Minor Tweaks

What made you think you could perform, that you’d be comfortable on stage?

I always had bands when I was younger. I played guitar. If I had to guess I always thought I would be more of a John Lennon impersonator. The Beatles were my idols when I was growing up. Elvis would have been the last thing I thought. I took it on like an acting thing. Getting the mannerisms down, the voice down.

What’s the difference between a good Elvis and a bad Elvis?

If I was just someone being objective, I would say the main thing is you have to have the look. There are a lot of people that shouldn’t be doing it. You can sort of pay homage to Elvis by singing his music but there are a lot of people -- like, when you see a midget doing it or someone from India -- just people who don’t resemble him physically in any way, you know, when they go out and do it, it gives people like myself who are doing it seriously -- it doesn’t make us shine, so to speak.

You’re more interested in creating an illusion ...

Right. I don’t mock him in any way. Anyone sitting in the audience, you’re seeing what you saw if you had seen him in concert. I’m not going to be doing anything for the benefit of a laugh.

You sing all the songs?

Oh yeah.

You don’t lip-sync?

No. I never lip-sync.

When you meet other Elvises, is it a brotherhood or is it more like "Hey, this is the competition?"

For me, I enjoy it. I enjoy shooting the bull. But for a lot of the others it is a competition. But like anything you get a lot of be nice to your face but they’ll stab you in the back the second you leave the room type thing. The last place you want to be is in a room full of Elvises. They can get very catty. But to me, it’s amusing because I don’t take it as serious as they do.

Where do you get the costumes?

There are a couple of different places. They have the same patterns that Elvis’s costume designer used. They start at $1,000 and go up to $4,000. That’s per costume. You want to have what he had when he was up there. You don’t want a satin-y Halloween costume.

What’s the best part of this job?

I just enjoy meeting the people. I’m a very social kind of person. I guess the biggest thing is seeing the joy that it brings for a lot of people. Sort of job satisfaction. With any other job you can never feel satisfied and you wonder what the whole purpose is, but with this you're sort of doing something you enjoy doing and people actually appreciate what you’re doing. So it gives you a lot of fulfillment.

So will there come a time when you’ll give it up?

Oh yeah. I don’t plan on doing it a whole lot longer. Elvis died when he was 42. So being just a tad older than he was when he died -- I don’t want to be one of these 50-year-old Elvises who walk around all wrinkly and all that stuff. To me, that makes it all a mockery. When my time comes I’ll definitely be ready to quit. I was blessed with good genes and I look about ten years younger. Most people think I’m 32 or 33.

Is there sort of a sharp dividing line between Tom Bartlett and Elvis Presley?

The only time I’m Elvis is when I’m on stage. When I walk off stage I’m myself. I don’t walk around looking like -- well, okay that’s a hard one. My hair is my own hair and my sideburns are my own sideburns. So if I get dressed up at all I look like Elvis walking around, even without the costume. So no matter where I go it’s like Elvis has entered the building. I get that everywhere I go. So I usually have my baseball cap on backwards and sunglasses. I dress myself down an awful lot to take away from that. But even then I walk into someplace and someone will say "You look just like Elvis."

When they do recognize you, do they want you to do something? Sing? Do the voice?

I’ve been in a situation where I’ve been in a club and people say I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you go over and sing "Love Me Tender" to my girlfriend. I’m not comparing myself to a celebrity by any means, but you can see how it might be for anyone who has any type of fame to walk into a place and want to be left alone and they won’t leave you alone. I can appreciate that. I just impersonate somebody and the guy I impersonate is dead. People want your autograph. That’s gonna sound really crazy. Some kid will come up and ask for your autograph. I’m like, you gotta be kidding me.

What name do you sign?

I always sign my name. I use to sign "Elvis Presley by Tom Bartlett." But now I just sign my name ... There’s nothing better than being up on stage. I’ve had people crying, just bawling their brains out while I’m singing. They say "You just reminded me so much of him. You took me back to that show where I saw him." They just lose it. They’re all crying. Like, when I’m done, I’m done. It’s like okey-dokey, this is a little deep for me, you know? But I do enjoy that, though. I guess you know you’re doing the right thing. I would rather have women crying than the alternative, like throwing tomatoes at me.