Presley's physical attractiveness and sexual appeal were widely acknowledged. "He was once beautiful, astonishingly beautiful", according to critic Mark Feeney.[356] Television director Steve Binder reported, "I'm straight as an arrow and I got to tell you, you stop, whether you're male or female, to look at him. He was that good looking. And if you never knew he was a superstar, it wouldn't make any difference; if he'd walked in the room, you'd know somebody special was in your presence."[357] His performance style was equally responsible for Presley's eroticized image. Critic George Melly described him as "the master of the sexual simile, treating his guitar as both phallus and girl".[358] In his Presley obituary, Lester Bangs credited him with bringing "overt blatant vulgar sexual frenzy to the popular arts in America".[359] Ed Sullivan's declaration that he perceived a soda bottle in Presley's trousers was echoed by rumors involving a similarly positioned toilet roll tube or lead bar.[360]
While Presley was marketed as an icon of heterosexuality, some critics have argued that his image was ambiguous. In 1959, Sight and Sound's Peter John Dyer described his onscreen persona as "aggressively bisexual in appeal".[361] Brett Farmer places the "orgasmic gyrations" of the title dance sequence in Jailhouse Rock within a lineage of cinematic musical numbers that offer a "spectacular eroticization, if not homoeroticization, of the male image".[362] In the analysis of Yvonne Tasker, "Elvis was an ambivalent figure who articulated a peculiar feminised, objectifying version of white working-class masculinity as aggressive sexual display."[363]
Reinforcing Presley's image as a sex symbol were the reports of his dalliances with Hollywood stars and starlets, from Natalie Wood in the 1950s to Connie Stevens and Ann-Margret in the 1960s to Candice Bergen and Cybill Shepherd in the 1970s. June Juanico of Memphis, one of Presley's early girlfriends, later blamed Parker for encouraging him to choose his dating partners with publicity in mind.[206] Presley never grew comfortable with the Hollywood scene, and most of these relationships were insubstantial.
On August 16, 1977, Presley was scheduled on an evening flight out of Memphis to Portland, Maine, to begin another tour. That afternoon, however, his fiancée Ginger Alden discovered him unresponsive on the bathroom floor of his Graceland mansion.[269] Attempts to revive him failed, and he was pronounced dead at Baptist Memorial Hospital at 3:30 p.m.[270] He was 42.[271]
President Jimmy Carter issued a statement that credited Presley with having "permanently changed the face of American popular culture".[272] Thousands of people gathered outside Graceland to view the open casket. One of Presley's cousins, Billy Mann, accepted US$18,000 (equivalent to $91,000 in 2023) to secretly photograph the body; the picture appeared on the cover of the National Enquirer's biggest-selling issue ever.[273] Alden struck a $105,000 (equivalent to $528,000 in 2023) deal with the Enquirer for her story, but settled for less when she broke her exclusivity agreement.[274] Presley left her nothing in his will.[275]
Presley's funeral was held at Graceland on August 18. Outside the gates, a car plowed into a group of fans, killing two young women and critically injuring a third.[276] About 80,000 people lined the processional route to Forest Hill Cemetery, where Presley was buried next to his mother.[277] Within a few weeks, "Way Down" topped the country and UK singles chart.[278][279] Following an attempt to steal Presley's body in late August, the remains of both Presley and his mother were exhumed and reburied in Graceland's Meditation Garden on October 2.[274]
Cause of death
While an autopsy undertaken the same day Presley died was still in progress, Memphis medical examiner Jerry Francisco announced that the immediate cause of death was cardiac arrest and declared that "drugs played no role in Presley's death".[280] In fact, "drug use was heavily implicated" in Presley's death, writes Guralnick. The pathologists conducting the autopsy thought it possible, for instance, that he had suffered "anaphylactic shock brought on by the codeine pills he had gotten from his dentist, to which he was known to have had a mild allergy". Lab reports filed two months later strongly suggested that polypharmacy was the primary cause of death; one reported "fourteen drugs in Elvis' system, ten in significant quantity".[281] In 1979, forensic pathologist Cyril Wecht reviewed the reports and concluded that a combination of depressants had resulted in Presley's accidental death.[280] Forensic historian and pathologist Michael Baden viewed the situation as complicated: "Elvis had had an enlarged heart for a long time. That, together with his drug habit, caused his death. But he was difficult to diagnose; it was a judgment call."[282]
The competence and ethics of two of the centrally involved medical professionals were seriously questioned. Francisco had offered a cause of death before the autopsy was complete; claimed the underlying ailment was cardiac arrhythmia, a condition that can be determined only in a living person; and denied drugs played any part in Presley's death before the toxicology results were known.[280] Allegations of a cover-up were widespread.[282] While a 1981 trial of Presley's main physician, George C. Nichopoulos, exonerated him of criminal liability, the facts were startling: "In the first eight months of 1977 alone, he had [prescribed] more than 10,000 doses of sedatives, amphetamines, and narcotics: all in Elvis' name." Nichopoulos' license was suspended for three months. It was permanently revoked in the 1990s after the Tennessee Medical Board brought new charges of over-prescription.[246]
In 1994, the Presley autopsy report was reopened. Joseph Davis, who had conducted thousands of autopsies as Miami-Dade County coroner,[283] declared at its completion, "There is nothing in any of the data that supports a death from drugs. In fact, everything points to a sudden, violent heart attack."[246] More recent research has revealed that Francisco did not speak for the entire pathology team. Other staff "could say nothing with confidence until they got the results back from the laboratories, if then."[284] One of the examiners, E. Eric Muirhead,
According to biographer Frank Coffey, "other plausible causes" include "the Valsalva maneuver (essentially straining on the toilet leading to heart stoppage—plausible because Elvis suffered constipation, a common reaction to drug use)
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