Austin Butler says Vanessa Hudgens had a “seer moment” predicting she was going to play Elvis

end of 2018, Vanessa Hudgens and Austin Butler, who split in early 2020 after more than a decade of relationship, enjoyed Christmas together. “We were in the car listening to Christmas music when an Elvis Presley song started playing. Austin, who is a natural blond, had just dyed his hair a darker shade. I watched him sing and said, ‘Honey, you need to play Elvis.’ Then, back in January, I was sitting at the piano, playing and singing, and I was like, ‘I don’t know how, but you have to find a way to embody Elvis. I don’t know how we get the rights or where to shoot, but you have to play it'”.

So told Hudgens herself, in the summer of 2019, of how it had been very clear to her from that moment that Butler was the right one to give life to the king of rock. She commented on it in an interview with the ‘LIVE Kelly and Ryan’ program in which the presenter declared that she had identified the actor as ‘her guest’s boyfriend, a Hudgens who could not hide enormous pride in signing of her then partner. Four years later, Butler tells the same story, but does so without mentioning Hudgens and alluding to a “friend”.

“People always ask me if I think I look like Elvis, and I always say the same thing, that I really don’t think I look that much. It never crossed my mind. But only a month before I found out that Baz [Luhrmann] I was shooting the movie I was about to enjoy the Christmas lights with a friend and an Elvis Christmas song came on the radio. I started singing and my friend looked at me and said: ‘You must play Elvis’. So I thought it was a gamble. Then my agent called me and said, ‘It turns out Baz Luhrmann is making an ‘Elvis movie’…’. My hair stood on end. I thought maybe I wasn’t good enough, but I would give it my all. I hired a movement coach, a voice coach, and a dialect coach, and started working as if the role was assigned to me.. I met Baz after a month and we spent five months trying things out. I finally had to audition and I was like, ‘Oh, isn’t this role mine yet?'”

Of course, before this the tabloids reacted with surprise not only because Butler didn’t mention Hudgens in telling the story, but why did he refer to his ex girlfriend as a “friend”. Now Butler had to respond directly to Mark Olsen of the Los Angeles Times, a reporter who wanted to know who that “friend” was.

“I owe him a lot”

Austin Butler, who is in the final stretch of the award race that could end with an Oscar in the Best Actor category for his role in “Elvis,” He resolved the matter with sincerity and humility, publicly thanking him for the support he received from his ex-girlfriend. “We’ve been together for a long time and she’s had this sort of clairvoyant moment, so I really owe her a lot for believing in me.”.

‘Elvis’, directed by Baz Luhrmann from a screenplay by Luhrmann himself, Sam Bromell, Craig Pearce and Jeremy Doner, It’s nominated for eight Academy Awards, including the aforementioned Butler pick and the big prize of the night: Best Picture.