Ifellinlovewith Michaeljackson. Hereminded

13.10.12

LisaMarie Presley ‘I fell in lovewith Michael Jackson. Hereminded me of my dad. They were both dynamic’ By Tim Teeman

THE BILLIONAIRE WHO KEEPS ON GIVING Janice Turner meets Melinda Gates MAKE LOVE NOT PORN The woman who took on the sex industry Lisa Marie Presleyonlife DaDDy’s withher father,marriage to Michael Jacksonand Girl whyshe’s movedtoSussex

intErviEw Tim Teeman

opposite: Elvis Presley with Lisa Marie in 1969. this page: Lisa Marie Presleyin2012. Clothes by Dolce &Gabbana

Portrait Emily Shur he daybefore Lisa Marie Presley and Iare to meet,the National Enquirer Priscilla, Elvis and reports Presley’s fourth marriage is Lisa Marie Presleyin on the rocks and her singingcareer California, 1968. Below: in freefall afterpoor album sales With Priscilla last year and poorly attended concerts. But in aLos Angeles photography studio,the 44-year-old T daughter of Elvis Presley –dressed in diaphanous blue shirt, her Sixties- styledhair and smoky eyes recallingher mother,Priscilla, when younger –seems far from awreck. The custodian of Graceland, and heir to her father’s estimated $150 million fortune, Presley livespartly in LosAngelesand partly,surreally,outsidethe Sussex village of Rotherfield, where shereportedly considered joiningthe Kings Arms’ladies’ darts team and has servedfishand chips from their mobile van. Between pictures, Presley kissesher husband, Michael Lockwood, father of her three-year-old twin daughters Harper and Finley,tenderly.She initially sits at an angle to me, lookingatthe door,but later relaxes. Twoofher team saythey will be “right outside if…”,but Presley is ballsy,intelligent and candid (not “a victim”, sheinsists), if wary of everyone: “I’m alwaysonmyguard.” Three years ago, Presley deconstructedher “lifeand regime Ihad around me –confidants, friends, hangers-on –when Irealisednoone wasasIthought. There were quiteafew betrayals, it wasthe magnitudeofhow many... and Ididn’t see it. Iwas in alabyrinth of completemanipulation and didn’t know it. So is shejoiningadarts team? “I go to Uncoveringitwas really shocking. People who afew pubs and don’tplaydarts.”What of Ithought were well-intended were not. Igot rid ‘I wasinalabyrinth of the rumouredfailingcareer? “The National of absolutely everybody from my life, besides Enquirer is obsessively tryingtomakemefail my husband, children, mother and family.” complete manipulation whatever I’m doing. If Isoldeverything[in She sighs. “Then I began to write: I process termsofalbums], they’d sayIwas failing.” pain through music. People don’t understand and didn’t knowit… Igot US criticshavepraisedthe new album: Rolling COM. MAKE-UP: GARRET

Y. fame. I’m not whining or saying, ‘Woe is me,’ Stone said, “Storm&Grace is the album shewas but you have to question the intentions of the rid of everybodyfrommy borntomake–araw,powerful, country, folk people closest to you. Friends you’ve had your life, besidesmyfamily’ and bluescollection that finds her embracing GE: INFEVENTS.COM, GETTYwhole IMAGES life can turn out to be really wrong. her Southernroots and family name.”She is PA I thought I had a good BS detector, but no. happier with the “bluesy,organic,Americana R CELESTINEAGENC Seeing the truth set me free; a lot of the anger feel of this record” than the previous two, she FO has gone.” Explaining Storm & Grace, the title says. “This is not an instant gratification genre. of her third album, she says, “As you get older It takes alot more work to win an audience you get more graceful. You hope to, anyway.” over.”What about her allegedly crumbling Was she being cheated of money? “No, it marriage? “There is absolutely no truth was a sinister scene about control and power, whatsoever to the storymymarriage is failing. manipulating me into doing things or Iwill be with him till one of us is dead.” not doing things. Going to England and England has provided much-needed writing songs was my therapy.” She lived sanctuary. “For the children it’s vastly different. ROBERT BEHAR. HAIR: SIENREE DU

T: in Richmond, southwest London, for eight In the US you’re saturated with celebrity.

