Petula Clark turned down Elvis Presley's advances
Petula Clark has told how she fled Elvis Presley's dressing room because she was convinced he "fancied" both her and Karen Carpenter.
Petula Clark fled Elvis Presley's dressing room because she was convinced he "fancied" both her and Karen Carpenter.
The 92-year-old singer and her friend - who died in 1983 aged 32 - had gone to see The King in action in Las Vegas and, after being invited to his dressing room after the show, found the Blue Suede Shoes hitmaker was "quite obviously" thrilled to see them together.
Speaking on UK TV show Loose Women, Petula said: "I was out with Karen Carpenter, she as a friend of mine. We thought, what shall we do? We were in Las Vegas, Elvis was in town, we didn’t know him and we thought we’d go and see Elvis.
" We go along, we were received like royalty, given the best seats in the house, which was very nice. He was really on form. He was very, very handsome, he was singing well, doing the whole bit.
"At the end the Maitre d' came in, ‘Ms Clarke, Ms Carpenter, Mr Presley would like you to go to his dressing room.’ So off we trot.
"And the dressing room was huge, there’s a special place where the star does his or her make-up and gets ready, and that’s where Elvis was. There were some people outside, out comes Elvis looking… gorgeous.
"He was so thrilled at seeing us. It was quite obvious he was thrilled seeing us. He wore very tight trousers, put it that way."
Although Elvis was "charming" towards Petula and Karen, she felt something wasn't right and made the decision her and the Carpenters singer should call it a night.
She continued: "We were the two biggest female stars in the world at the time, Karen and me. He was charming, a southern gentleman kind of attitude, but I sensed there was something going on there. He fancied both of us, putting it bluntly.
"Karen was more naïve and I was a bit more worldly wise, I’d been living in Paris and saw the signs, if you know what I mean.
"so I said to Karen, ‘This has been very nice, we really must be going, you’ve got that thing in the morning.’ And she said, ‘What thing in the morning?’ Nobody does anything in the morning n Las Vegas.
"I said, ‘We have to be going Elvis, thank you very much. He said, ‘What?’ I said, ‘We have to get our beauty sleep. He said, ‘You don’t need beauty sleep.’
"We left like a couple of scared rabbits and I turned around and he looked at me like, ‘Hmmm, I’ll get to you one day.’ “
