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Honoring Dolly Parton: A Heartfelt Tribute to Her Legacy and Impact on Music, Film, and Philanthropy · The K.B. Radio Network

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Hello everyone and welcome to Movie Goodness where we examine life through cinema here on the KB Radio Network.
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I am your host Kevin Reed and ladies and gentlemen today is a little darker.
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It's a little gloomier.
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The sun isn't shining as bright as it was.
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yesterday because today august the 25th 2026 we lost a legend we lost an icon and you never miss a good thing till it's gone type deal and
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that's how i felt when i first saw the news that miss dolly parton has passed away at the right young age of 80 years old
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I can say this going into this.
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I am a huge fan of Dolly Parton.
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And I'm not just giving her her flowers now that she has passed on.
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This is true blue.
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Love Dolly Parton.
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I don't care what it was.
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Her music,
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her performances,
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her on film.
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It's just something about Dolly Parton that it was just that...
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that girl next door oddly enough type feel that she gave like somebody you could just be cool with and she was just cool she just reeked cool never hung out with her don't know what she was all about personally it
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didn't matter i didn't care you know this was true fandom i just it was just something about her she just gave off a glow and never saw dolly parton upset unless she was
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acting in a you know in something where she was upset or anything like that but in interviews and performing and uh whatever it was she popped up she just looked happy and she just gave off that happy feeling that
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just it was just uplifting and she was just an uplifting spirit and from somebody who is not a country music person that i am not into country music at all
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Other than two people,
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two people that I would listen to on repeat all the time in that genre.
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That's Johnny Cash and Dolly Parton.
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Because to me,
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they transcend the genre.
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It wasn't just country.
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You know,
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it was pop.
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It was just music.
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And Dolly Parton had that ability.
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She just...
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touched my soul along with millions of others around the world with her just beautiful voice she had one of those unique voices that was uh how can i describe it is it's there
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are hundreds of gifted performers singers uh that can really you know push that button for everybody where everybody loves them
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I don't care if you're black,
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white,
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young,
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old,
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American,
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Siberian,
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whatever.
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It didn't matter.
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It's just something about their voice.
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And
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Dolly Parton was one of them.
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I would say Whitney Houston was another.
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Oddly enough,
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both of them performed
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I Will Always Love You.
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Dolly Parton is the one who wrote that song.
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She performed it way back in the day.
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And
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Whitney Houston remade it.
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for the bodyguard soundtrack and it just turned into this juggernaut and everybody jumped on board it like it was an original whitney houston song but no they came from dolly parton and as powerful and soulful and hypnotic
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as whitney houston version of i will always love you is uh it's you put the two side by side dolly parton
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D'h-
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She did just as good as a job as Whitney Houston.
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Whitney Houston just put that extra little oomph to it.
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You know what I'm saying?
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That Whitney oomph.
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But
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Dolly Parton is,
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she will always be an icon in my eyes.
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Of course,
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she was a musician,
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an actress,
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a philanthropist,
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a businesswoman.
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She was dubbed the queen of country.
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And she is one of the most honored female country performers in history.
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Dolly Parton received multiple accolades throughout her,
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get this,
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60...
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years six decades that's a career man um some of those accolades include 11 grammy awards three emmy awards the gene herzog humanitarian award along with nominations for not one but two academy awards six golden globe awards and a tony uh
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she wrote her very first song
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at the age of six years old and performed it regularly on tv at the age of 10 and made her first recording at the age of 11 she became a professional songwriter at the age of 16 years old and
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after writing hits for other artists her debut album hello i'm dolly was released in 1967 beginning a career spanning 60 years.
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In
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50 studio albums,
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Dolly Parton composed more than 3,000 songs,
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which include the aforementioned I Will Always Love You,
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which is a two-time U.S.
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country chart topper,
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and an international hit for Whitney Houston that sold
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40 million copies worldwide.
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My all-time favorite song,
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Jolene,
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from Dolly Parton.
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I love that song.
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I don't know why.
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It's just a deep song.
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I've never heard a song.
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I've never heard a song where a woman is begging another woman to just leave my man alone.
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Please don't mess with him.
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Because if you mess with him,
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I'm going to lose him.
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You know,
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she wasn't talking.
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Never once did she ask her man,
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don't mess with Jolene.
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She would scrape to the sword.
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She would scrape to Jolene and say,
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please.
