When Dolly announced her “big dream” for a “fantasy city” called Dollywood USA during an interview with Barbara Walters in 1982, there was already a Silver Dollar City theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. Jack Herschend, one of Silver Dollar City’s owners, realized their park would never be able to compete for business with a new park bearing Dolly’s name and likeness, and what happened next was a classic case of “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em.” Silver Dollar City joined forces with Dolly Parton, agreeing to manage and operate the park, which would soon be “Dolly-ized” and expanded as Dollywood.
The gates to Dollywood, “the friendliest town in the Smokies,” swung open for the first time on May 3, 1986. Everyone but Dolly seemed apprehensive about the joint venture; however, fears were calmed when attendance jumped from 750,000 to nearly 1.4 million the first year. Dollywood was the fastest growing theme park in America. A comprehensive media campaign surrounding the opening of Dollywood had its namesake busier than ever, and Dolly’s celebrity guaranteed her a spot on virtually any media outlet she desired. She was interviewed by Johnny Carson and Phil Donahue, profiled on “Fame, Fortune, and Romance,” appeared on Entertainment Tonight, and even made stops at the morning shows on all three major television networks.
Features in nearly all the major women’s interest magazines were arranged to coincide with the opening of Dollywood. While this Ladies’ Home Journal piece touched on the news of the theme park’s opening, interviewer Cliff Jahr was focused on Dolly’s personal turmoil. Candid and forthcoming with details of her issues with depression, Dolly explains just how close she came to ending her own life and how that dark moment changed her future for the better. —Ed.
Health problems and death threats drove her to despair. This month, she launches a comeback.
“Turning forty this past January,” says Dolly Parton brightly, “gave me a whole new lease on life. It was like a switch clicked on. Suddenly I felt younger than at twenty-five, when I was working so hard and fighting to get ahead. I’ve always known what I wanted, but now I know what to do with it.”
Until very recently, though, the country-music superstar was conspicuously absent from recording studios and concert halls. For three years, she put her career on hold as she struggled to get her private life in order. It was a time of ups and downs—mostly downs. During one tough period, she even considered suicide.
“I’ve been through just about everything—tragedy, heartache, disappointment,” she says. “But now I’m smarter about things, about family and friends and business, and I don’t think there’s anything I can’t do. I’m ready to live!”
This is her first sit-down interview in well over a year, and she seems as sunny and fun loving as ever. Yet there’s a hint of greater self-assurance in Dolly’s voice. She talks confidently about the Las Vegas shows, the scheduled release of a new album this fall, and the filming of another movie with her 9 to 5 co-stars, Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin. In May, she opened Dollywood, her own theme park, in Tennessee.
“Oh, I’ve got lots of things on the burner—you’ll be surprised,” she says, tugging at her upswept yellow wig. “I’ve kept a low profile lately, and that’s on purpose, because when I come back I want to come back strong. I told myself I’d make my return when I was forty, because at this age you can’t sit on the fence any longer. Who knows how much time you’ve got?”
She is lunching today at a Los Angeles restaurant she adores for its famous green-corn tamales. Daintily, she dips a tamale in hot sauce, being careful not to spill any down the deep neckline of her black angora sweater. She recently lost twenty pounds without sacrificing her famous curves, and as a bonus, Dolly’s lovely high cheekbones, one of her best features, have reappeared. It’s nice to see her smiling again after so many years of heartache.
Dolly’s troubled period began back in 1982. At the time, she was at the height of her career, following the worldwide success of her first movie, 9 to 5, and then The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, which is the third-biggest movie musical in box-office history. Then, one September night, during a performance in Indianapolis, she was suddenly stricken by internal abdominal bleeding. Gynecological surgery was successful and stopped short of a hysterectomy, but it left Dolly weak for months.
When she returned to work, telephoned death threats from a man in Kentucky forced her to cancel her tour. “I still don’t know whether he was a killer or just a crank,” she remarks. “But, of course, you always have to be prepared for that kind of stuff.”
