Baz Luhrmann is about to dive back into his long-aborning Joan of Arc movie. But before he does, he had to return to the Elvis well, and the King\u2019s new and returning subjects are glad he did. \u201cEPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert\u201d opened exclusively in Imax theaters this weekend before going wider to slightly smaller screens on Friday. there was little doubt the audience for Presley is still there, or at least for an Elvis seen through the eyes of one of contemporary cinema\u2019s biggest name-brand directors.<\/p>\n
\u201cEPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert\u201d may not make it to the $151 million domestic gross achieved by the director\u2019s 2022 biopic \u201cElvis\u201d in 2022, but weekend results were strong in the initial 325 Imax theaters that played it this weekend, with a $10,000-per-screen average, the highest of any film on the chart. So Luhrmann can already claim victory in his crusade to immerse contemporary audiences in what he considers to have actually been Presley\u2019s peak period as a performer, when he first started playing Las Vegas at the very end of the \u201960s and beginning of the \u201970s. Critics as well as the Elvis flock have taken to it: Variety\u2018s review, by Owen Gleiberman out of its Toronto premiere, called it \u201cone of the most exciting concert films you\u2019ve ever seen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Popular on Variety<\/p>\n
Prior to his personally touring a series of international Imax unveilingss, Variety spoke with Luhrmann over Zoom at his compound in Australia, where he carefully maneuvered the camera to not reveal any \u201cJehanne d\u2019Arc\u201d spoilers plastered across nearby walls. But there\u2019s nothing to spoil about his contention that, in his mind, Elvis Presley is America\u2026 at any size, but preferably at about 45 feet tall, enshrined in full motion in Hollywood Blvd.\u2019s vaunted Chinese Theatre.<\/p>\n
First off, how are you?<\/p>\n
I am extraordinarily absorbed and busy, and it\u2019s just been my nature since childhood. I\u2019m just always making things and doing things. And I\u2019m deeply absorbed in my big movie, \u201cJehanne d\u2019Arc,\u201d which is driving ahead. But now I take a moment for this completely different work, which is trying to get as many people \u2014 fans and new audiences \u2014 to see \u201cEPiC\u201d on the biggest screen possible. I have to pause and shout out John Redmond, my editor of at least 20 years, who\u2019s the creative partner in this and drove it as much as I did. Our big focus is to make a theatrical cinematic experience, and to make it feel as much as possible like you\u2019re actually in the audience and your experience of Elvis is kind of unfiltered. So part of that is me going out and encouraging people to not wait to stream it, to get out and be part of a theatrical experience. Bluntly, it\u2019s a passion of mine.<\/p>\n
Putting it on Imax screens exclusively for one week before it goes wider is one way of getting that messaging across. And personal appearances you\u2019re making at some Imax screenings.<\/p>\n
Absolutely, man. I\u2019ve been actually in the Gold Coast, where I have my creative facility, then I go to Sydney, which is an outdoor experience with thousands of people, and then that night to the biggest Imax screen in the world, which ia Melbourne. Then I go directly out the back door of that to London, then to L.A. We are doing it at the TCL, the old Mann\u2019s Chinese, in Imax, and I\u2019m thrilled about L.A. because of the memory I have of coming out of COVID.<\/p>\n
Quick side story. After being locked down for two years and working in Australia on \u201cElvis,\u201d the movie, I was finally able to leave and I came to the U.S., landed, and the first thing we said we would do \u2014 with masks on and all of that \u2014 was \u201cLet\u2019s go down to see a movie.\u201d I walked into TCL and \u201cDune\u201d was on, which I didn\u2019t want to see on streaming, in this theater I dearly love. I saw the opening night of \u201cTitanic\u201d there with Leonardo. So I walk up the stairs, thinking, \u201cOh God, what\u2019s it gonna be like \u2014 will there be anyone here? Iit a good idea to go to the theater?\u201d And as I go up the stairs, I can see the screen., and I just stood there and looked at the vast image and the sound, and I just went, \u201cI\u2019m home. I am home.\u201d So the idea that something the whole team has toiled so passionately on is gonna be seen at the TCL, I think for me, that\u2019ll be a historic moment in my journey.<\/p>\n
This includes footage that was shot for a couple of Elvis concert films in the early \u201870s. I liked those films, but I admit I haven\u2019t seen either of them since I had them on laserdisc in the \u201890s\u2026 which is similar to a lot of people\u2019s experience, except maybe minus the laserdisc part. So for those of us without a clear memory of those films, how much of them might be carrying over into what you have in your film, albeit with a big upgrade?<\/p>\n
