Dolly's dalliance and a very unusual marriage: She sleeps with her (female) PA, got cosy with her bodyguard and there's talk of trysts with Burt Reynolds. Yet she's been blissfully married for 50 years...

  • Dolly Parton, Queen of Country, to appear on stage at her Tennessee home
  • The bash will mark her 50th wedding anniversary and renewal of the vows
  • Husband Carl Thomas Dean will break a lifelong habit and appear in public
  • Elusive husband has been photographed with her little more than 20 times

Larger than life: Queen of Country Dolly Parton. But while Dolly loves the limelight, her husband has stayed in the shadows throughout their 50-year marriage

Larger than life: Queen of Country Dolly Parton. But while Dolly loves the limelight, her husband has stayed in the shadows throughout their 50-year marriage

Get ready for the mother of all hoedowns. Dolly Parton, Queen of Country and proud possessor of the biggest hairdo — among other things — in showbusiness, will appear on stage next May at a party at her grand Tennessee home.

Friends and family will gather at the 60-acre estate at Willow Lake outside Nashville, music royalty mixing with her close friends, and even a bit of both in the form of the singer’s goddaughter, oversexed pop star Miley Cyrus.

The bash will mark a very special occasion — Dolly’s 50th wedding anniversary and a renewal of her marriage vows — so one guest really has no excuse for not being there.

Carl Thomas Dean, alias Mr Dolly Parton, is set to break a habit of a lifetime and actually appear in public with his wife. He will join the larger-than-life star on a makeshift stage, revealed Cyrus, who added: ‘Not to sing — just to be there, at her side, in the spotlight.’

It will be a celebration of not only their marriage but of 69-year-old Parton’s remarkable career, rising from deep poverty in rural Tennessee to become one of the world’s most cherished performers and worth the best part of £300 million. 

For any other showbusiness spouse, even one who prefers to stay out of the limelight, this would not exactly be a great hardship. 

In the case of Mr Dean, who has probably been photographed fewer times in the past half-century than the Loch Ness Monster, his appearance will be the showbiz equivalent of the discovery of a dodo.

For like the dear old dodo, he has become almost a myth — so elusive that many Dolly fans started to believe he didn’t actually exist.

But he does. Although a blurred photograph of the couple on their wedding day appears in Parton’s 1994 memoirs — one of just three of him among dozens of Dolly — Mr Dean, now 73, hasn’t been photographed with her in public for decades.

Indeed, it is said that little more than 20 photographs have ever been taken of them together, and that even some of Parton’s own aides have never met him.

According to his wife, country boy Carl, as shy and retiring as she is bold and brassy, made it clear from the start he didn’t want to be part of her professional life. Instead, he stayed at home and ran an asphalt-laying business. 

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Rare sighting: The rumoured appearance of Carl Thomas Dead (pictured right, with Dolly, in June 2013) at the couple's anniversary celebrations in May would be the showbiz equivalent of the discovery of a dodo. For like the dear old dodo, he has become almost a myth

Rare sighting: The rumoured appearance of Carl Thomas Dead (pictured right, with Dolly, in June 2013) at the couple's anniversary celebrations in May would be the showbiz equivalent of the discovery of a dodo. For like the dear old dodo, he has become almost a myth

But will he finally emerge from the shadows to appear by her side and celebrate a union that Parton has described as her ‘first and last’ marriage? 

Even this may be in doubt, as reports recently circulated in the U.S. that he is threatening to call off the party.

According to his wife, country boy Carl, as shy and retiring as she is bold and brassy, made it clear from the start he didn’t want to be part of her professional life.

According to a magazine, Mr Dean is ‘furious’ because his wife has never got over a six-year affair she had with her former bodyguard.

Mr Dean reportedly ‘hit the roof’ when he heard rumours that Parton was cheating on him with Mark Kiracofe, a strapping 6ft 5in man 11 years his junior.

Mr Kiracofe is said to have first met Parton in 1989 when he worked as one of her stage equipment handlers. Parton promoted him to her head of security and they even co-wrote a 1991 made-for-TV film called Wild Texas Wind in which she played a singer struggling with an abusive manager. 

Unlike her husband, Mr Kiracofe was frequently photographed at Parton’s side as she went off on tour.

When news of their relationship was first reported in 1996, Parton’s representatives denied any affair. It was claimed that Mr Kiracofe had given Dolly an ultimatum to choose between him and her husband. 

When she refused to leave Carl, Mr Kiracofe reportedly stopped working for her and ‘walked out of her life’. 

Close bond: The relationship between Dolly and her personal assistant, a redhead named Judy Ogle who has been a friend from childhood, has been the subject of persistent speculation. Pictured, the pair together in New York in October 1980

Close bond: The relationship between Dolly and her personal assistant, a redhead named Judy Ogle who has been a friend from childhood, has been the subject of persistent speculation. Pictured, the pair together in New York in October 1980

Mr Kiracofe, now a 62-year-old trade union official, told me he had ‘no comment’ on the claims, declining either to confirm or deny them. He reportedly told a magazine last month he wasn’t interested in discussing ‘the past’ though he wished Dolly well. Her publicist also declined to comment.