To compound matters, she was still trying to get over the unpleasant experience she had shooting Whorehouse. There had been endless production delays, fights and firings, as well as struggles with temperamental Burt Reynolds. His black moods, which swung between sulks and tantrums, sometimes brought Dolly to tears. “Making that picture was a nightmare,” she confides.
She was also feeling downhearted because of snarled relations with some of her relatives. “It’s very hard to be the family of a celebrity,” she notes gently.
At the same time, she faced the disloyalty of “a special friend, an affair of the heart, which just about killed me. Oh, I cried an ocean. But I ain’t gonna talk about it anymore,” she says playfully. “I’ve got to keep some mystery.”
Whether a romance or not, the friendship did not threaten her seemingly open marriage to Carl Dean, a union that has flourished for twenty years. “There’s no way Carl and I are ever going to break up,” she insists. “We have a happy marriage, a great marriage.” Has she ever been tempted by other men? “Of course I’ve been tempted,” she says with a laugh. “I’m married—I’m not dead.”
As her problems worsened, Dolly began to fall apart. Binge eating made her overweight. Hoarseness and fragile health led her to cancel concerts, which resulted in lawsuits and more unhappiness. Finally, she became so depressed, she dropped from sight. For the next two years, Dolly accepted only a few carefully chosen projects, such as a Christmas TV special and the hit single “Islands in the Stream,” both with Kenny Rogers, and one solo album, Real Love.
How blue did she get? “It was bad,” she replies. “It was devastating to be in that depressed state of mind. For about six months there I woke up every morning feeling dead.”
Did she ever think of suicide? Dolly looks off into the distance. “I got close once,” she says softly. “I was sitting upstairs in my bedroom one afternoon when I noticed in the nightstand drawer my gun that I keep for burglars. I looked at it a long time, wondering and saying to myself, ‘Well now, this is where people get the idea of suicide, isn’t it? Guns around the house and people sorrowing and all.’ Then, just as I picked it up, just to hold it and look at it for a moment, our little dog, Popeye, came running up the stairs. The tap-tap-tap of his paws jolted me back to reality. I suddenly froze. I put the gun down. Then I prayed. I kinda believe Popeye was a spiritual messenger from God, y’know?
“I don’t think I’d have done it, killed myself,” she explains, “but I can’t say for sure. I always thought I was absolutely not the suicidal type because I’m too well anchored with roots and family and friends. But now that I’ve gone through that terrible moment, I can certainly understand the possibilities even for someone solid like me if the pain gets bad enough.
“After that, my life changed in a positive way,” she says, brightening. “I have greater wisdom now, more tolerance and patience for people who are struggling with liquor or drugs or suicide or being in prison. That frightening moment with the gun was very, very humbling. I kind of think it was God’s way to bring me to my knees long enough to pray.”
The experience also made Dolly more appreciative of her close friendship with Judy Ogle, her aide and companion since high school days. “Y’know, you often hear that stars who died sadly, like Elvis and Marilyn Monroe, had all kinds of people around them, but you never hear that they had a best friend, someone who really knew them and loved them. Well, I have Judy. I can talk to her about anything, especially on our long trips in the camper. She knows about me, and anything’s okay with her. I think friends can literally save your life.”
During much of the tumultuous period, Dolly retreated to the love of her big family in Tennessee, lying low with Carl at Willow Lake, their eighty-acre estate outside Nashville. When she was on the West Coast, she’d often hop into a camper with Judy or by herself, wearing no wig or makeup, and drive southeast from Los Angeles to her hideaway in Hemet, California, an old cottage with a swimming pool, hot tub and total privacy. For weeks on end, she swam, soaked, strummed a guitar, wrote songs and read everything from self-help to poetry.
As 1984 approached, Dolly felt restored enough to take on her third movie, Rhinestone, a romantic comedy filled with country songs she wrote herself. Everyone expected Dolly and leading man Sylvester Stallone to make a dream duo, but the result was a standoff between curves and muscles. At the box office, Rhinestone didn’t sparkle.
“Which devastated Stallone,” recalls Dolly. “Sly probably thinks I nearly wrecked his career with that movie, but to me, I was the one taking the chance. I’ve done two musicals with men who can’t sing—Sly and Burt Reynolds—and here I am a singer. Both were bad casting, of course, but I have only myself to blame.”