Yeah, I can tell you. Look, I loved them too. I really did. But the quick narrative is: I\u2019m making \u201cElvis,\u201d and I hear from Jono (Redmond) that there might be these lost reels. He said, \u201cLook, if you\u2019re able to get the funds, maybe try and find these reels.\u201d And Ernst Jorgenson, who is probably the premium expert on Elvis in the world, says to me, \u201cTry and get the funds.\u201d And I go, \u201cOK, maybe we can use some of these extra reels,\u201d as supplementary footage of the (Las Vegas) showroom, which I didn\u2019t have in the film at that point. So we got the funds, we go looking, and to our surprise, we find 69 boxes. I didn\u2019t go there, but it\u2019s literally in the salt mines in Kansas City where the negatives of the whole MGM collection are kept so that they don\u2019t rot. When the guys find it, they start sending pictures \u2014 boxes everywhere, some are mislabeled, some stuff missing, some not. Wow. So we bring it out and we print some of it. I go, \u201cLook, this is too big a job right now. I\u2019m gonna build the showroom (as a practical set). We\u2019re not gonna use it.\u201d<\/p>\n
But now we have 59 hours of not just \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is,\u201d but \u201cElvis on Tour,\u201d and some 8mm. And most tellingly, we have this audio \u2014 about 50 minutes of it \u2014 of Elvis just talking about his life in a way in which you really never hear him talk. So all the way through making \u201cElvis,\u201d we said, \u201cWe\u2019ve got to do something.\u201d And the Elvis fans got wind of it, and it was a bit like, \u201cRelease the video! Release the footage!\u201d Like, \u201cRelease the files! \u2014 the Elvis Files.\u201d And I contemplated: Do we just kind of do a reboot of \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is\u201d and \u201cElvis on Tour\u201d? But then we also had this 8mm that was extraordinary, and we had this audio, and we also got things like the full Hampton Road concert (shot on 1972 at the Hampton Roads Coliseum in Virginia for \u201cElvis on Tour\u201d). But we only had negatives and we didn\u2019t have the sound.<\/p>\n
I was so lucky to work with Peter Jackson and his remarkable team at his studio, because you know how Peter had done refurbed the Beatles (for the \u201cGet Back\u201d docuseries). And Park Road have a particular gift for (upgrading) 35mm anamorphic. MGM shot in 35mm anamorphic for \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is.\u201d Then you had 16 and you had 8. I wanted to bring it all up to Imax quality, so that\u2019s expensive. And then we spent two years trying to find the sound. The mag tape wasn\u2019t there, so we had to find audio. Sometimes we had people in car parks in the middle of the night trading bootleg stuff. I mean, the bootleg industry for Elvis is gargantuan.But the concept becomes: Why don\u2019t we do something that never really happens when it comes to either an Elvis doc or even a concert film, and just let Elvis tell his story \u2014 sing it and tell it to you \u2014 almost like in a dreamscape?<\/p>\n
\u2018EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert\u2019 Neon<\/p>\n
Now, John Redmond will be able tell you what\u2019s in this exactly frame by frame. [For more of that, look to a separate interview with Redmond about making the film, coming up in Variety.] There are some bits that are in \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is,\u201d and there are some bits that look like they\u2019re in \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is,\u201d but actually aren\u2019t; it\u2019s a different night, or a different angle. Then there is a significant percentage of the footage which is material that just simply has not been seen. Or maybe some seconds or some minutes have been bootlegged.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll give you an example. There\u2019s an amazing bit I love where Elvis was just sitting with the guitar and he is doing \u201cLittle Sister,\u201d and he segues into \u201cGet Back.\u201d Now, there\u2019s pirated black-and-white stuff out there, but through Park Road we were able to print it and bring it back into a colorscape. Or, when he sings \u201cHow Great Thou Art\u201d in the gospel section, 16mm, that\u2019s just never been released. Some of it you would\u2019ve seen in very scratchy bootleg versions. But even if you\u2019ve seen some of it in \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is,\u201d you\u2019ve never seen it like this\u2026 In our movie you see Sammy Davis Jr. and Cary Grant backstage, and we\u2019ve been able to dig back the sound. You\u2019ve seen that footage occasionally, pirated, but we found the sound of what they actually say.<\/p>\n