People always ask me if I’ve had extramarital affairs, and you can draw your own conclusions.
Dolly Parton, on her marriage 

Given the fog that envelops Parton’s private life — and her conflicting comments over the years about the exact nature of her marriage — rumours have inevitably swirled that she is hiding something.

It has been claimed — though denied — that she has had flings with the actors Sylvester Stallone, Burt Reynolds (her co-star in Best Little Whorehouse In Texas) and fellow country singer Billy Ray Cyrus, father of Miley. A liaison was long rumoured between her and long-time collaborator Kenny Rogers, until he said it had all just been platonic.

Confusingly, at times Parton has suggested she has an open marriage, at others she has flatly denied it. ‘People always ask me if I’ve had extramarital affairs, and you can draw your own conclusions,’ she said once.

And in her 1994 memoirs she described how her husband would wait loyally at home for her to return from her glamorous travels: ‘He seems to know that I’ll be back, and that love affairs and relationships are just part of my dealings with people.’

What's the secret?: Confusingly, at times Parton has suggested she has an open marriage, at others she has flatly denied it. Pictured, Dolly Parton performs on the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury, in June 2014

What's the secret?: Confusingly, at times Parton has suggested she has an open marriage, at others she has flatly denied it. Pictured, Dolly Parton performs on the Pyramid Stage at Glastonbury, in June 2014

Loves the limelight: While Dolly is never happier than when she's in the public eye, her husband is much more content in the shadows. Dolly Parton performs the song 'Hello God' at the Country Music Association Awards show in November 2002, in Nashville, Tennessee

Loves the limelight: While Dolly is never happier than when she's in the public eye, her husband is much more content in the shadows. Dolly Parton performs the song 'Hello God' at the Country Music Association Awards show in November 2002, in Nashville, Tennessee

Yet, more recently she has insisted both of them only flirt with other people and have never cheated properly.

There have been reports of wobbles in their marriage and that, weighed down by depression which she says runs through her family, Parton once vowed to leave him, only for her husband to rule out a divorce. It was claimed that Dolly, who bought homes in Los Angeles and Hawaii in the eighties, became upset when Carl refused to visit either of them and took it as a sign he no longer loved her.

In public, however, Parton has been adamant they are a pair of ‘old mountain goats’ who ‘will be together till one of us dies’.

Together forever: Parton has been adamant that both her and her husband are a pair of 'old mountain goats' who 'will be together till one of us dies'. Pictured, Dolly arrives at the 78th Academy Awards in March 2006, in Los Angeles

Together forever: Parton has been adamant that both her and her husband are a pair of 'old mountain goats' who 'will be together till one of us dies'. Pictured, Dolly arrives at the 78th Academy Awards in March 2006, in Los Angeles

But in recent years, Mr Kiracofe isn’t the only outsider with whom Parton has been romantically linked — though he is the only man. Her relationship with her personal assistant, a redhead named Judy Ogle who has been a friend from childhood, has been the subject of persistent speculation.

Dolly has admitted that they have a special relationship, describing Miss Ogle — an ex-soldier who has never married — and her husband as the two rocks in her life. ‘They keep me grounded and the two of them get along great,’ she says. ‘Judy is the only person that Carl doesn’t mind coming in and out of our house.’

Although she insists there has never been any romance between them, she has conceded they are closer than most female friends would feel comfortable being.

‘We have never, you know, been lovers, and yet, we have shared more things than most couples do, and we’ve slept together since we were little kids, you know, just like my sisters and I do,’ she said a few years ago.

In her 1994 autobiography, she said she often shared a bed with Miss Ogle — ‘Why scream across the room when you don’t have to?’, she reasoned — and described their bond as ‘closer than husband and wife’.

Closer than with her husband, perhaps. When discussing ‘him indoors’, she doesn’t exactly boil with passion for quiet Mr Dean. She likes to call him her ‘tall drink of water’ — faithful and loving, who she always knows she can come home to after the stage lights have been turned off and the fans have gone home.

‘We’re friends and we’re married,’ she said four years ago. ‘We like each other a lot.’

Who is this man she ‘likes a lot’ and with whom — to be fair — she has achieved one of the longest, if oddest, marriages in showbusiness?

Old friends: But the relationship doesn't boil over with passion. Parton likes to call Carl her ‘tall drink of water’ — faithful and loving, who she always knows she can come home to after the stage lights have been turned off and the fans have gone home
Old friends: But the relationship doesn't boil over with passion. Parton likes to call Carl her ‘tall drink of water’ — faithful and loving, who she always knows she can come home to after the stage lights have been turned off and the fans have gone home

Old friends: But the relationship doesn't boil over with passion. Parton likes to call Carl her ‘tall drink of water’ — faithful and loving, who she always knows she can come home to after the stage lights have been turned off and the fans have gone home

They met in 1964 shortly after Parton had moved to Nashville to try to make a career as a singer. Dolly, then 18, was the fourth of 12 children brought up by ‘dirt-poor’ farming parents who paid the doctor who delivered her with a bag of oatmeal.

