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Five minutes before the show, Kevin Mills dons the suit.

“Once you put that suit on, and you’re all made up, you totally get in the zone,” he said. “Without that suit, I’m just Kevin.”

With the suit, he’s the King.

Mills is one of four Elvis Presley tribute artists who will appear on stage for the “Elvis Lives” stage show Tuesday at Greensboro’s War Memorial Auditorium.

The show, which features a live band and photos from Graceland’s archives, will cover the singer’s career from when he hit it big in the 1950s up to the rhinestone-speckled tours of the 1970s. It is presented as part of the Triad Best of Broadway series.

Mills will portray the King during the movie years, roughly the early to mid-1960s, and will dance with Ann-Margret tribute artist Lori Russo during a rendition of “Viva Las Vegas.”

A New Jersey native, Mills said he first became fascinated with the King when he was 9.

“My brother Mike came in with a bunch of old albums that he got at a flea market and threw them on the bed and told me to pick out my favorite ones,” he said. “So I grabbed one, and it was an Elvis album. I put it on, and I was hooked.”

He began mimicking Elvis at birthday parties and family gatherings, and when he was 19, he started a rockabilly band on the Jersey Shore.

“I would always do a few Elvis songs throughout the set,” he said. “And people would tell me all the time, 'Man, you sound just like Elvis. Maybe you should do a contest or your own show.’ ”

So in 1990, he donned a pink jacket, picked up a big 1950s-era microphone and hit the stage at Images of the King in Memphis, Tenn., then the World Series of Elvis contests.

He placed first and three years later found himself performing in front of President Bill Clinton at his inaugural ball.

Mills has made a fairly good living since then and recently finished up an eight-show-a-week engagement at Bally’s Atlantic City Hotel & Casino.

He typically spends about an hour-and-a-half getting his hair and makeup done before a show. Though he says he looks like Elvis offstage, he does use a few wigs, depending on the era he’s portraying. His rhinestone-laden costumes (some of which cost $5,000-$6,000) come from B&K Enterprises, the original makers of the King’s jumpsuits.

Like many others who do what he does for a living, he describes himself first and foremost as a tribute artist and rejects the term “Elvis impersonator.”

“Anybody can be an 'impersonator,’” he said. “There’s 40,000 Elvis guys in the world. But there’s only a handful that can do what we do. I don’t use the term impersonator because I am an actor, and I am an artist. And I’ve done a lot of studying.”

Performing as Elvis, he said, also requires him to stay in shape.

“Elvis was a mover and a shaker,” Mills said. “He had high energy. I go to the gym every day, do a lot of cardio. You also need to have the natural ability to pull off some of the moves he did on stage. You can’t force it. You’ve got to be natural.

“The easy part is singing. The hard part is studying his mannerisms, his body movement. That’s what creates the illusion.”

Contact Robert C. Lopez at 691-5091 or robert.lopez@news-record.com