MOBILE, Ala. -- The King still has a few surprises left in him, it seems.
Perhaps 700 people turned out Monday night to see "The Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artists Tour" at the Mobile Civic Center Theater. It's a new production, sanctioned by Elvis Presley Enterprises, that uses four award-winning impersonators to represent Presley's career.
The pleasant surprise of the night wasn't the live band, though it played quite well and was richly bolstered by six backup singers. Nor was it the lead performances, though the quartet of artists did an impressive job of re-creating Elvis' look, voice and charisma.
The memorable thing about the show was its lighthearted, fun atmosphere, which began with the unique rapport the Elvii created with the crowd. At times they were completely in character, impersonating the King right down to minor mannerisms and stage patter.
But the four -- Victor Trevino Jr., Leo Days, Kevin Mills and Bill Cherry -- didn't stick rigidly to the role.
At times they responded to shout-outs from the crowd with answers that showed more of their own individual personalities. And at times they would break character almost completely to narrate the context of the next song.
The net effect was that both the showmen and the audience seemed to respect the subject without taking themselves too seriously. There seemed to be an implicit understanding: "We're all indulging in a fantasy here, and we all know it."
Which is not to say the leads couldn't impress even people who'd seen the real thing.
"I'll tell you a story," Bud McLean, a longtime Mobile educator and musician, said in the lobby during Cherry's portion of the show, which covered Presley's rhinestone-intensive white-jumpsuit period.
"I saw Elvis Presley over there," McLean said, pointing in the direction of the Civic Center's arena dome. "And that guy," he said, pointing in Cherry's direction, "is scary."
From "Hound Dog" and "Blue Suede Shoes" to "In the Ghetto" and "If I Can Dream," this much was clear from the night: Presley's drawing power might be down a bit from his arena-filling years, but he and his music still can get people's heart rates up.
And that really might just be the ultimate tribute.
