This Is How Elvis Presley Was Almost Murdered

There is so much danger that comes with being a celebrity. Not only have some of the biggest movie scenes in history required shots that almost killed the stars involved, but sometimes celebrities simply attract the fanatical attention of people who would do them harm.

As with fellow musical heavyweights such as Mick Jagger and Bob Marley, there was an "attempt" on Elvis Presley's life, too. It is an astonishing story featuring the most unlikely of would-be assailants.

Elvis spent his entire music career in the public eye. He surely learned early on about the dangers to him but would not bow to fears and threats. In fact, as the Express reports, he once performed in Las Vegas with a gun in his waistband (he had an extensive collection of firearms and was a huge enthusiast) after a series of telephone calls hinting at a potential kidnapping or murder plot.

"If anyone fired at him, he intended to shoot back and, in the event that he was killed, he had ordered his bodyguards to shoot the assassin before the police moved in. 'I don't want anyone to become famous for shooting Elvis Presley,' he said," stated author and celebrity biographer Chris Hutchins.

Nothing materialized from this incident, but there was a frightening and bizarre evening when Elvis was a hair's-breadth from being shot to death by none other than Alice Cooper.

The extraordinary story comes from an interview Cooper gave The Daily Mirror in 2011. The musical legends met for the first time at a hotel in Las Vegas in 1971. "The place was full of guns," Cooper remembered. "Elvis took me into the kitchen, opened a drawer, and pulled out a loaded pistol, telling me to put it to his head." Cooper was fearful, expecting security to burst in and see the super-incriminating scene, but Elvis simply wanted to demonstrate his martial arts prowess. He kicked the gun away from the grasp of his "assailant," effortlessly restrained Cooper, and announced, "That's how you stop a man with a gun."

Most frighteningly, Cooper reported actually wanting to fire. He joked, "'A little voice in my left ear was telling me, 'Go on, kill him, you'll always be the guy who killed Elvis.'" Alice Cooper has also lived an unbelievable life, but that would've been the ultimate tragic headline.