YLIS months, then found a home “in the middle It’s more civilisedinEngland. It resembles ST of nowhere; my only preference was it had to somethingfromthe Fifties, the children in be an hour by train from London. We moved their schooluniforms. Ilove that Iknow lots there knowing no one. I needed to be around of people in my village. Jeff Beck livesnear us normalcy, which I have found the English and we hangout with him and his wife.”Aren’t OPUS BEAUTY USING CHANEL. LACE SUIT, DOLCE & GABBANA. THIS

AT countryside gives me. Being around normal, villagers agog when Lisa Marie Presley pops

IS good people – I’m talking about English intothe butcher’s?“Either they’re not going VA Lisa Marie wears dress villagers – made a huge difference.” to payany attention because they know who PREVIOUS SPREAD: CORBIS. GER by Michael Kors, shoes by Guiseppe Zanotti

46 The Times Magazine youare, or they’re justgoingtobepolite. There From top: Presleywith months of marriage; with are ways to keep clear of fame. Iwasn’t raised Michael Jackson; in 2001 her husband, Michael to call the paparazzi when Iwent to Starbucks; with Nicolas Cage, whom Lockwood, at the Billboard now it’s,‘Do all youcan to get intothe tabloids.’ she divorced after four Music Awards this year You don’t have to be terrorised by it.” Presley has been her father’s custodian since shewas agirl. “I’vebeen sitting to watch everyone else falling down and in meetings from 15. I’velearnt to think crying and ambulances coming. I was really business-wise, not tooemotionally,how to keep confused because I was there, experiencing things authentic,toprotect his image.”Itwas my emotions, but it was worldwide. I was “a really confusingchildhood”.Her parents watching the news, watching people outside separated when shewas 5, afterher mother had the gates pass out and have to be taken away. arelationship with her karateinstructor. Lisa I was stunned by what was going on around Marie spent half her time at Graceland with me.” His body reportedly contained a total of her father and the rest with her mother in 14 drugs, including 10 times the normal dosage Beverly Hills. “There were no limitations of codeine and toxic levels of methaqualone whatsoever at Graceland. Icould stay up all (quaaludes). “It’s still confusing for me,” night,sleep all day, never takeabath, be an Presley says. “People were trying to shield absoluteterrorand tomboy. When Iwent to me and pull me away, but unsuccessfully.” my mother’s Iwas on astrictschedule.”Her Shefeels “veryclose” to her father at parents’separation wasn’t traumatic: “They Graceland. “I alwayswant to have it; it will were alwaysveryfriendly with each other. alwaysbemine and my family’s.It’smylegacy They madedecisions together.” and it’s important to me how it is perceivedand “I usedmusic as my escape,”she says. handled.”She goes three or four timesayear, “I would listentomy45s: my father,Sweet has family dinners when the tourists have long Inspirations, Neil Diamond, Elton John. My departed, “ridethe golf cartsaround. It’s likea father sangalot of gospel around the house. time capsule. There’salot of interestingenergy Iwas very influencedbythat.”Was the “Elvis” in that house, the lifethat wasonce there: it on stage an act? “There wasnothingabout haunts the walls and hallways. Youcan feel it.” that persona that wasput on,”Presley says ‘I hoped my marriage As she grew older she was “a treacherous, adamantly.“He’d justasmuch blow your mind terrible teen. I was really confused, really when he walked intoaroom as on stage. His to Michael Jackson rebellious.” Why treacherous? “I feel because presence truly wasawesome to witness.”Her I lost my father, who I was closest to, too father would makeher singorplaythe piano in wouldlast, buttoo many early. My mum and I weren’t very close when front of people. “If he wasaway, he would listen I was younger. She was young growing up on the phone afterapiano lesson to hear what people gotinvolved’ with me; it was hard, she was still trying to Ihad learnt.”Her favouritememory: “Upstairs find her way. I never liked anyone she dated. in Graceland are tworooms, his and mine [off She didn’t know what to do with me and her limits to the public today]. He set up achair, solution was to send me off a lot: boarding table and TV in my room; he wasalwayssitting schools, Switzerland. I got the wrong message in there. Ilovedit. In the middle of the night, from that.” How are she and Priscilla – famous Iwould wake up and he would be sitting for playing Jenna Wade in Dallas – now? “We watchingTVbecause he wanted to be close made friends in my thirties and now we’re to me. Ilovedthat. It wasalwaysnice to turn very, very close. Certain elements in our overand have achat with him.” lives have kept us from getting close before, Howaware wasshe of his prescription drug people we were seeing or dating.” Priscilla is dependency? “Hewas an incredible father.Ifelt appearing as the Wicked Queen in an English very loved, very protected. He had things that pantomime production of Snow White, “which madehim unhappyand the people around him the twins are really looking forward to”. who weren’t good were abig partofthat. He Presley “was always intimidated” by could be frustrated.Iwasn’t aware of the drugs pursuing a career in music, “because it’s until towards the very end. He would appear with it pretty quickly.” Shestill drinks. “I can very daunting, the whole ‘daughter of Elvis’ slightly disconnected. Inoticedheneeded drink with the best of them in pubs in London, thing”. She felt she would be judged? “I am to takesomething. Tablets. All prescription, though the Englishcan out-drink me by along constantly,” she says sharply. “People think it’s nothingwas street. He didn’t drink or smoke shot.”She likes champagne and Guinness. “I easier for me, but it’s a lot more difficult and cigarettes. It wasall pharmaceutical stuff.” can’tkeep up with my Englishfriends. They’re there’s a lot more pressure because they’re Did sheinherit his addictive personality? still goingthe nextday.I’d needanambulance.” expecting something out of you that you “I am the kind of person who,when Ilove Of Elvis’s death in 1977, when she was 9, may or may not have.” In a “different time something, Ilove it,all or nothing. But from an apparent heart attack, she says, “Of or place”, she feels, “when Carole King or Iwouldn’t want to ever be caught or ownedby course it was devastating. I don’t know how Linda Ronstadt were doing their songs in something.”Asateenager,“Itrieddrugs. Iwas else to describe something like that.” Was her the Seventies, I could have been a lot more never addictedtoanything. When Iwas 14,15 loss complicated by his fame? “I think that successful on my own. But that whole ‘You’re Itriedeverything, then justgot boredwith it. I was probably the most confusing thing for me, not your father’ thing comes in and I can’t wanted greater purpose in lifeand gotdone because it delayed my grieving process. I had win. People are either really gunning for getty images, rex features, corbis

