At the Marriott on Thousand Oaks Boulevard, behind the IHOP, about 500 Elvis Presley fan club officers and their dates are packed into the hotel's ballroom for a meal of London broil and pink champagne. They have traveled here at their own expense to attend the annual Fan Club Presidents' Luncheon.

This year's theme is "Follow That Dream," the title of a 1962 comedy in which Elvis plays a Florida homesteader and sings "On Top of Old Smokey." At the podium, Patsy Andersen, Elvis Presley Enterprises' perky fan relations manager, is introducing Elvis' costar in the film, Anne Helm. Also here are Gavin and Robbin Koon, identical twins who appeared in "Follow That Dream" as children. The Koons are wearing bifocals and matching crew-neck sweaters and peer glumly at the audience.

Next, Patsy introduces the Browns, a country harmony trio who toured with Elvis in the '50s. At the podium, matriarch Maxine Brown, who looks a lot like former Texas governor Ann Richards, regales the audience with a story in which Elvis' mother, Gladys, chides her son for "not wearing no drawers" onstage. There's some strangled laughter, but many of the fan club officers wear expressions indicating they find the anecdote in poor taste.

Patsy announces that she has a surprise, but first, fan club officers come up to the podium to present gifts to charity in Elvis' name. The Irish Elvis Presley Fan Club presents $1,500 to the Beaumont Hospital in Dublin. The Elvis Friendship Circle in Shreveport, La., donates 168 pounds of peanut butter to the Northwest Louisiana Food Bank. It is announced that the Elvis Heart of Gold Fan Club in Kahoka, Mo., has given six teddy bears to the Missouri Highway Patrol to "help comfort children who have been involved in accidents, domestic abuse or other traumatic situations."

Finally it's time for the surprise, and Patsy introduces a Disney executive named Kevin. Kevin wants to share a preview of an upcoming Disney animated feature that features seven Elvis songs, but says he must make sure no photos or video footage are leaked prior to the film's release. "We can't show this until all the cameras and video equipment are on the floor," Patsy interjects playfully. "If I see any pictures on the Internet, I know where you live and I will find you and kill you." Everyone laughs. The laughter subsides somewhat when a squad of security guards fans out across the room, checking for cameras.

Finally, the lights dim and a montage from the animated film "Lilo and Stitch" is shown on two large-screen TVs. The film concerns a young Hawaiian girl who adopts a space alien disguised as a dog. (It would be released in the spring, with impressive box office results.) When Stitch, the alien dog character, begins singing "Can't Help Falling in Love," the room bursts into whistles and applause. This happens every time Stitch sings an Elvis song. When the lights come up, Kevin says that thanks to "Lilo and Stitch," a new generation will be introduced to the music of Elvis Presley. Everyone applauds.

Day 2

On Graceland's front lawn, a photographer from Sports Illustrated is taking pictures of a tall young black man in expensive-looking sneakers. A security guard tells me the man's name is Shane Battier and that he's the star forward for the Memphis Grizzlies, the city's new NBA franchise. "Do some air guitar," the photographer instructs, and Battier strikes a '50s greaser pose, gyrates his hips and strums the air.

Built in 1939 by Dr. and Mrs. Thomas D. Moore, Graceland still looks more like the home of an affluent physician than of a man who has sold a billion records. The Georgian colonial that Elvis bought in 1957 for $100,000 is far more modest than, for example, the homes of the rappers and heavy metal musicians profiled weekly on MTV's "Cribs."

Downstairs, in a rec room furnished with three TVs, a stereo console, a soda fountain and a small glass sculpture of a monkey, one of the lemon yellow walls is emblazoned with Elvis' logo: the letters TCB, which stand for "Taking Care of Business," wrapped around a lightning bolt. Upstairs, the Jungle Room is upholstered in floor-to-ceiling shag carpeting and decorated with faux-African recliners and an indoor waterfall. In the adjoining room, a globe-shaped bed covered in fake crimson fur has an eight-track player built into the canopy.

Most of the details, however -- a football jersey, framed portraits of Elvis' parents -- are reminders that when he moved here, Elvis was a 22-year-old who never touched anything stronger than Pepsi. His favorite activities included gunning a golf cart loaded with high school friends around the property and renting out movie theaters and the local amusement park at night. Much of Graceland still looks like the home of a wealthy, unsupervised teenager.

In the backyard, a few sleepy horses graze behind a fence. There's a small office and a smokehouse that Elvis converted into a shooting range. The old slot-car track has been replaced with the Hall of Gold, an exhibit of Elvis' gold and platinum records, of which there are a formidable number. The racquetball courts now house an enormous glass obelisk from BMG Records, proclaiming Elvis "The Greatest Recording Artist of All Time," as well as a collection of stage outfits from the '70s. With their gold inlay, rhinestones and peacock feathers, they look like costumes from a kabuki production of "Grease."

In the Meditation Garden, a crowd of visitors outfitted with headphones and digital recorders stands silently around a small fountain. They look down at gravestones inscribed with the names of the Presleys. Several months after Elvis' death, in 1977, Vernon Presley moved his son's body here from nearby Greenwood Cemetery, which became inundated with fans. Gladys' grave is adorned with teddy bears. Elvis' is heaped with flowers and cards, and a dozen more wreaths and plaques are lined up along the side of the swimming pool. There is a guitar made of lilies, a red, white and blue floral arrangement bearing an intimate inscription from a French fan and a metal-and-wood plaque nearly as tall as a man, engraved with the names of five fans from Osaka, Japan.

In 1962, when Elvis built the Meditation Garden on a solitary corner of the property, Graceland was located in a bucolic spot adjacent to the Mississippi border. The only reminder of the city was Highway 51, a two-lane road that connected Memphis and Jackson. Today, Elvis Presley Boulevard is bounded by Graceland Plaza, a sprawling strip mall that houses an assortment of antiseptic diners, souvenir shops and mini-museums devoted to Elvis' cars, planes and personal effects. The highway takes motorists to the casinos in Tunica and the university in Oxford, and farther south, all the way to Baton Rouge and New Orleans.

The Meditation Garden hums with the sound of traffic. Standing near Elvis' grave, a well-dressed middle-aged man begins to weep. His wife tries to console him, but he buries his face in his hands and turns away.

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