And we had the original Elvis voice, we have the band, but sometimes I\u2019m going from him singing on stage to him talking. Or we\u2019ve done these DNAs where we\u2019ve kind of made new Elvis songs. So it\u2019s meant to be a dreamscape, and that distinguishes it from \u201cThat\u2019s the Way It Is.\u201d But what I do want to say is, even in Toronto (it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival), people were geeking out about the quality. The image is three times the size of my building I\u2019m in, if you\u2019re in a big Imax. But what we really did was make it sound and feel like you\u2019re actually there.<\/p>\n
For a lot of us who grew up after the main Elvis era, we go through a journey where we come to worship the Sun Sessions of the \u201860s, and things like the \u201968 comeback special, but generally, Elvis later on represents something to us that is spoiled or gone to seed. And so there\u2019s this dichotomy: Black Leather Elvis, cool. White Suit Elvis, not cool. And the average person almost has to put some effort into listening to the boxed sets RCA has put out over the years from the late \u201860s and early \u201870s to discover how much of value is there. There\u2019s still this fallacy we have to get over that Las Vegas was just, in its entirety, not a great period.<\/p>\n
Yeah. A thousand percent. You\u2019re dead right \u2014 the black leather, cool, but the white jumpsuit, because it\u2019s associated with his extremely fast decline at such a young, young age\u2026 And with Las Vegas\u2026 He does it once and twice, and then he does the 15 cities\/15-day tour, great. Then does it again, and then does it again, and then does it again, and then does it again. He doesn\u2019t quite know, like a bird hitting a glass window, why the hell he can\u2019t go and do the world tour that he so desperately wants to do. And then as with all of those artists that are beyond music but are actually cultural icons, all of the corruptive things come, and the body becomes corrupted. So what we remember is the Halloween costume \u2014 the cheesy white jumpsuit that people wear at Halloween with the glasses, or the wedding chapel send-up guy or the impersonators.<\/p>\n
And what gets lost is that when he first did that show, everyone expected him to do a nostalgia show, but he was totally on the cutting edge. And the big sound, like taking \u201cBridge Over Troubled Water\u201d and turning it into this giant gospel power ballad \u2026 I spoke to Clive Davis, and he said, \u201cI was there opening night, and you know what? I still to this day have never seen a night like that,\u201d talking about the opening night, the \u201869 show. The white suit doesn\u2019t come till 1970, because that\u2019s when they film it. But he said, \u201cThey had to stop him from doing cartwheels.\u201d The energy on stage was just on another level.<\/p>\n
So what has been forgotten is that his absolute pinnacle, his true pinnacle, are those very early Vegas shows. The other thing I think is worth taking into account is that the critics were all flown in by Colonel Parker, and it was a time of the counterculture and the Beatles were breaking up. They came basically with an attitude of like, \u201cThis is gonna be a bit of a joke,\u201d and they were utterly blown away by the artistry and the sheer stage power. One thing that I love in the film, for me, personally, is when he is covering the Beatles or doing a Bob Dylan song. Bob Dylan actually said, \u201cThe highlight of my career, that\u2019s easy, Elvis recording one of my songs.\u201d<\/p>\n
I mean, even the white jumpsuit, by the way: If you look at Mick Jagger and Freddie Mercury, the jumpsuit becomes this huge rock \u2018n\u2019 roll iconic thing. Mick wore it, Freddie wore it. But it comes from Elvis.<\/p>\n
Neon<\/p>\n
One thing not everyone will be aware of before seeing this is how great the TCB Band is, with some of the greatest players in the world, on their game.<\/p>\n
What do you think the privilege is like to be able to work with this stuff? I\u2019ve produced a lot of music; I\u2019ve been working with RCA for, like, 15 years; I\u2019ve had a label with them. But to be able to isolate just Ronnie Tutt\u2019s drumming\u2026 the Tuttster\u2019s drumming\u2026 He\u2019s surrounded by the best. And when you see Elvis rehearsing, he sings the top lines \u2014 like, he sings the orchestrations \u2014 and he\u2019ll go, \u201cNo, no, no, let\u2019s go up here.\u201d It\u2019s in his head. And I think what gets lost again in the whole white jumpsuit kind of Halloween costume smoke is what an awesome and profoundly gifted musician he was. He\u2019d just pick up and sing anything. By the way, think of the voice. So, he\u2019s starting as a high tenor in the \u201850s. But he\u2019s so obsessed with Mario Lanza and opera singers, and he says in our film, \u201cI listen to everything,\u201d and he\u2019s always working on his voice. By the end of it, he\u2019s truly got operatic tone.<\/p>\n
