alive! in taz of November 9, 2010
- ^ Title page of the "Weekly World News" from June 28, 1988 to one day from July 13, 2011
- ↑ Uwe Kreisel: Culture Key USA; Hueber 2003, p. 119
- ↑ Presentation on Elvis and the RAF: Harald Schmidt reaps laughter on n-tv on October 13, 2007
- ↑ ALF - Me and the King (Suspicious Love). In: Fernsehserien.de. Retrieved August 15, 2019 .