Lisa Marie Presley complained to Sofia Coppola over Priscilla film script
Lisa Marie Presley complained to director Sofia Coppola that a new film's script made her father Elvis out to be "a predator and manipulative", according to Hollywood outlet Variety.
Lisa Marie wrote to the filmmaker to raise concerns four months before her death in January, Variety reported.
The film tells the story of her mother Priscilla, who met Elvis at the age of 14. Priscilla supported the movie.
He is depicted with "sensitivity and complexity", Coppola told Lisa Marie. The film, titled Priscilla, is based on Priscilla's 1985 memoir Elvis and Me.
In one email, Lisa Marie reportedly wrote: "My father only comes across as a predator and manipulative.
"As his daughter, I don't read this and see any of my father in this character. I don't read this and see my mother's perspective of my father. I read this and see your shockingly vengeful and contemptuous perspective and I don't understand why?"
Lisa Marie threatened to speak out publicly against it and her mother's support for it. "I am worried that my mother isn't seeing the nuance here or realising the way in which Elvis will be perceived when this movie comes out," she wrote.
"I am worried she doesn't understand the intentions behind this film or the outcome it will have."
As well as supplying the source material and being an executive producer, Priscilla has given a number of interviews to support the film. She said it was an accurate depiction of her and her relationship with the King of Rock 'n' Roll.
Coppola, who won an Oscar in 2004 for the screenplay for Lost in Translation, "did some homework", Priscilla said. "She and I, we talked about it."
Referring to the start of their relationship in 1959 when she was just 14 and he was 24 and serving in the US Army in Germany, Priscilla told Morgan it was "a different time".
Elvis was "unique", she said. "I don't know about grooming me. I didn't take it at that. I'd never heard the word. He loved to take me to beautiful stores to buy me an outfit. I didn't have any money. He would take me to the movies every night."
She said she understood why people today would think it was inappropriate. "But I was 14 in
Germany, and there was always people around," she said. "Our talks were private, but he never ever, ever, ever was aggressive, nor did he ever make love to me [until they got married when she was 21]. I was someone he trusted to talk to and pour his heart out [to]."
Coppola's representative gave Variety the message she sent to Lisa Marie in reply to her emails. "I hope that when you see the final film you will feel differently, and understand I'm taking great care in honouring your mother, while also presenting your father with sensitivity and complexity," she wrote.
Lisa Marie died at the age of 54 after a cardiac arrest caused by a "small bowel obstruction" that arose following weight-loss surgery she'd had several years earlier.
The Priscilla film was released widely in the US on Friday and stars Cailee Spaeny in the title role, with Jacob Elordi playing Elvis. It will reach cinemas in the UK in January.