Though she was less than impressed with her co-star’s singing voice, Dolly found Stallone to be intelligent and humorous. “He was so funny that he’d make me laugh until I’d lose my breath and beg him to stop,” she recalls. “He’s really fun to work with—he’s nuts, sick, crazy, a scream! He’s pretty to look at, too, and I know that when Sasha, his last wife, was getting her divorce, she said we were having an affair. Not true at all. Sly and I are just not each other’s type.
“Both he and Burt are egomaniacs,” she continues, “but Sly is the perfect balance of total ego and total insecurity. I see how his mind works. If you were in love with him, he’d pick out all your weaknesses and either use them to help you or use them against you. I told him right up front, ‘Sly, please, please, please don’t get on me like you do other people. I know what I am, who I am, and I happen to be happy with me.’ So he never bothered me, but when he was in a bad mood I couldn’t wait to see who he was going to fire or curse out next. I always told him he was spectacular but that he had a blind spot where compassion and spirituality ought to be. He was amused by me, I think, but he couldn’t deal with me on a day-to-day basis because I’m too raw and honest.”
Just as Dolly was beginning to gain back her old confidence, she was forced to confront another obstacle. A songwriting team claimed that she had used their music to create her Oscar-nominated title song for the movie 9 to 5, and they sued for plagiarism. Last December’s trial in Santa Monica, California, which put Dolly and Jane Fonda on the witness stand, dragged on for twelve days and made unsavory headlines.
“So degrading,” Dolly says with a wince. “One of the most painful things I’ve ever gone through. It damaged my reputation, I think, because there’ll always be some people out there who think I would stoop so low as to steal from working people. Hell, I know how hard it is to get a break in this business. Besides, there were only five musical notes in question, and they have been used in a hundred songs.”
Dolly picks up a taco chip and examines it for a moment. “Well”—she smiles, snapping it in two—“the jury was out for twenty minutes, and we won. The court awarded me attorney’s fees, which is a lot of money. Then the couple who sued me tried to get a retrial, claiming I charmed the jury because I played songs on the witness stand. The retrial was denied, and then they actually started trying to get me to record some of their songs.”
The trial ended shortly before Dolly turned forty. By the time her birthday rolled around, she was ready to take back control of her life. “Y’know what I did?” she drawls, smiling broadly. “I got up early that morning and went straight to a list of names I’d made. I wrote letters to four people, some family, some business, who I had let mess with my head. They’re people who’d had the upper hand on me for years. When I saw them comin’, I’d cringe. When they called, I wasn’t in.
“The letters were very blunt. They said, I’m not going to put up with your B.S. anymore. You have no control over me and little control of yourself, so you should examine things very carefully. Then I made some phone calls, too. I decided to get all the grief and worries over irresponsible people out of my life. And it worked—it really cleared the air. I’m perfectly comfortable with those people now.”
With her life straightened out, Dolly pressed on with plans for her comeback, timed to follow her new theme park’s grand opening on May 3. Dollywood is a mini-Disneyland nestled on 140 acres in the Great Smoky Mountains. Its unique attraction is a rags-to-riches museum that displays Dolly’s humble birthplace, the two-room tar-paper shack in which she spent her childhood with eleven brothers and sisters. Actually, it’s an exact copy of the original house, which still stands nearby but was not moved to Dollywood, because it has sprouted a fancy price tag since her rise to fame.
Dolly is still devoted to her family, especially to her mother, Avie Lee Parton, a hardworking backwoods homemaker who was determined that her dozen children not grow up stigmatized by poverty. Explains Dolly, “Mama always said, ‘We’re rich people because we know we got love and we got each other.’ But then again, there were hungry times when the crops were down, and that’s when Mama made stone soup.”
To make stone soup, Avie Lee sent her children outdoors to fetch the smoothest stone each could find. She then selected one to drop in the pot with whatever potatoes and onions she had.
