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John
Smith
says, he
is the son
of the
King.
“I’ve
known that
Elvis is
my daddy
since I
was 27
years
old,” says
Smith, 51.
“And
there’s no
one word
that
describes
how it
feels to
finally
tell the
world the
truth."
“The
correct
word is
scary,”
according
to Presley
historian
Cory
Cooper,
who
recently
served as
technical
adviser on
director
John
Scheinfeld’s
Fame and
Fortune,
an
adaptation
of Elvis:
Still
Taking
Care of
Business,
a 2008
bestseller
by
Presley’s
former
bodyguard.
“These
people
show up
every few
years,
claiming
to be
Elvis’ son
or
daughter.
The sad
thing is
that some
of them
actually
believe
it. Maybe
they’ve
been fed a
story all
their
lives
about a
one-night
stand
their mom
had with
Elvis, and
they think
it’s true.
Whatever
the story,
they
always
have two
things in
common:
They all
swear they
have birth
certificates
or DNA
evidence
to prove
their
claim, and
they all
have a
story
about why
they can’t
show you
those
things.
And, of
course,
the real
reason
they can’t
is because
they don’t
have them.
Their
story
isn’t
true.”
True or
not, John
Smith’s
book
provides a
fascinating
read —
perhaps
not for
Presley
fanatics
or anyone
who
actually
cares
whether
Smith is
the
out-of-wedlock
son of the
world’s
most
famous
dead
entertainer.
Almost
everything
in John
Smith's
book is a
story
either
wildly
exaggerated
or
completely
made up.
The album
deal with
RCA
Records
turns out
to be a
pair of
45s
released
on a tiny
indie
label. The
songs
Smith says
he wrote
for famous
artists
clearly
were
penned by
others.
His claims
about
performing
on
recordings
by John
Denver
appear
also to be
untrue, as
Smith’s
name
appears in
none of
the liner
notes for
any Denver
recording.
Nor does
Smith
cough up
any proof
of an
Elvis-sponsored
trust
fund.
Filled
with
inaccuracies,
extrapolations,
and
flat-out
lies, Let
the Boy
Sing is to
literature
what Harum
Scarum is
to the
fine art
of cinema.
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Is John
Smith
Elvis Son?
After
repeated
requests,
John
Smith
finally
provided
a copy
of a
birth
certificate
that
shows
his
birth
name
as
John
Dennis
Roach
and
his
birth
parents
as
Elvis
A.
Presley
and
Zona
Marie
Roach.
The
document,
which
could
easily
have
been
photo-shopped,
shows
Smith’s
birthdate
July
1961
but
issued
in
1985
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