She emerged from the Wishy Washy launderette just as Carl, three years older, drove by in his pick-up truck. He told her she was going to get sunburnt in her skimpy outfit and followed her back into the launderette to chat her up as she folded her clothes.

Dolly, I want you to have everything you want, and I’m happy for you, but don’t you ever ask me to go to another one of them dang things again! 
Dolly's husband, Carl Thomas Dean in 1966 

‘Looking for a man’ had been the last thing on her mind, she said in her memoirs, but ‘there was something irresistible about this man’. 

They married two years later in Georgia with just Parton’s mother and the preacher’s wife as witnesses.

Dolly says she was always honest with her husband, saying she didn’t hanker after a life staying at home cleaning the house, but wanted to pursue her dream of becoming a country singer. Meanwhile, he rapidly made clear he didn’t want a life as a showbusiness spouse.

For their first and only glitzy outing together, an industry dinner in 1966 at which she was collecting an award, he dressed up in a dinner jacket and joined her on the red carpet.

As they drove home, she recalls, he turned to her and said: ‘Dolly, I want you to have everything you want, and I’m happy for you, but don’t you ever ask me to go to another one of them dang things again!’ 

She has abided by his wishes, although he has watched her perform at least once.

According to Parton, who last year performed in front of an 80,000-strong crowd at the Glastonbury Festival, her husband is a loner who hates crowds and doesn’t really like anyone apart from her. 

Superstar: Dolly says she was always honest with her husband, saying she didn’t hanker after a life staying at home cleaning the house, but wanted to pursue her dream of becoming a country singer. Pictured, Dolly greets fans during a TV appearance in July 2002, in New York

Superstar: Dolly says she was always honest with her husband, saying she didn’t hanker after a life staying at home cleaning the house, but wanted to pursue her dream of becoming a country singer. Pictured, Dolly greets fans during a TV appearance in July 2002, in New York

Strong bond: According to Dolly, her husband is even more religious than she is, which is saying something. She says she gets up at 3am so she can meditate and read the Bible

Strong bond: According to Dolly, her husband is even more religious than she is, which is saying something. She says she gets up at 3am so she can meditate and read the Bible

But he does have a sense of humour. Parton recalls how she was singing at a rodeo in Kentucky when she suddenly realised her husband had joined her backing singers on stage to belt out the chorus to her hit song Higher And Higher, one of his favourites. 

She got her own back, telling a policeman beside the stage that the man at the mike was a stalker. They were about to haul him off when her manager intervened and said it was a joke.

She concedes her husband is neither musical nor conventionally romantic.

He was once mocked for giving her a stove for Christmas early on in their marriage — but Parton says he is the kind of man who will leave out a vase of wild flowers where she is working, along with a poem he has written. 

Opposites attract: When people ask her how she has stayed married for so many years, Dolly likes to say ‘because I stay gone’. It really helps that they are so completely different, she says. Pictured, Parton in Los Angeles in January 2012

Opposites attract: When people ask her how she has stayed married for so many years, Dolly likes to say ‘because I stay gone’. It really helps that they are so completely different, she says. Pictured, Parton in Los Angeles in January 2012

According to Dolly, her husband is even more religious than she is, which is saying something. She says she gets up at 3am so she can meditate and read the Bible.

Parton, who feels it is un-Christian to oppose gay marriage, also credits her faith with getting her through a dark period of her life in the eighties when she had a partial hysterectomy and realised she would never have the children she longed for.

When people ask her how she has stayed married for so many years, she likes to say ‘because I stay gone’. It really helps that they are so completely different, she says.

Retired from mending roads, he loves to potter around on their farm, mowing the fields. She insists they have never had a serious row.

‘He’s a homebody and I love to travel . . . we just have a complete understanding. We enjoy each other when we are together,’ she says.

‘We know we can trust each other — I know I’m always coming home, and he knows I’m always coming home.’

When they aren’t sitting at home cooking or watching TV, they have their ‘special things’ they do together. They are not very glitzy — but then this is Mr Asphalt.

‘We like to get out in our little RV [camper van] and just be simple,’ says Parton. ‘I put on my little comfy clothes — I call them my baby clothes — and we just relax.’ Not that Mr Dean wants to be away long, before he can return home and get back to tinkering in his barn.

It seems hard to believe this is the man who inspired Parton’s classic ode to female jealousy, Jolene, in which she implores another woman, ‘Please don’t take my man’. Parton says the song was based on her anxiety about her husband’s trips down to the local bank so he could flirt with an attractive clerk.

Perhaps another of her hits, I Will Always Love You, might better fit the bill for her to sing when the couple renew their marriage vows next year.

As for the mysterious Mr Dean, finally thrust into the spotlight, perhaps he shouldn’t worry too much about getting all that loathsome attention. Chances are nobody will have a clue who he is anyway.

 

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