Had a great head on his shoulders, helped make Elvis make a lot of big decisions," Klein said. Esposito appeared in some of Presley's movies, including "It Happened at the World's Fair," and was one of two best men at Presley's wedding to Priscilla Ann Beaulieu.
A decade later, he was among the first to find Presley's body after Elvis collapsed and died at his Graceland mansion in Memphis. Esposito broke the news of Presley's death to Priscilla and to Presley's manager, Col. Tom Parker, and was a pallbearer at his funeral. I actually saw somebody else in that position, and I realized how good Joe was. Elvis trusted and depended on him," Schilling said. He kinda kept us in line. We would be having fun in Vegas or whatever, Joe was always the adult in the room.
And that was a problem. He just started gaining weight. Larry King : Did he constantly talk about weight? Did he try to say, I'm going to take it off or exercise? Joe Esposito : At different times. We'd sit and talk to him. A lot of guys sit around and talk to him, say, Elvis, you know, you got to get yourself back in shape.
You're a little heavy, and this and that. And he'd listen to you, but sometimes he wouldn't. He'd get mad at you. Joe Esposito : Yes, toward the latter couple years of his life. Because people don't realize when you're a big star, you turn 40 years old, at that time, 40 was old. And that's a horrible thing to say about anybody. And that gets to him. Little by little, what did you do? You know, if you get depressed, you try to take something to make you feel happy, just like a person that drinks, they'd have a drink.
Well, he'd take a pill. Before, nobody was allowed to take -- there was no such thin as going to a drug clinic. Larry King : There weren't anti-depressant.
In other words, there's no Betty Ford. Joe Esposito : No Betty Fords at all. And at that time, you got caught doing something like that, they'd tear you apart. So nowadays, it's cool. Larry King : The time of his death, says personal physician Dr. George Nickopolous, right, was charged with over prescribing, right? Joe Esposito : Hard to turn him down. And I got to defend him to a certain point because when he made trips, we all took the same pills. We all did it.
I was hooked on sleeping pills for a long time. Took sleeping pills because we were all doing the same thing together. When you're with Elvis, you're with him 24 hours a day. You do everything together, vacation, travel, everything we did together.
So, we all got into the routine, too. Joe Esposito : We had a lot of groupies that would hang out at the gate 24 hours a day, follow us when we would go out shopping.
They'd follow us in the car. You know, that was tough. But I recall those groupies. We had a lot of other nice, great fans that were always around, that would do anything for Elvis. And just I meet more men today that ask me about Elvis than I do women sometimes. They want to know about Elvis. It's just amazing. Joe Esposito : Well, you know what was amazing about him, I know if he set his mind to do it, he could have. Because there were times that he would just stop taking anything for a long time.
Joe Esposito : Yes, he could if he wanted to. But, you know, we had been pressured by a lot of people saying why don't you guys do something, why don't you do something? We couldn't do a damn thing. If he didn't want to do it himself, it don't mean a thing. Larry King : You said he always vacationed in Hawaii. His last vacation was in Hawaii. Joe Esposito : Yes, March of Yes, had a great time there. Played football on the beach. Joe Esposito : He never talked about it.
No, he never talked about getting remarried. Joe Esposito : He did like to have more kids, yes, but, you know, it never happened. Joe Esposito : Yes, he did. At that time that was the downhill point. Nowadays it's not. But in those days, when you hit 40, you're on your way down. So what do you think about when you're a big star? Joe Esposito : Death and old age.
What am I going to look like when I'm 50? Are those young girls going to still be out there screaming for me? That's a depressing thought. Larry King : Elvis passed away on August Where were you that day?
Joe Esposito : I was there August We were getting ready to go on tour that evening. Joe Esposito : The night before, I talked to him. He was fine. I talked to him. I said anything you need before we leave? Joe Esposito : We were getting ready to go to Portland, Maine.
