Our first guest is an incredible singer songwriter and a larger
than life personality.
Please welcome the seven-time Grammy award winner,
the one, the only Dolly Parton.
[CHEERING]
Hello, everybody!
Hello, Ellen.
Whoops.
Well, hello, Dolly.
I just popped my top.
But it's all right.
That's probably not the first time.
No, it's not.
[LAUGHTER]
Now, it's OK?
Do we need to do anything?
No, it's all right.
All right.
I showed more than that.
I'll fix it at a commercial.
But anyway, it's OK.
This is tight.
All right.
You had a hilarious line the other day
when you said that there's not going to be a wardrobe
malfunction with you because--
Oh, I said because I'll probably take out the first three rows.
[LAUGHTER]
But I can tell you this.
If there is a malfunction, you will not see a nipple ring.
It'll be more like a hula hoop.
[LAUGHTER]
There's a lot of strain on my little clothes.
Yeah.
But I'm glad to see you.
You look great.
Thank you.
Now, and you're not ashamed to say that you're 58 years old.
Yes, I am.
You're-- it's amazing.
[CHEERING]
I've been around a long time.
And I've enjoyed every year of it too.
And how-- I mean, I'm 46.
But I feel like-- now I feel really bad.
I mean, you look so good.
What do you do?
Do you work out?
What do you do?
Well, it ain't cheap.
I just look cheap.
But just a lot of good doctors, you know, like--
a lot of good makeup.
so I--
No, this is not makeup.
You have great legs.
You do something.
This is not--
Thank you.
I don't really work out that much.
I'm not really physical.
No, I'm just-- I just kind of do whatever I need to do.
Yeah, but when you lost all that weight.
I'm a cartoon.
So it's almost easy to look this way.
I'll look this way probably when I'm 100, which will be--
But you didn't always--
you didn't always look this way.
You lost a lot of weight.
You must have done something.
Well, I was-- in my early years, I never had a weight problem.
But I did go from when I was like 38 years old
until I was about 45, I guess, I gained a lot of weight
because I'm just a big old hog.
Inside of me, there's a--
I mean, I'm a country girl.
All the foods I love are bad for you.
And I gained a lot of weight.
But I couldn't stand it.
I hated myself and everybody else.
I was that heavy.
So I just had to get my weight down.
I just eat--
I did everything to get the weight under control.
But now I just kind of eat small portions of the things
I really like.
The same things, though, you didn't cut out all the carbs
and all that stuff.
No, I love everything.
And that's why I had trouble.
I'm just a big eater.
But anyhow, thank God I got all that under control.
But I just-- it's kind of--
I look at myself like being in show business
kind of like a show dog or a show horse.
I have to kind of keep it groomed and clipped
and whatever.
Whatever I'm going to present, as long as I'm going to be on,
it's like I just kind of--
Let me know when you're ready for some water.
All right, so-- and then what--
you said that you look at yourself as a cartoon.
Did you have some kind of idol?
Did you go, this is how I want to look.
And I'm going to--
I'm aiming for this look?
When I was young?
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, actually, and I've told this story before,
but it's the honest truth.
There was this woman--
I grew up, first of all, way back in the mountains.
And we only got to go to town every once in a while.
But every time we would, there was this woman that
was the town trash, whore.
But I thought she was beautiful.
I didn't know what any of that meant.
And I would just see this woman with this yellow hair piled
on her head and bright red lipstick,
red nails, high heeled shoes.
And I thought she was the prettiest thing I'd ever seen.
And I used to say to my mama, oh, she's so pretty.
Mama say, oh, she's just trash.
And I thought to myself, that's what
I want to be when I grow up is trash,
because I felt that was a word for how she looked.
And I thought that was how I wanted to look.
Right.
So I grew up to look just like her.
[CHEERING]
Does she know that?
I mean is she still around.
No, she was probably-- she was older then.
I was just little.
I'm sure she's not around.
But I've never said her name for the sake of her family.
But she might not have been a whore.
She just might have been like me.
She might have just looked like one.
Maybe she thought that was a pretty way
to look because I know most girls, most country
girls, that's the way you think you're supposed to look.
I mean you-- or I mean, as plain as we were.
We had nothing.
Right.
And I used to put merthiolate and mercurochrome on my lips.
I used to paint my eyebrows with burnt kitchen matches.
I was going-- well, I mean like how you-- once they're burned,
then you lick them.
And then they dye.
They put stuff on you.
And pokeberries in the summer, I used to make a little water
dye, it makes like a little-- and then can
have a little rouge.
And so you'll figure it out if you're inclined.
Yeah, well.
You're like a makeup junkie or something.
You're jonesing for some eyeshadow
and you're just like needing to fix it out of anything.
It's true.
But that's actually a really inexpensive way
to put makeup on, what you just said.
It is.
But I actually could do it.
And my daddy hated--
my grandpa was a Pentecostal preacher, the hell
fire, brimstone.
And he thought I was Jezebel.
They thought I was going to hell in a handbasket.
They thought I was running around with the boys.
And I thought, no, ain't no way I'm sleeping with no boys
because I don't want nobody to mess up my makeup
or smear my lipstick.
We were just chatting through the commercial.
We do have a lot in common.
We both sleep in our makeup.
Now, is that true?
You really do sleep in your makeup?
It's really true.
Somebody asked me that once in an article.
Well, it's when I go-- like in LA,
because of the earthquakes and everything, I'm always--
and when I'm in New York, you're always
staying like in these high building hotels.
And I think, I always sleep with a wig on a lamp pole
by the bed.
And I always keep my makeup on and a pair of high heels
to get down the fire escape.
Sure, yeah.
But it's true.
When I'm in the big city, I leave my make up on.
Everybody else is going to be in pajamas and anything
they can find.
Well, there's the trash whore.
She made it out.
[LAUGHTER]
All done up at 4:00 in the morning.
And have you been, so far, have you been ever caught
in an earthquake?
Yes, I've been in every one you've had out here.
That's why I know what to do, yeah.
OK.
Because it's scary.
That is the worst feeling in the world.
You've been in them, right?
I have.
And I'm from New Orleans.
So the first time it happened, I thought
a truck was passing outside.
And it was just--
I was used to my apartment shaking that I lived in.
Being brought up in that holy roller background,
I thought it was the end of time.
It was doomsday and hell fire and damnation.
I just started praying about all this bad stuff
and asking forgiveness at the moment.
Right.
--for everything I've done.
So I could just--
Go right back to your old ways right after it.
I'm pretty sure that's what I did.
Yeah.