Dolly Parton never tried to sell her looks as natural. The big hair, dramatic eyelashes, her body proportions and her love of flashy clothes are all there to create a certain image and she never pretended that she woke up like that. Instead she always treated her looks as something to play with, exaggerate and make it a look of her own.
Over the years people have asked her abut what she got done numerous times and she never really denied it. She never said it was all good genes, a special moisturiser or drinking a gallon of water a day. She’s always found an honest yet humorous way to admit to having work done, and her one liners about her looks have an amazing effect on people because not only does it make them laugh, but it also makes Dolly seem a lot more real and relatable.
Dolly Was Never Trying to Look “Natural”
You could never really say Dolly Parton has a natural look. But that was the point. She likes to share the story about how she came up with her look in interviews. She grew up on the farm and didn’t go into the city often, but when she did she was fascinated with this woman who had beautiful big peroxide blonde hair, long red nails, bright lipstick, tight and short clothes. She thought this girl was just the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen. People would say that it was the local “tramp”. Dolly’s mother would say “that girl is nothing but trash”. But Dolly would say “well that’s what I want to be when I grow up”.
She’s not chasing some sort of tasteful ideal, she’s created a wonderfully memorable character, she based her look on a town tramp and she has a great sense of humour, which is why she also summed up her look with a great quote: “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.”
She Was Astonishingly Open About Having Work Done
Dolly has been very open about the work she had done, she never tried to convince people she looks different because she started taking vitamins and sleeping better.
In 2003 Larry King asked Dolly how come she’s so open and willing to discuss her procedures and plastic surgeries and her reply was wonderfully straightforward: “Because people like you ask me, and I don’t want to lie about it.”
She then went on to confirm that yes, she has had a facelift, she’s her work done around her eyes, she’s had liposuction and excess skin removal after a significant weight loss. She has admitted she uses Botox, and has collagen in her lips.
But when Larry King asked her if she ever gets a little afraid going into these procedures Dolly replied that yes, but she gets the best doctors.
And Then There Were the Plastic Surgery Jokes
No one was better than Dolly at turning a conversation about her looks into comedy.
Her most famous philosophy was beautifully simple: “If I see something saggin’, baggin’ or draggin’, I’ll get it nipped, tucked or sucked.”
Most celebrities feel uncomfortable talking about Botox, but it looked like Dolly used it as an opportunity to polish her stand-up routine. She loved to joke about looking artificial and she often joked that she thinks of herself as a show dog that she wants to keep groomed. Dolly also said that she never went for huge transformations, instead choosing to do little bits here and there, and she doesn’t do it often.
She was also very aware of her figure and took on comments about the size of her breasts in stride, joking that she’s not sure if they’re supporting her or if she’s supporting them, but she likes it either way.
Her Honesty Made the Artifice Feel Strangely Authentic
The Dolly Parton paradox is that even though she looked totally artificial, she came off totally real in every other way. She had no problem being real in interviews, and she was very real in expressing her views and beliefs. Dolly always came across way more authentic than many other celebs who swore they never had any work done.
Here lies the great Dolly paradox: almost nothing about the visual presentation was supposed to look untouched, yet she came across as more authentic than celebrities desperately insisting they had never touched a syringe.
Dolly was surprisingly modern when it came to her views on beauty. She understood with perfect clarity what she was doing and to what effect. She knew that in order to look a certain way she didn’t have to pretend it was real. She just had to be happy with the result. And that made her unique.
She Also Knew Plastic Surgery Wasn’t Risk-Free
As much as Dolly jokes about her looks, she was never reckless. She knew plastic surgery came with risks and she took those risks seriously.
In an interview with Howard Stern in 2023 she explained that she never does everything at once, and actually prefers to do small procedures whenever she needs to. She also stressed that she always tries her best to get only the best doctors, and even then she knows that something could go wrong. You could have the best doctors in the world, but you never know how you’re going to heal, so you have to be careful about it.
Dolly never tried to make plastic surgery seem like an easy and fabulous solution. She was just very real about it, and was happy to talk about it and share her experience so that if someone was going to do it, they knew what to expect.
In the End, Dolly Didn’t Erase Herself — She Invented Herself
In conversations about plastic surgery, there’s often a lot of talk about losing yourself to it, changing yourself to the point go looking completely different and not like yourself. But Dolly seems to be a shining example of the opposite.
Somehow, despite her exaggerated curves, the massive wigs, the big bright lips and sparkling costumes she became distinctly more herself. She didn’t pretend to be anyone else, she simple used it all as self-expression.
Her looks weren’t meant to keep up with the times, she wasn’t trying to follow trends. Her look was based on a country girl’s idea of glam and she was always uniquely herself.