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leave my man alone because i know he's gonna go to you you know it just an awesome song but uh sad but awesome at the same time as an actress she starred in the 1980 coke classic nine to five which we're going to review at the end of this show as
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well as the best little whorehouse in Texas in 1982 and earned.
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and earned Golden Globe nominations for both of those films.
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She also starred in Reinhardt House,
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which I think co-starred Sylvester Stallone in 1984,
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Still MacNoyers in 1989,
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which is one of my favorites from back then,
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Straight Talk in 1992,
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and Joyful Noise in 2012,
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with estimated sales exceeding 100 million records.
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Dolly Parton is one of the best-selling music artists of all time.
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Her music includes certified gold,
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platinum,
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and multi-platinum awards.
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25 of her singles reached number one on the Billboard's country music charts,
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tying with Reba McEntire for the most by a female artist.
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She had 44 career top 10 country albums.
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a record for any artist and 110 career chart singles over 40 years her
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49th and final studio album rockstar was released in 2023 became her highest charting billboard 200 album peaking at number three i'd so happen to listen to that album believe it or not and
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i
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Her rendition of We Are The Champions,
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look,
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from Queen,
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you know,
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Queen originally recorded that.
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But her rendition was so cool,
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I really,
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I don't want to say she outdid Queen,
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but she came close.
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Dolly Parton,
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with her voluptuous curves that she possessed,
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she had turned down several offers.
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to pose nude in playboy magazine but she did appear on the cover in october of 1978 the issue uh where she's wearing a uh uh playboy bunny outfit and complete
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with the ears and everything but to a lot of a lot of men's chagrin when you open up that issue there was no you didn't get any dollies
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So that was as far as she took that.
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As far as her music is concerned,
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believe it or not,
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despite the fact that she can play many instruments,
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which includes the auto harp,
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the banjo,
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guitar,
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electric guitar,
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the fiddle,
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the piano,
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the saxophone.
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she couldn't read sheet music if she didn't know how to read sheet music and and that is phenomenal to me there's a lot of artists that does that you know that can do that but that that's a god-given talent that's when you know that you're given a god-given talent you could just play by ear and
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you know it's it's not easy if you think it's that easy go pick up an instrument and just start playing it's not easy and she could do multiple instruments
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or play multiple instruments without the benefit of sheet music another big thing from dolly parton besides her breasts was her philanthropy and she was very very dug
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in to helping others and that's what made her more special than any other artist that i can think of because that really you know around the time when i'm growing up
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That's what she was mostly known for.
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All of the things that she did for others,
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you know,
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all of these foundations.
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One of them is a nonprofit organization,
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Dollywood Foundation,
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and that was to improve education outcomes among children in her home county in Tennessee.
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Among the foundation's early efforts was the Buddy
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Program. In that program,
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seven and eight.
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grade students paired with a friend and pledged to support each other in remaining in school and graduating from high school students who graduated received 500 the dropout rate among participant participating
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classes uh it fell from 35 before she started that program to a six percent dropout Great.
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Unbelievable.
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Just that little effort.
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And the program encouraged the community to develop additional incentives to sustain the improvement of that statistic.
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One of the other programs was the literacy program,
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and that was called Dolly Parton's Imagination Library,
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as also a part of the Dollywood Foundation.
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And it was founded in honor of her father,
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who never learned how to read or write.
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And what that foundation did or that program did,
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it mailed one book per month to each enrolled child from the time of their birth until they entered kindergarten.
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Over 1,600 local communities provide the Imagine Library to almost 850,000 children each month across the United States,
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Canada.
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the uk australia and ireland that's how far it reached out in
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2006 dolly parton published a cookbook dolly's dixie fixing love laughter and lots of good food with all proceeds going towards the imaginary or the imagination library um
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in february of 2018 she donated her
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100 million free book a copy of uh her children's picture book coat of many colors to the library of congress in washington dc and was honored by the library on account of
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the charity sending out its
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100 million book for her work in literacy
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Dolly Parton received awards including the Association of American Publishers Honor Awards in the year 2000,
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Good
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Housekeeping Seal of Approval in 2001,
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and
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Parents as
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Teachers National Center
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Children and Family Advocacy Award in 2003.
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Going back to 2016,
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in response to the 2016...
