The following document, discovered in an attic in a house in Memphis or somewhere, is a transcript of an interview conducted, on an unknown date, with Rabbi Alfred Fruchter and Jeanette Fruchter, upstairs neighbors of the young Elvis Presley. As Peter Guralnick explains in his definitive biography of Presley, Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley:
“The house on Alabama was a big Victorian set on a rise and divided up into two good-size apartments. The rent was fifty dollars a month, payable to a Mrs. Dubrovner, whose husband had been a kosher butcher and who lived down the street herself, and both Mrs. Dubrovner and the Presleys’ upstairs neighbors, Rabbi Alfred Fruchter and his wife, Jeanette, showed a considerable amount of kindness… toward the new tenants. Mrs. Presley visited with Mrs. Fruchter almost every afternoon after work, and the Fruchters were particularly fond of the boy, who would turn on the electricity or light the gas for them on the Sabbath when it was forbidden for Orthodox Jews to do so for themselves.”
MRS. FRUCHTER: Such a nice boy.
RABBI FRUCHTER: A mensch.
MRS. F: And handsome? Like you wouldn’t believe.
RABBI F: The hair.
MRS. F: The hair! He lived for that hair. Every day a different style. And always with the comb. But not conceited.
RABBI F: Never, never conceited.
MRS. F: Always with the pompadour.
RABBI F: And the clothes.
MRS. F: The clothes! The little black toreador jacket. Remember, Alfie?
RABBI F: And the trousers.
MRS. F: A pink stripe down the side! Like a waiter at a good bar mitzvah.
RABBI F: He never missed a shabbos.
MRS. F: Never once. Like family. Come in, turn on the light, turn on the gas….
RABBI F: “Can I get you anything, sir?” Always with the “sir.”
MRS. F: And that car he had.
RABBI F: A Lincoln. 1941. He loved that car. Him and his father. Herman.
MRS. F: Not Herman. V something. Val, Valentine.
RABBI F: Verdant. Vermeer.
MRS. F: Verner!
RABBI F: Verner.
MRS. F: I’m the one who taught him Yiddish, you know. He had a good ear.
RABBI F: Of course he had a good ear. He was a singer. A performer.
MRS. F: He was a singer you know. Even then. A real performer. But shy. And skinny. All skin and bones. “Eat up,” I would say. “Eat up.”
RABBI F: You with your pinching. “Eat.” With the pinching.
MRS. F: His cheek. Only his cheek.
RABBI F: That he didn’t like. You can’t force a boy to eat.
MRS. F: Somebody had to make him eat.
RABBI F: Your stuffed derma he ate.
MRS. F: And my matzohball soup. “Any soup for me today ma’am?” Always asking for the soup.
RABBI F: The soup he liked.
MRS. F: We had him eating kosher for a while. Nothing but kosher.
RABBI F: Lean pastrami.
MRS. F: Not pastrami. Corned beef. From Dubrovners’. They were good to the boy, the Dubrovners.
RABBI F: Such a voice he had.
MRS. F: Always singing.
RABBI F: A cantor he should have been.
MRS. F: A cantor! The boy wasn’t even Jewish!
RABBI F: But he could sing.
MRS. F: He was shy, too shy.
RABBI F: There are plenty of shy cantors, believe me. Plenty.
MRS. F: Not with that pompadour.
RABBI F: The hair goes under the yarmulke, no one knows.
MRS. F: A very shy boy.
RABBI F: There are plenty of shy cantors, believe me.
MRS. F: But a nice boy. Even with the shaking legs and the drumming on the kitchen table. Always the drumming.
RABBI F: And the hips.
MRS. F: That pompadour! But he never missed a shabbos.
RABBI F: He turned on the lights, turned on the gas.
MRS. F: “Do you need any cans open ma’am? Should I get your mail for you?”
RABBI F: A cantor he could have been.
MRS. F: Cantor shmantor. Can you see him? Cantor Brillstein, with the pink shirt and the toreador jacket and the sideburns.
RABBI F: So? They looked like pais. And it wasn’t Brillstein. Something P.
MRS. F: My memory is going.
RABBI F: Tsemisht, she is. Prillman?
MRS. F: Priller. Prelly.
RABBI F: Prelstein.
MRS. F: Perlstein!
RABBI F: Isador? Ira?
MRS. F: With an E. Eddie?
RABBI F: Cantor Perlstein. A very good singer.
MRS. F: Ellis! Ellis Perlstein. The boy could sing, but I tell you he was no cantor.
RABBI F: Fine. He was no cantor. She’s got to get the last word. Always with the last word!
Illustration by Lily Holmes