You have some augmented or drastically remixed tracks in the film and on the soundtrack.<\/p>\n
Working with Jamieson Shaw, we started doing this on \u201cElvis\u201d the movie, thinking, instead of just having score all the time \u2014 although we do have score in this \u2014sometimes we go, \u201cWell, why don\u2019t we just make a new Elvis track?\u201d \u2026 We have this small section of Elvis singing \u201cOh, Happy Day\u201d with the Sweets [the Sweet Inspirations]. We started the movie with him singing that, but he always dreamed of singing with really giant Black gospel choirs, because as you know, he would go when he was a kid and see people like Mahalia Jackson. Elvis was always mixing white and Black gospel. So we have him singing with the Sweets, but then we also recorded choirs in churches in the South, so that we could realize slightly the dream, in this dreamscape, of Elvis singing \u201cHappy Day\u201d with a giant gospel choir. And a big shout-out to our lovely friends in the South who recorded that for us. It\u2019s just going like, well, what if\u2026 wouldn\u2019t it be amazing\u2026 we\u2019re always asking the question, what would Elvis do?<\/p>\n
If you read reviews of the comeback special, some of the (critics) said, \u201cOnce again, Elvis is selling sex, but really can\u2019t sing.\u201d I mean, I work in opera. I\u2019ve worked with the greatest singers in the world. And he\u2019s almost like Orpheus, he\u2019s so gifted. I\u2019ve heard the raw vocals. He never recorded in studios with a drop mic; he always had a handheld. So when he\u2019s on stage, the clarity and the evenness of the vocal, even with a pretty crap sound system, is so great. That\u2019s because he\u2019s basically mixing it himself, by mic technique. Which is a thing you just learn \u2014 when you bring it in and out, basically, you\u2019re balancing yourself. I\u2019ve heard raw tracks of all sorts of icons, and he has the greatest mic technique of any vocal artist that ever existed.<\/p>\n
Do you have a favorite performance of his that\u2019s in the film?<\/p>\n
Well, I always avoid doing lists. But, I really lock in every single time when he does \u201cPolk Salad Annie,\u201d because it\u2019s so random. When he goes into the onomatopoeia\u2026I don\u2019t wanna be the world\u2019s biggest name dropper, but a famous, famous, iconic singer of a famous band who I dearly love as a friend said to me, \u201cOh, the thing about us is, we rehearse, but Elvis never rehearsed moves. It\u2019s a bit like he\u2019s in a spiritual state. He just kind of felt it.\u201d And you see it in \u201cPolk Salad,\u201d him just feeling the music and doing the scat, and then the movement, and then what he does at the end \u2014 he\u2019s not so much making it up as he\u2019s going along as just feeling it and passing it on to the audience. And I think that\u2019s why he\u2019s so enigmatic on stage, is that not only does the audience not know what he\u2019s gonna do, the band didn\u2019t know what he was gonna do. Ronnie Tutt said, \u201cWe had to glue our eyes to him because we were like, what\u2019s he gonna do next?\u201d That\u2019s why he\u2019s so remarkable as a live performer, because he is literally like a live wire. For a person who\u2019s so uncomfortable off-stage, he\u2019s so comfortable on stage. It\u2019s like you\u2019re in his lounge room, hanging out.<\/p>\n
Speaking of iconic singers of famous bands. Bono has been very interested in Elvis all along, even writing a song on \u201cThe Unforgettable Fire\u201d that is essentially his poem about Elvis. Here, you have Bono delivering another poem speaking at the end of the movie. How did that come about?<\/p>\n
If you saw the show the guys did in Vegas in the Sphere, there\u2019s a lot of Elvis in that, you know? Bono is a real friend, and we\u2019ve collaborated way back in \u201cMoulin Rouge,\u201d and he was such a help on this, just as a cheerleader. I was in the South of France where he lives, and he said, \u201cLook, I\u2019ve written a poem about Elvis,\u201d and he read it to me. Jono and I were thinking, how do we end this? You can\u2019t wrap it up with a comment. Is it another song? And John O. put the poem in, and it seemed to be a great way, with a film that is really, I think in itself, a poem, to end poetically. So I rang Bono, and he said, \u201cAbsolutely, I\u2019m honored that you would use it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Baz Luhrmann and Austin Butler at Baz Luhrmann\u2019s \u201cEPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert\u201d Los Angeles Premiere held at the TCL Chinese Theatre on February 18, 2026 in Los Angeles, California. JC Olivera<\/p>\n
