Family, friends and celebrities gathered at Graceland on Jan. 22 to honor the life of Lisa Marie Presley, who died unexpectedly on Jan. 12 at age 54. Riley Keough, Presley’s oldest daughter, attended the funeral with her husband, stuntman Ben Smith-Petersen.
The actor wrote a moving letter to her mother, which Smith-Petersen read during the ceremony.
“A letter to my mama: Thank you for being my mother in this life. I am eternally grateful to have spent 33 years with you. I’m certain I chose the best mother for me in this world and I knew that as far back as I remember you and I remember everything,” Smith-Petersen read, as shown in a video by ABC24 Memphis. “I remember you giving me baths as a baby and I remember you driving me in my car seat listening to Aretha Franklin. I remember the way you would cuddle me at night, and the way you smelled. I remember you taking me for ice cream after school in Florida. I remember you singing me and my brother lullabies at night. I remember how you would lay with us until we fell asleep.”
As Keough’s husband continued reading, the letter revealed that Presley had become a grandmother before her untimely death.
“Thank you for showing me that love is the most important things in this life,” Smith-Petersen read from Keough’s letter. “I hope I can love my daughter the way you loved me.”
The name and birthdate of Keough and Smith-Petersen’s child — Elvis and Priscilla Presley’s first great-grandchild — have not been made public. However, a representative for Keough confirmed to People that the baby girl was born in 2022. Keough and Smith-Petersen have been married for eight years; they first met while filming “Mad Max: Fury Road” in 2012.
Lisa Marie Presley had four children. She shared daughter Riley and son Benjamin, who died from suicide in 2020 at age 27, with ex-husband Danny Keough, whom she was married to from 1988 to 1994. Her twins, Harper and Finley Lockwood, were born in 2008 during Presley’s marriage to her fourth husband, Michael Lockwood, whom she divorced in 2016.
By Tricia Goss, for Scripps News.
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