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great smoky mountain wildfires that took place uh dolly parton was one of the country music artists to participate in a telethon to raise money for victims of the fire this was held in nashville on december 9th and in addition dolly
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parton hosted her own telethon for the victims on december the
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13th and reportedly raised around nine million dollars for those victims
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Her fund,
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the
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My People Fund,
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provided $1,000 a month for six months to over nine...
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100 families affected by the wildfires,
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culminating with $5,000 to each home in the final month due to increased fundraising,
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totaling $10,000 per family.
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In 2018,
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the FBI honored Dolly Parton for her wildlife aid,
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awarding her the 2018 Director's Community Leadership Award at a ceremony at the FBI.
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headquarters the honor was bestowed by the director of the fbi and was accepted by uh well on her behalf uh because she was uh ill at the time and couldn't participate in
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the aftermath of the 2024 hurricane helene dolly parton announced a donation of two million dollars in relief efforts one million dollars personally
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and another $1 million through her various businesses and the Dollywood Foundation.
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This was an amazing human being.
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Dolly Parton,
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when you hear,
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put your money where your mouth is,
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put up or shut up,
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that was Dolly Parton.
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She was real.
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She was a real one,
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man.
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That is real philanthropy.
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Now,
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Sometimes you hear these stories about certain individuals who rip off charity funds and all this other stuff.
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It's sad.
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Money that's set aside to help people who are less fortunate or going through tragedies or going through hard times or whatever it is.
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And people are just ripping it off just to be greedy.
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But you have someone like a Dolly Parton who doesn't have children.
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but she made sure that children got their education to learn to read and things of this nature nature it's it's amazing man that somebody had a heart that big that it it is so amazing bro it it feels good to hear stories like this in a time like this that we're living in when you turn on the news and you hear nothing but bad news about bad people and
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to hear this news
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or to know this news and i'm just recapping her life i'm pretty sure that a lot of people already knew all the works that she did throughout her life and it wasn't for publicity it wasn't to grandstand or boast she did this clearly
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out of the kindness of her heart because she loved others and that's something that we all should do now i don't have a million dollars to donate now if you have a million dollars to donate to me
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by all means but i if i could that's the type of person i would be i i if i was rich that would be that would probably be my goal you know because my mind said and this don has got truth i talk me and my wife talk about this all the time i what we gonna do with all that money yeah
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it sounds good to be a billionaire but what we gonna do with all that money and now i'm not gonna give it all away.
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But I'm saying I would help others.
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I would help others.
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And this is the example.
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This is the blueprint right here,
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Miss Dolly Parton.
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This amazing,
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amazing woman.
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As far as her film career goes,
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she really don't have a large filmography.
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She only starred in a few films or guest starred on a few films or supporting roles and whatnot.
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But it all started in 1980 with nine to five.
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That was her,
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believe it or not,
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her first role.
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And like I said,
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she did an excellent job,
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excellent enough to get a gold golden globe nomination for her performance in that film.
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Uh,
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two years later with the best little whorehouse in Texas,
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rhinestone in 84,
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uh,
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uh,
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still make no years in 89.
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Straight Talk in 1992.
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In 1993,
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The Bibbly Hillbillies,
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where she played herself in a cameo.
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She also had a cameo as herself in Miss
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Congeniality. I can never say that.
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Part 2 with Sandra Bullock in 2005.
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Gromeo and Juliet,
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you know,
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she played the voice of Dolly Grome.
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Joyful Noise.
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In 2012,
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Hollywood to Dollywood,
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she played herself in a cameo,
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and her last appearance on screen was in 2020,
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Dolly Parton's Christmas in the Square as an angel.
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And so
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I...
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kind of bounced back and forth on what film we was going to review you know uh i love still mcnollius so much but i want to give still mcnollius his own show i don't want to i don't want to split that with nothing and so i said okay nine
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to five is a film that always stuck with me uh probably because it's one of my most i guess you could say earliest films i remember watching when i was a youngster you know i i was born in
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79 so i was a year old when it came out but i didn't see it until maybe i don't know four or five maybe but i loved it i always i don't know why i always gravitated to this movie one of the main reasons was because of daphne coleman i love daphne coleman uh he he in
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my eyes was one of the most underrated actors around that time comedic actors you know and could be serious too
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I've seen him in a number of different movies,
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and me growing up and watching him,
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I just adored him.
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And in this film,
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he was the villain.
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He played the most sexist,
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egotistical,
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hypocritical bigot you could ever imagine being.