We were leaving the day of the 16th at And I fly to Portland, spend the night there and do the show the next day. Joe Esposito : We had our own private jet, called Lisa Marie. It's a big four-engine jet that we bought.
Joe Esposito : Big four-engine, yes. He only liked four-engine. He didn't want a two-engine plane because he said it was safer with a four-engine plane. Larry King : He's right. Not many people have private four-engine planes. Larry King : All right. So, you're ready to go to Portland, Maine. And that afternoon, I was there. I was supposed to wake him up at to get ready to leave.
Joe Esposito : We were going to leave that night of the 16th. And his girlfriend called downstairs. Joe Esposito : No. This was a girl named Ginger Alden. Called downstairs, asked for somebody -- Elvis had fainted in the bathroom. So, I ran upstairs and went into the bathroom. And I saw him on the floor. And the minute I touched him, I knew he had been dead. I knew it right then. I picked the phone up real quick. It was sitting right next to the bathroom, there was phone there.
And I called for an ambulance. The ambulance got there and I went into the ambulance with him, him and Charlie Hodge was with me and Dr. Nick got there too. We went to the hospital, took him to the emergency room. Joe Esposito : I knew it. I was hoping possible, but I just knew there was no way. Larry King : What was your first reaction?
I mean, he was 42 years old. Joe Esposito : I know. It was -- you know, it didn't hit me for awhile that he passed away. It was just -- I just sort of blocked it out of my head. But it was tough. It was very tough. He was -- we were very close friends and we spent a lot of time together. And I consider him my best friend. And, so, when you lose somebody like that and all the time we spent together, our whole lives together, I thought my life had ended right there.
Joe Esposito : Ginger was all upset. And Lisa Marie was there too visiting. Larry King : In fact, she called Linda Thompson. Joe Esposito : So, I had to call Priscilla and tell her about it.
Joe Esposito : She went crazy when I told her. She dropped the phone. She was all upset. But then, you know, then she got on the phone and she was worried about Lisa? She said, 'how's Lisa Marie doing? I called Colonel Parker and told him.
Joe Esposito : Well, they wanted me to do it, but I wouldn't do it. Joe Esposito : I just couldn't. They wanted -- I said, yes I'll do it. But then, emotionally, I couldn't have done it. So the P. Larry King : It went around the world in a flash.
Everyone knows where they were. You know what was amazing though, Larry, you know, never -- like we said earlier, from the inside, you don't see it from the outside.
I didn't realize the effect he had on people for those few days. I mean, the thousands of people that come and showed up for this funeral from around the world. I never expected that. No way. And the streets were lined all the way down to Joe Esposito : We got 17 white limousines because Elvis' favorite color was white.
His dad said we need to get white limousines. We had to get them from all around the country to get him in there. Larry King : What was his cause of death? What was the final determination, heart attack? Joe Esposito : You know, his heart just stopped. That's all.
It just stopped. Joe Esposito : They say drug connected. I think it was his health connection. He didn't eat good. Joe Esposito : Fluctuation of weight, had an enlarged heart. He had high blood pressure. People didn't realize. And not only that, if you look at his family on his mother's side, they all died at very young ages. They were all addictive people. Couple of his cousins died from drug overdose and stuff, and his mother drank a lot.
So, on his mother's side it was bad. Medication for that. He was on medication because he had glaucoma in one eye for that. Joe Esposito : Yes, one of the eyes, yes. He had some intestines problem. Nobody talks about that. That's why a lot of his medication was off. But all that medication doesn't help because Elvis figured, you know, one pill, take two pills, helps better.
But you know it doesn't work. Larry King : What did you make of all the Elvis' and dead stories? That's still going on. Joe Esposito : You mean about still being alive? I mean, that just drives me crazy. I mean, it's so stupid. The man's gone. He would never, ever give up his life because he had to sing on stage. Joe Esposito : Yes, I know. I couldn't believe they said that, it wasn't him in the casket.
