Elvis Presley is still setting trends 45 years after his death. The watch The King wore in Blue Hawaii is going back on sale in honor of what would have been his 87th birthday.
The King loved watches and had a large collection of Omegas and Rolex. But early in his career, someone gave Elvis a watch made by Hamilton called the Ventura S Quartz as a gift, and he loved it. Hamilton launched in 1957. Designers gave it a unique triangular design to make it stand out amongst its competitors. So when Elvis Presley wore his while Blue Hawaii it was instantly recognizable. Sales of the watch spiked after the movie came out and became a hit that year.
You can buy Ventura S Quartz for $725 in honor of Elvis’ birthday on Jan. 8.
While the watch was a big hit, it can’t compete with the smash song from the movie. Elvis Presley debuted “Can’t Help Falling In Love With You” in Blue Hawaii. The song topped the Billboard charts in the United Kingdom and made it to No. 2 in the U.S. Hot 100. But the tune had staying power. Elvis performed it for the rest of his life and would often close out his shows with the song. It’s also one of the songs he’s most known for, which is saying something when you consider the depth of his catalog.
Angela Lansbury on Working With Elvis Presley on ‘Blue Hawaii’
Before she was solving murders on Murder, She Wrote, Angela Lansbury was working alongside Elvis Presley on the surfer comedy Blue Hawaii. The now 96-year-old spoke with Turner Classic Movies in 2013 about what it was like working beside the biggest celebrity on the planet.
“Well obviously I was awed by being in the presence, but he was an awfully nice young man in those days. (Elvis) always was a wonderfully nice young man, a very caring person. He had terrible problems of a very personal nature, but in those days he’d just come out of the Army. He was fit, he was slender, and he was top of his form. And he couldn’t have been nicer to me,” she said.
Angela Lansbury was only nine years older than Elvis Presley, yet she played his mom in Blue Hawaii. A fact they both found funny.
“We had a lovely time, it was a wonderful location. We were on Kauai in the Hawaiian islands. I’ll never forget it, it was really wonderful,” Lansbury said. “And she was such a funny character! Her whole reaction to her son who she didn’t understand at all. [Elvis] loved it, he thought it was terribly funny. He was very sweet.”