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I think he was the CEO or the vice president of the corporation or company.
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that these three ladies were working at and i just loved it this was home alone before home alone uh nine to five came out in 1980 it is a comedy directed by colin higgins and it stars jane foster lily tomlin and dolly
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parton as well as daphne coleman and along with uh dolly parton i believe this was Jane Foster's first film.
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or one of her first films but they they came together in this film all three of these ladies and it tells the story of three working women who live out their fantasies of getting even with
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and overthrowing their company's egotistical bigot sexist vice president played by Daphne Coleman.
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The film went on to gross $103 million and
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it was set up as a star vehicle for dolly parton who was already established as a well successful country music artist at the time but it launched her permanently into the mainstream pop culture zeitgeist uh the film spawned off a tv series that
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ran for five seasons i barely remember that tv series i think it was it wasn't that good i do remember that Thank you.
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How he got five seasons,
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I don't know.
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And it also had a musical adaptation as well with new songs written by Dolly Parton.
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And that opened on Broadway in 2009.
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9 to 5 is 74th on the American Institute's
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100 funniest movies of all time and has a 70%
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approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
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It is considered a...
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cult classic nine to five is downright funny everything about this was just hilarious jane foster was hilarious lily tomlin is always hilarious and dolly parton you
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could tell she was the the young pup on this set but she held her own with everybody else and if she stood out the most.
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Not just because of her of course her physique.
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But she just stood out as a presence in this film because everybody else was,
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you know,
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hustling,
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bustling,
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seemed like a city folk type person.
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But here's this country girl with this thick country accent coming in there with the,
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what would you call that hairstyle?
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A blonde Afro type deal?
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Curly fro?
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I don't know what her style was.
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She had so many throughout her life.
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But she just stood out.
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And my main takeaway from this movie that has never left in 46 years,
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the main thing that sticks out in this movie that
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I've taken with me my entire life was women.
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was the fact that
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Women deserve equality.
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Now...
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of course this was the underlining mess message in this movie rightfully so but for it to resonate with a little toddler to the point i understood the message and
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it it is stuck for all of these years with me says a lot about this movie it it it really hammered home that message and you know i No.
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A lot of fellas who's listening right now is not going to like what I'm about to say.
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But,
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I mean,
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it's the truth.
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The truth of the matter is,
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she,
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well,
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she,
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they and these women and all women are just smarter than us.
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They are the backbone to everything.
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They're the backbone to these companies,
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corporations,
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and small businesses and households.
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They're the backbone.
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without without the woman without a woman uh uh being in the forefront or in the background wherever they are uh pushing the man along or pushing the business along because nowadays women are more independent and god bless them for being that way but
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if it's not for the woman men would be in trouble bro we'll still be neanderthals we'll still be running around caves with leather
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leather cloths over our genitals and beating rocks with a stick.
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You know,
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that's where we'll be right now.
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You know,
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we only...
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Here's the truth.
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Here's the truth.
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And I don't mean to go off on a whole tangent about this,
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but it's the truth.
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The only reason a man gets up in the morning and goes to work is so they can make money to provide for their family,
27:00
a la wife or a significant other.
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the only reason a man would go take a shower to smell good put on cologne and deodorant and all this other stuff so they won't smell bad around a woman the only reason a man would dress up nice is to impress a woman everything we do is
27:18
to please a woman and so the mere fact that we treat women still to this day and it's been since the beginning of time we we treat women less than
27:34
it's sickening it's sickening in a lot of ways and i'm not afraid to say that and i'm not just saying that to say that it's the guy's honest truth because i have a mama i have sisters i have a wife and i have daughters and
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i i don't i can't imagine any man or anybody treating them less than and me just accepting that there's no there is no Thank you.
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way i can go through life feeling like oh well well they are women no you're not gonna let nobody treat your mama any type of way your your daughters any type of way you want your daughters to have be successful and have the same opportunities that any other boy man whatever have
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you know so why treat them less than and this movie in this film
28:32
you know these women had to literally fight to get to get over on this on this complete idiot of a vice president who leans on the one who who who he's a sponge and just soaks up their knowledge their experience and their expertise uh in particular the lily tomlin character who is really the brains of the operation but
28:57
he's getting all the credit because he's the man and it's
29:01
It's sad to see.
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Like I said,
29:04
what impresses me so much about this movie is the fact that I can remember all of that.
29:10
All of those emotions.