“She made such a big to-do about picking the right one,” relates Dolly with a laugh. “She’d say, ‘Oh, I feel some magic in this one.’ It was Mama’s wonderful imagination that distracted us from the hunger. Maybe it didn’t work on a few of my brothers and sisters, who still resented being poor, but for others, like me, it was the best thing that ever happened.”
Dolly’s parents don’t have to worry about crop failures anymore. They now live in a hilltop mansion (“like a Hallmark Christmas card,” she notes), but the family is as close as ever. “Daddy saw 9 to 5 so often”—she laughs—“that I think it was his way of getting to know which kid I was. He just lived in that drab theater, and it touches me to think of it. Y’see, he and Mama had so many kids that none of us got special attention. What’s more, I was so busy working on my music that I had just about left home by the time I was ten.
“Mama and Daddy don’t cater to me any more than the other kids,” she adds. “I’m still just their li’l Dolly. I’m so much like my mother, who always sees to it that she’s the center of attention. Mama’s attitude is, Why, of course Dolly’s a star—she’s just like me.”
These days, Dolly softens childhood memories of the tar-paper shack by indulging her love of buying houses. To the list of places she keeps in Manhattan, Nashville, California and Hawaii, she is adding a big, glamorous “dollhouse” in Beverly Hills. Despite rumors she would sell Willow Lake, she is actually spreading out in the Nashville area. She recently bought a weekend house on a nearby lake, partly as a way of accommodating Carl’s passion for privacy. “He doesn’t like a lot of people around him,” Dolly explains. “So I’m limited in using that big, fine house. But now when I want to have some people over for a cookout or a swimming party, Carl can take Popeye and go down to the lake house. Or vice versa. We’re doing it up just like an old sea shanty, and it’s on water that connects all the way to New Orleans. It’s so private that you could run around naked—and we probably will.”
Dolly’s blue eyes shine merrily. Does she consider herself happy now? “More than I’ve ever been,” she says firmly. “But I think you have to work at being happy, just like you have to work at being miserable. I’m going to grasp every happy moment I can find. It would be a great sin for me not to enjoy my success. Oh, I still sometimes feel pain and sadness, and I get emotional and cry, but I don’t think there’s anything missing from my life now. Of course, I do have my little shortcomings. I know I will always be short, for instance, and that’s okay. What is not okay is when I’m short and fat. But I like me. I just hope everybody else likes me as much as I do.”
Does she think she’ll still be happy with herself when she’s sixty? “I’ll be a great old lady,” she affirms. “Just a little older than I am now, but lots of fun and busy and smarter, full of life and still foolin’ around a little. If it’s God’s will that I’m healthy and I keep my mind, I can always sing, write for other people, manage, produce, do a talk show, a variety show, a TV series. I get these incredible offers all the time, but during this part of my career, I’m going for the bigger stuff, the movies, Dollywood, books I’m going to write, and helping to run my new film and TV production companies with my manager.
“I don’t know what the big deal is about old age,” she continues. “I’m writing a book about old people right now called Old Dogs, New Tricks, and I think people give age too much importance. Old people who shine from inside look ten to twenty years younger. I swear that some of them shine so bright that they’re still sexy.”
She sits back and delicately dabs a napkin at the corner of her mouth.
“Of course,” she drawls, “I’m gonna be one of ’em.”
DOLLY DIAMOND
On Her TV Series
“I want it to be really uplifting, spiritually uplifting, at a time when people need to feel more confident about themselves. At the end of that hour, I want people to feel so good that they’ll want to see it again. The human spirit could use a good shot of what I hope this show is going to have. . . . Everyone says variety is dead. Well, I say, ‘If variety is dead, what are we doing here? If variety is dead, we’re all in deep s--t!’ . . . I’m gonna go at this as if it were the last show I was ever going to do. I will lay everything on the line. I will show the people who I am, good and bad. If they want to see me without wigs and makeup, that will happen.”
—To Susan Cheever, TV Guide, October 17, 1987
DOLLY DIAMOND
On Her TV Series
“If the show fails, it won’t be the end of my life—I’ll move on. I’m not afraid to try anything, and I’m certainly not afraid to fail.”
—To Mary-Ann Bendel, Ladies’ Home Journal, November 1987