Austin Butler has reflected on his deep connection to Lisa Marie Presley for the first time since her tragic passing earlier this month.
In his last appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallonthem Elvis star, 31, opened up about his friendship with the late Lisa Marie.
“I first met Lisa when we screened the film at Graceland,” Butler recalled. “And I’ve never had an experience where I met someone and felt an immediate depth of connection with them.”
“She was a person who really had nothing to prove and didn’t want to open up to everyone, and she just opened up to me,” he added, darkly, “and we got so close, so fast. So, yeah, it’s just devastating.”
Butler played the late icon’s father, Elvis Presley, in his biopic Elvis, which earned him a Best Leading Actor nomination at the 2023 Oscars.
During that first meeting, Butler said Lisa Marie took him on a tour of the iconic Graceland estate and took him to see Elvis’ slippers and his current bedroom.
“[I] getting goosebumps,” Butler recalled. “It was after the movie was shown and the bedroom, you know, his bedroom is a place most people never see. And she said, ‘I want to show you something.’ And she took me up there, we just sat in her room. And up there, it’s not Elvis, it was just dad, you know?”
“And so, to hear those stories, I will truly cherish that forever,” he added.
Lisa Marie died after suffering cardiac arrest, just two days after Butler won a Golden Globe for her performance in Elvis.