It hurts a lot of fans that really want to believe he's still alive. That's what's bad. It gives them hope he's alive. I get letters all the time saying, 'please tell Elvis, I know he's alive, tell him we said hello and we love him'. That's sad. People want to make money on it. That's it. I got to give credit to all the guys who worked for Elvis security and all the guys around us. We really did a great job organizing this funeral because it was major event. But the thing about it, we all sat together and said, listen, this is going to be Elvis' last performance.
Let's make sure it's a good one. And we all worked hard. It was amazing how smooth it went with all those people out there. Joe Esposito : Yes. His dad wanted to make sure that everybody could say good-bye to Elvis. And thousands of fans kept walking up for hours. Joe Esposito : Well, they paid one of his cousins a lot of money to sneak a camera in and take a picture of one of his relatives.
Larry King : Looked pretty good, as I remember. They did a nice job. Larry King : Was it hard -- when did it set in for you, afterwards? Joe Esposito : About three months later, it was like I left between tours, but there was no more tours after that. I got very depressed, very depressed for a long time. And it was tough. And I still miss him today.
I really do. Larry King : He was the first rock 'n' roll rebel, wasn't he? I mean, he was against the tide. Joe Esposito : Oh, definitely. Let's face it, at that time everything was -- Hit Parade was always mediocre, nice songs. But they were beautiful at the time. But I think kids were looking for something Larry King : And as The Beatles and others have said, he affected them. And I met a lot of the big stars; they say the same thing. Elvis was a very big influence then.
Even young kids today. Larry King : What do you think Elvis would have done had he lived Joe Esposito : Oh, I he definitely would have still sang, performed.
Definitely would have performed. He wanted to direct movies at one time. You know, he got tired of his movies. He wanted to direct movies. He wanted to do action movies and comedies. He loved comedies. So he would have done that and plus, but he would never have stopped performing on stage as long as he could.
Joe Esposito : Yes, he'd be on stage, yes. If he was able to be on stage, he'd be singing somewhere, like Sinatra did. Sinatra didn't want to stop. Nobody could have handled him better than he did.
Not too many managers only manage one person. They become famous, a star, and all of a sudden they manage all these other people. Colonel Parker was offered many, many big stars, they wanted him to be his manager.
He said 'Nope. I only handle Elvis, that's it'. John Mackie : But the Colonel has been criticized for misguiding Elvis.
You don't think that's fair? Joe Esposito : Oh, he made his mistakes, there's no two ways about it. We all make mistakes. None of us are perfect.
But overall, nobody could have done what he did with Elvis Presley. I'm sorry, nobody. I don't care who the hell they are, the biggest managers in the world. It's just that you have to understand, the Colonel dedicated his life to him. He didn't care about anybody else. Twenty-four hours a day, he'd always be thinking about something for Elvis. He'd come up with these great ideas that nobody else ever did. He made mistakes too, but anybody that knew, that was around us could tell you, there was nobody better than Colonel Parker.
They were a team, basically. They became a team, they were just unbelievable together. But they had arguments, just like husbands and wives do. John Mackie : But Elvis was really loyal, he never would have left the Colonel. They would have fights, disagreements, but I could never see him going to another manager.
Joe Esposito : Well, that was devastating to Elvis while he was alive. To me that probably put him over the end. The last year of his life, that's all he talked about, that book. It was just hurting him so much inside that so-called friends would do something like that to you. He had a horrible last year of his life, and I blame 80 percent of it on that book. Joe Esposito : I keep in touch with Priscilla more. Lisa has her own little group of people.
A younger crowd, they don't hang around us old guys. Joe Esposito : Yes, I see her occasionally. Yes, we talk. Yes, she's doing fine. John Mackie : Why do you think the Elvis legend seems to be so strong, 30 years later? Joe Esposito : Because of his music, and if you look into his eyes on a movie screen or a TV special or something, there's something about him that you just cannot help but like. And his voice - let's face it, he had the greatest voice in the world, over any singers in history.
