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.