Elvis is Kick-Ass “King” in “Creole”

Elvis Presley’s Best Film Performance

“King Creole” become an international hit for Elvis in 1958

From its haunting opening musical frame with the song, “Crawfish,” the 1958 classic feature film, “King Creole,” rocks as Elvis Presley’s best big-screen performance of his career.

A screen-capture from Presley’s “Crawfish” opening number in “King Creole.”

Directed by Michael Curtiz, produced by Hal Wallis, and adapted from the Harold Robbins novel, “A Stone for Danny Fisher, “King Creole” pairs Presley with a dazzling list of charismatic and talented co-stars including Carolyn Jones and Dolores Hart, as Presley’s double love interests, Walter Matthau and Vic Morrow as the film’s villains, the legendary Dean Jones, and many more.

Presley with Delores Hart (who later became a nun in real life, while Elvis played a surgeon opposite Mary Tyler Moore as a sister in 1970’s “Change of Habit” (Presley’s final feature film).

Filmed in black and white, “King Creole” followed Presley’s big-screen debut a few years earlier with “Love Me Tender.” But in that movie, he was just a co-star. In “King Creole,” he is a bonafide star. As history records it, “King Creole” also happens to be the leading superman’s favorite role on any screen.

With good reason.