He could sing anything, and he sang from his heart. People can feel that when they listen to his music. He doesn't sing just for the sake of singing, he sang from his heart. That catches people. Young people today love him. He's been dead 30 years, and they're only 10, 15 years old. I don't no another artist who does that to people. It just amazes me.
It's the second most visited house from the -- except the White House. The White House is first and Graceland is second. That just amazes me. I mean, I lived there. Fontana Interview with Ernst Jorgensen. No part of any article on this site may be re-printed for public display without permission.
Never before have we seen an Elvis Presley concert from the 's with sound. Until Now! Included we see a live performance of the elusive Long Tall Sally seen here for the first time ever. This is an excellent release no fan should be without it.
The interviews of Elvis' Parents are well worth hearing too. The afternoon show footage is wonderful and electrifying : Here is Elvis in his prime rocking and rolling in front of Highly recommended. Read more. Contact Us. Elvis Presley's songs are unforgettable - they have stood the test of time, especially his singles of the s, a decade in which he had a song at No. Read More. Joe Esposito first met Elvis Presley in the Army in and began working for him soon after they were both released from the service in until literally the day he died seventeen years later.
Joe was Elvis Presley's right hand man and head of the Memphis Mafia. Larry King : How did you meet Elvis? Larry King : You didn't meet him at Fort Hood? Saw him around; never met him, though. Larry King : Did basic training there.
Joe Esposito : Yes, basic training. Joe Esposito : Absolutely. Larry King : So how did you meet in Germany? Larry King : Hit it off right away? Joe Esposito : It was just a click. Larry: King: OK, in Germany, what were those touch football games like? Joe Esposito : He worked a lot harder than I did. Larry King : Really? Joe Esposito : Oh yes, very much so. Joe Esposito : Yes I was. Larry King : Where was that?
It was in Germany. Larry King : She was what, the daughter of Larry King : She was only 14, right? We didn't know it at the time.
She looked Larry King : She did look a little old? Larry King : So what was the occasion of their meeting? Larry King : When did he find out her age? Joe Esposito : Probably that night. Larry King : Why didn't that scare him off?
Joe Esposito : Well, you know, because Larry King : He was what? He was 24? Larry King : How about her parents? Larry King : Did you like Priscilla?
Joe Esposito : Yes, very much so. Larry King : What was your job? Joe Esposito : My job? Larry King : With Elvis?
Larry King : You'd read the other part to him? Larry King : His assistant. Joe Esposito : Right; his right hand. Joe Esposito : Road manager. Larry King : Big job. Joe Esposito : Oh yes, yes.
Larry King : He looked great Larry King : Remember that show. Larry King : Elvis sang 'Witchcraft'. Larry King : I was in Miami.
Larry King : Put him down on his knees. Larry King : Frank liked him a lot. Joe Esposito : Oh yes. Larry King : And got to like his music. Larry King : How did you get the name 'Diamond Joe'? He loved to read about religion and science especially. He was no dumb country boy. He was my best friend. Contact him at jkatsilometes reviewjournal.
Follow johnnykats on Twitter, JohnnyKats1 on Instagram. Note: The participation of Marty Lacker as co-best man at the the wedding of Elvis and Priscilla Presley was added to the original version of this column. He hopes the post will help boost business. But I am leaving at the right time. Kevin Costner does not support men singing along at concerts. He made that clear at Sunset Amphitheater. Hardly anyone noticed. Special to View. Elvis Presleys former road manager and friend Joe Esposito, left, shakes hands with Bremerhavens mayor Manfred Richter, right, at the point Elvis stepped on German soil forty years ago, Thursday, October 1, Both unveiled a bronze commemorative plaque beforehand.
Esposito was Elvis' right-hand man, handling much of Elvis' personal and business matters. Esposito made travel and tour arrangements, and always made sure Elvis and his entourage knew where they needed to be.
Joe Esposito, a former road manager for Elvis Presley, chats with the King in an undated photo. By signing up you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Service. Unsubscribe at any time.
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