Unlike many other stars, 78-year-old Dolly Parton doesn't describe her colorful life in memoirs, no, she makes a musical about it. And is currently publicly looking for dollies of different ages.
There's Britney, 35 years old, from Georgia, mother of three. She sings: “Just Because I'm Blonde, / Don't Think I'm Dumb, / 'cause This Dumb Blonde Ain't Nobody's Fool,” while looking cheekily into the camera.
Or there is six-year-old Emilia, who sits in front of a wooden house in Louisiana and sings: “Back Through the Years / I Go Wonderin' Once Again.” She chose her jacket to match the song “Coat of Many Colors”: a quilted jacket made of many different materials.
Both have uploaded a video of themselves to Instagram and Tiktok, just like thousands of other women. Below she wrote under the following hashtag: #searchfordolly.
“Calling all aspiring global superstars,” says the website that started the hype. Because 78-year-old Dolly Parton dies Queen of country music, is currently working on a Broadway musical. It will be called “Dolly” and will retell her life. She is now looking for dollies of different ages. “Are you ready to step into the high heels of a legend?” Britney and Emilia – they are ready.
It fits well with the narrative of Dolly Parton's life that she is not necessarily looking for professional actresses, but is open to “diamonds in the rough with that conscientious extra”. Because she herself was once such a rough diamond, growing up in poor conditions in the southern state of Tennessee.
And it's also fitting that the 78-year-old doesn't stage her memoirs in a book – she's already written a few of them: for children, for those seeking advice (“Dream on”), about fashion – but as a show in which her music and their self-presentation are the main components. Because Dolly Parton doesn't just deserve the title of Queen of Country Musicbut also clearly that of the Queen of show business.
What began as a singer-songwriter's career in the 1960s developed over the years into one of Hollywood's biggest success stories. Dolly is and was omnipresent: on television shows, on the radio, on stages around the world, on red carpets, on the cinema screen. Dolly feels like she is successful in everything she has accomplished.
A few numbers: She composed over 3,000 songs, sold over 100 million albums, won 10 Grammys, was nominated for an Oscar twice, runs a theme park (with rodeos, roller coasters and a wellness hotel) called “Dollywood” and a foundation that has already raised millions sent books and children. In 2014, when she was almost 70, she played at the Glastonbury Festival in England in front of over a hundred thousand fans.
“Dolly Parton will never die,” says Sandro Monetti, journalist and Hollywood expert. How do over sixty years of life and show fit into a musical? What stories will Dolly Parton tell? Will she give more insight into her personal life?
For example, their marriage was long considered Hollywood's biggest mystery. She has been married to Carl Dean, whom she met as an 18-year-old in a laundromat in Nashville, since 1966 – and yet he has not once been seen with her on the red carpet. “He is a very private person,” says Parton. And so will she, as soon as she comes home to Nashville.
Perhaps she will also talk about her birth: She was born the fourth of twelve children, and her father is said to have not had enough money to pay the doctor who was present at her birth in their small wooden huts. He is also said to have given him a sack of oatmeal.
Or she talks about her visit to Elvis Presley's studio, where he played his cover version of her song “I Will Always Love You”. Parton was thrilled until Presley's manager called her and explained that as a songwriter she had to give up 50 percent of her publishing rights, “standard procedure.” “But not my procedure,” Parton replied. A decision that would later make her rich when Whitney Houston made the song a worldwide hit in 1992.
The musical will definitely not lack humor, as Dolly Parton always has a saying up her sleeve – even at her own expense. When asked by a journalist how she manages to always look so happy, she waved him off and said: “Oh, you know. . . It’s the Botox!”
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