My Way

“My Way” is the song whose horns accompany the climax of Myra Evans’s imagined encounter with Elvis Presley. Its placement gives the scene a brash, theatrical crescendo: Myra dances with the King, kisses him before an arena audience, and experiences the fantasy as bodily ecstasy.

Appearance in the Elvis Fantasy

The song arrives after Elvis draws Myra into his performance and dances with her across a wide stage before four thousand screaming fans. The Jordanaires chant a rock-and-roll refrain; Elvis turns her toward him, and she is swept into a kiss. As the horns kick in with the syncopated opening of “My Way,” the fantasy intensifies into an erotic experience that fills her attention completely.

Dramatic Function

The song helps carry the scene from public spectacle to private sensation. Myra is ostensibly performing before a vast audience, with Cora Rusk looking up at her from below the footlights, but the music and Elvis’s attention narrow her world to the encounter. The contrast between the arena’s scale and Myra’s absorbed physical response makes the fantasy feel both spectacular and intimate.

Connection to the Illusion

The performance is not a real concert: Leland Gaunt watches Myra in the shop as she clutches the picture of Elvis, while the imagined stage encounter unfolds around her. In this setting, “My Way” is part of the illusion that gives Myra’s longing an overwhelming sensory form. The song’s climactic role links popular performance to the scene’s collapse of distance between an image and the desire projected onto it.