The Times Magazine 49 you or pulling for you. It’s really extreme.” believeinsomething“bigger”? “Yes.Ibelieve Shesaysshe “didn’t want to be controversial, ‘Atnight Iwould wake up it’s important people believeinwhat they want but certain things have been by default or to believeintomaketheir livesbetter.” connection”. Doesshe mean her marriages? and my father wouldbe From that frying pan – she seems fairly “They were justdifferent phasesofmylife, but unrattled – we head into the fire of ageing. they were highly public.” Herfirstmarriage, sitting watching TV to be “I’m OK, because my husband is a lot older which lastedfrom1988-94, wastoScientologist than me [Lockwood is 51],” Presley laughs. musician DannyKeough, and they marriedina closetome. Iloved that’ “But if my husband was a lot younger than me Scientologychurch in LA. Whydid it fail? “We I’d be a nervous wreck all the time.” Elvis died were oil and waterand it wasnever meant to at 42: did she worry about dying young? “Of be.”Did shethink it wasfor ever? “I did and have married. “We’re still friendly, stuff course. I worry constantly, especially because we had children [Riley,23, and Benjamin, 20], happens, things happen, life happens. He’s I have little ones. I know what losing a parent which is alwayspainful. But Iwas really young. happy, I’m happy. We’re still friends.” She and is like and losing them worries me constantly Iwanted to have children young. Ifelt likeI Lockwood, who she met while married to too. It’s natural for a parent. You love so much neededtoberesponsible; they gave me purpose. Cage, will stay together for ever, “without a it leaves you vulnerable to a lot of pain.” I’m very maternal and likenurturing.” doubt. Having gone through so many things Shewas “nervous because my mother’s Why did Presley marry Jackson in 1994? you just want a partner who complements sideofthe family live very extended lives. “Because I fell in love with him,” Presley says you, and is really confident with himself.” My father’s sidehad health issuesand died briskly. A lot of people found the union odd. Lockwood “doesn’t get intimidated because of younger.Ididn’t know where the cards fall “I don’t know why, because we were actually my situation”, says Presley. “He’s worked with forme, but Ithought I’d improve the odds so similar in a lot of ways. We didn’t have really strong females such as Carly Simon. Istoppedsmokingwhen Iwas 38.”She hasn’t conventional lives. It made sense to me.” He We’re partners and best friends. Everything had plastic surgery, “but Iwas justlookingat was loveable? “Very.” Was she acting out some flows really well. Maybe twice in nine years my linesand thinking, ‘I’d love to get rid of desire to “save” Jackson in a way she couldn’t we’ve had a slight tiff. We haven’t spent a those,’injectsomething, but youdon’t know her father? “I’m sure there were things about night apart: that’s also saying something.” what would happen. Iwould never saynever. Michael that reminded me of my dad. I don’t Having twins, “it’s double everything”,says It scaresmetodeath, doingsomethingwith think it’s unfair to say I’m still a sucker for Presley.“Double happiness, double concern, my face. I’veseen what happens.” a father figure. I think I always have been. double fits, double tempers. They’re really Presley will make“one, maybe two” more There were probably things they shared that strong-willed. Parentingsoftens you. Yousee albums. “I’m amusic lover, that’s whyIdoit, intrigued me. Both were incredibly dynamic how innocently we startout,then become not because Iwant to be likemyfather,as and iconic. My father set the precedent for me the productofeverythingaround us. It’s afine some have said. If Iwanted that,Iwould have early. There were some big shoes to fill.” line between not wantingthem to get hurt, yet done it earlier and recorded one of his songs.” WasJackson gay? “Absolutely not,not in lettingthem experience things.”Her eldest Presley laughs. “People lookatmeand say, anyway shape or form.Not,not,not,not.”She daughter,Riley,isbecomingawell-known ‘What are youtryingtobe?’ Idothis because waswith him when the firstchild molestation actress; Ben wants to be amusician. Of the people tell me Ichange their livesthrough chargeswere made. “I alwaysmaintain it’s twins, Finley will become asinger and Harper music,not because Idesire the limelight,which not anythingIwas around forand nothing an actress, shepredicts. They are in aschool is not the mostcomfortable thingfor me.” Iwitnessed.”Did shewant to have children “not with abunch of celebritychildren as Iwas Ultimately,beingElvis’s daughter has been “a with him? “In the beginning, yes.”They forawhile. Ididn’t do so great in that situation. blessing” rather than burden, shesays, if not divorcedafter twoyears in 1996. “I hoped Idid betterawayfromthe limelight and came resoundingly.“I’m not amoaner,not overly it would be the one that would last, but that intoitwhen Iwas ready.Iwant the little ones optimistic,not dismal. Ifeel more blessedthan wasamessy situation. Toomanypeople got to makeaconscious decision and forthings to cursed. But there wasnoguidetonavigate involved between us.”She means entourages. be as normal as possible until then.”Doesshe through this situation. Ihad to do it through “Weboth allowed that,which wasamistake.” want more children? “I go back and forth. trial and errorand Imademanyerrors.” Jackson’s death in 2009 “was really confusing Right now Idon’t think they’d love our “We’d probably have had some good and really,really painful. Our relationship was attention to be on anythingelse, even acat.” confrontations,”she says, smilingabout how somethingIhad parked away,pushedaway. It One new song, So Long,featuresthe lyrics: her father would have seen her life, “but Ithink brought it all back in away Iwas not prepared “Churches, they don’thaveasoul… Religion he would have understood where I’m coming for, things Ihadn’t dealt with. Some of the so corrupt and runninglives/Farewell, fair from, because we’re similar.Mymum is things that we went through could never be weatheredfriends/ Ican’t sayI’ll miss youin controlled, reservedand ‘English’.Hewas more fixed or resolved.Itwas devastating.” the end.”Isthis arepudiation of Scientology? all or nothing, likeme.”Maybe she’sbecoming They last spoke in 2005. She spent time Hasshe leftthe Church? “I writeliterally and more likePriscilla?Presley smiles. “I think alone with his body after the private funeral: metaphorically,” Presley says, guard cranking Imight be. Ilookathow Iwas and cringe. “Not an easy thing.” Now she has found “some up.“People are takingthings and going Youget olderand see beingrefinedaseasier peace, it can quiet but never go away”. She wherever they want with it. When Iwrite to swallow than ‘rough around the edges’.” remains close with matriarch Katherine, asongit’sanopen canvas.”Iask again if this Herbiggest pleasure in England has been presently in reported dispute with her son’s songisarejection of Scientology. “I don’t gardening, shereveals, beaming. “I’m growing children. “They’re really sweet, incredible discuss religion in anycapacity,”she says. Is all these vegetables, potatoesand… what were people,” Presley says of the Jacksons. “I’ve religion important to her? “Belief in something they? So incredible? Oh,radishes.”There’sthe always had a relationship with them. All is alwaysveryimportant.”Was Scientology headline scoop the National Enquirer missed: I can do is wish them the best.” helpful? “I am not discussingreligion.”Is “Elvis’s Daughter:Proud of HerRadishes.” n She and third husband Nicolas Cage faith important to her? “Absolutely.Belief is divorced after four months after marrying in important.”Doesshe believeinGod? “Again, Storm & Grace is released on Monday 2002, with Presley saying they should “never” that question is religious in nature.”Doesshe by Universal

The Times Magazine 51