The problem with playing Presley in a movie is that he is such an iconic figure, it soon devolves yo an impression. Of the two TV movies -one with Kurt Russell and one with Henry VIII Jonathan Rhys Myers,neither escaped unscathed.
And as for the TV show? Well, Presley as a young Clark Kent wasn't gonna do much for anyone and it was gone in a season.
Perhaps these problems were enough to put the major movie studios on guard when he came to paying for a big movie till now.
Director John Scheinfeld (he did the documentary "The US Vs John Lennon" is working on a adaption of Presley's bodyguard from 1960 to 1976, Sonny Weston tell all "Fame And Fortune".
This is an excellent idea; if you can distance yourself from Presley and watch him through a third parties eye, it will be a a refracted vision. It might be very good. There are only so many ways to tell Presley's story. Pure fiction might work, re-imagining him from the top down. Perhaps a what if he had lived. But Presley was very close with "The Memphis Mafia" -they were his real friends . To be able to move EP out of the Sun Sessions/Houd Dogs/Movies/68 Special/Fat Elvis legend, perhaps his humanity can be reformed, perhaps we can see him as a person.
No idea who is gonna play the King, but they say an unknown.