You\u2019ve been on such a mission with Elvis, so you must feel gratified that, with the previous film, the world kind of came along with your vision. There has been a fear among some Elvis fans that his core audience will die off, and even the next generations, over time, so will people still be going to Graceland in 50 or 75 years? You forestalled that, to a degree, or at least gave him a major cultural turbo boost. Even though the feature film will probably always be the biggest thing you do for Elvis, it looks like this is going to be kind of a continuum through your life.<\/p>\n
Look, it wasn\u2019t planned that way. I mean, I was affected by Elvis as a child, but I also went on to other artists as I grew up \u2014 Bowie and Michael Jackson and Elton John, for sure, who I love and work with. But Elvis was always there, more than just as a musician or even a pop icon. He was America in so many ways, through the \u201850s, \u201860s and \u201870s \u2014 the incredible rebellious energy, the kind of cool family part, but also then almost rising up like a god, and then the descent. And even in his most corrupted bodily state at the end of his life, he sings \u201cUnchained Melody\u201d with probably the best voice he\u2019s ever had.<\/p>\n
I did not intend to become this enmeshed in the curation of Elvis. But to your question, the gratification for me \u2014 and it\u2019s a little bit unexpected \u2014 was to give Elvis a fair voice. It\u2019s not particularly my vision. Of course, any storytelling is somebody\u2019s storytelling. But when I spent all that time in the South, I found Sam Bell \u2014 very hard to find him, actually; an older gentleman of color who, when Elvis lived in one of the very few white houses in the Black community, told the story about how they grew up. And I really realized at that point the impact of Elvis\u2026 and you can\u2019t extract him from the story of America. He\u2019s that central to so many key things.<\/p>\n
I think about what\u2019s going on in America right now. And if you want to know what Elvis might think \u2014 and I\u2019m not gonna answer for him; he didn\u2019t often use words \u2014 it\u2019s in the song choices. I\u2019m so happy we\u2019ve got \u201cWalk a Mile in My Shoes\u201d or \u201cIn the Ghetto\u201d in this show. And people did not want him to record those songs\u2026 Now we know through the data that not only have we picked up a truly surprising percentage of young audience that have discovered audience Elvis anew, but even little kids jump up and down in front of the television watching the \u201cElvis\u201d movie. It\u2019s Elvis\u2019 energy. It moves through time and geography.<\/p>\n
More than gratified, I feel privileged to have been the curator to help it be guided away from what I consider to be an ossification \u2014 not malicious or on purpose, but an unfair rusting, an untruthful summation, turning Elvis into a trope. It happens. And I wanted to take the trope, shake off the rust and help guide and reveal Elvis for the artist that he is, but also most importantly, the impact that he had on culture and on America as a whole. And the world. And the world \u2014 that\u2019s the thing. We know why he didn\u2019t have the world tour [as explored in the earlier \u201cElvis\u201d film: Colonel Tom Parker had his sway]. And honestly, we are going to give Elvis the world tour he dreamed of. Because he\u2019s gonna be playing on the biggest screens in the world. In Toronto, people actually came up to me and said, \u201cI couldn\u2019t work out whether I was in the audience or not. It felt like I was at the show.\u201d<\/p>\n
Are you still thinking about doing a stage-musical adaptation of the Elvis story?<\/p>\n
Yeah, actually\u2026 I don\u2019t know if it\u2019s announced; I\u2019ll get in trouble. But definitely\u2026 Let us put it this way: serious work is being done on the Elvis stage show, based on the movie.<\/p>\n
Good enough. And then to ask briefly about the Joan of Arc film\u2019s progress\u2026<\/p>\n
I\u2019m so deep in it. The reason I\u2019m shooting this corner of my atelier [on a Zoom call] is because the rest of it is just plastered with story structure and script. We have this extraordinarily gifted, gifted, gifted young actor (Isla Johnston) who\u2019s quietly doing all it\u2019s gonna take. Because it\u2019s gonna take time. I always take time. But I am building medieval France! You know, there\u2019s not a lot of medieval France hanging around ready to be photographed. So it\u2019s not quick, but I\u2019m deep in it. As soon as I finish the tour of Elvis, I\u2019m back to \u201cJehanne d\u2019Arc,\u201d and that will be my next journey. And yet another character who has actually been kind of relegated to a bit of a trope and a little bit forgotten. I like to be involved in those iconic characters from the past who you sort of wish their power and their guidance and their light was around today. Who, in different ways, were the most surprising candidate to have so much of an effect on the world.<\/p>\n
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