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All of those feelings.
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When I was four,
29:16
five,
29:16
six years old,
29:17
whenever it was,
29:17
I watched this movie.
29:19
And
29:21
I was still peeing in my pants.
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But I can still relate to this movie and feel some type of way.
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And feel like that women...
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women shouldn't be treated like they are in this film and it stuck with me and this is truly i'm it's not a guilty pleasure it's a pleasure i love this movie i love dolly parton in this movie i love everybody everybody in this film knocked it out the park and it
29:49
was a good little launching point for dolly parton and you know you would think that she would have did more films
29:58
But that just wasn't her thing.
30:00
You know,
30:00
she did some films,
30:02
but every now and then she'll pop up in something.
30:04
She'll pop up in Little Whorehouse in
30:07
Texas or
30:08
Steel Magnolias,
30:10
you know,
30:11
stuff like that.
30:12
But that's it.
30:14
She stayed in her lane.
30:16
She stayed in her lane and she had both of her hands on the steering wheel with a seatbelt on,
30:23
never deviating,
30:24
never veering off into something else.
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She knew who she was and she stayed.
30:28
with it uh nine to five from 1980 starring the great dolly parton jane foster fonda i don't know why i was going jolie foster but no jane
30:44
fonda and lily tomlin gets a letter grade of an eight yeah it is a cult classic a true classic it's a film that i often revisit
30:56
I revisit that movie more often than anything in my life.
31:02
I think I've seen this movie a hundred times in my lifetime.
31:07
Don't know why,
31:08
but it's just one of those movies that
31:11
I adore.
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I simply adore and will cherish,
31:17
especially now,
31:18
especially now that we don't have Miss
31:21
Dolly Parton,
31:22
who was hospitalized in Tennessee.
31:26
Nashville,
31:26
Tennessee on August the
31:28
21st of 2026 and died after a brief battle with cancer on August the 25th.
31:37
And she died at the young age of 80 years old.
31:42
Yeah,
31:42
man.
31:43
Icon legend,
31:47
just transcending force.
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Just like I said,
31:51
to open up the show,
31:52
she I don't.
31:55
i don't think i know a person black white or whoever who didn't love dolly parton who didn't listen to a dolly parton song who didn't i mean it didn't matter everybody knew dolly parton and she was just that known she was that embedded
32:14
in uh pop culture that everybody knew who she was and everybody loved her more importantly you know you could be known
32:23
but you can be known for a lot of things but dolly pardon was always known for uh good things and you know she will be missed and deeply missed but her 60 years on
32:38
this planet she definitely left a mark in so many different ways whether it was the music whether it's the movies whether it's her philanthropy whether it was dollywood
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whether it was no matter what it was she did she did her thing she she left a legacy and may she rest in peace miss dolly rebecca parton i
33:07
would like to know how what was your reaction to the uh you know to the news of dolly parton passing away did it hit your heart it hit me and i know it's often said you know oh man this one hurts
33:21
You know,
33:23
when an artist or somebody passes away and you're a fan of them,
33:28
oh,
33:29
man,
33:29
this one stings.
33:30
Oh,
33:30
man,
33:31
this one hurts.
33:32
You know,
33:33
we say it so often,
33:34
and really,
33:35
they all hurt.
33:37
They all hurt.
33:38
You don't want to see nobody pass away,
33:40
you know,
33:41
and it's the truth here.
33:43
This one hurt,
33:44
and it's the God honest truth,
33:46
it hurts,
33:47
because I truly was a fan.
33:48
I truly did.
33:50
admire her not just for what she did uh in the on the artist side of things but on the humanity side of things and she is she was truly a soul bro she was a good soul an
34:06
angel inside of a body built for sin oh dolly pardon she will be missed uh you can subscribe to the kb radio network
34:18
dot com website where you can be notified of new episodes dropping as well as previous episodes that on the network don't forget about YouTube subscribe to the KB Radio Network channel and like this video if you don't mind don't forget about the five stars the reviews and sharing this show if you're listening on Apple Podcast Spotify iHeartRadio wherever you are currently listening to
34:45
movie goodness here
34:48
on the kb radio network everybody thank you for joining me as we took a moment and remembered the legend the icon the queen
35:00
Dolly Parton.
35:01
Want you all to know that I love you.
35:03
Continue to love everyone.
35:04
And until we speak again,
35:07
you all be blessed.