ELVIS & ONJ WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN
A fleeting encounter left the late singer wanting more
Olivia Newton-john’s career was laden with collaborations with some of music and acting’s finest. But there was one enormous star that got away – Elvis Presley!
Elvis was reportedly very close to signing on and singing Beauty School Dropout in Grease but had to pull out at the last minute over a change of heart. Sadly, he would pass away less than a year later, but Olivia always felt she and Elvis were a missed opportunity. Insiders reveal much like everyone back then, the late legend had a heart-thumping crush on him.
“They came so close to working together, but something always got in the way,” shares the insider. “There was no doubt Elvis wanted to work with her.”
The Aussie legend, who died at 73 earlier this month after a 30-year journey with breast cancer, went to see Elvis in concert twice in her life and he would treat her to a special song each time.
At his Long Beach, California, performance in April 1976, he spotted her in the crowd and then sang her 1974 hit If You Love Me (Let Me Know).
“Olivia’s mind was blown,” says the insider.
In her 2018 memoir Don’t Stop Believin’, she wrote about hearing him sing to her again at the Hilton in Las Vegas. “During the show, Elvis shocked me and sang my song Let Me Be There.
It blew me away to hear him say my name, because I was such a big fan... but sadly I never met Elvis up close and personal. His road manager said there was an emergency and Elvis had to leave the building, literally!”
Friends say that Olivia was never one to have regrets, but not getting to work with the King is a hard one to forget.
“She was always a huge Elvis fan,” says one source. “It was why she agreed to lend her voice to a digitised ‘duet’ with Elvis for a Christmas album in 2008. She gave a beautiful rendition of O Come All Ye Faithful and you can tell it was finally her chance to sing for him, instead of the other way around.”
‘During the show, Elvis shocked me and sang my song’