Dollitics
( Christine De Carvalho )
Listener supported, WNYC studios.
Brian Seaver:
It's verbal judo. She's the best interviewee on the planet. Nobody does interviews like Dolly. I'm very outspoken politically, but I try not to talk Dollytics at all.
Dolly Parton:
Anyway, so we're getting ready to go. We're just waiting here in the wings.
Jad Abumrad:
Got you.
Dolly Parton:
Then we're going to go get in the car.
Jad Abumrad:
I am excited about that.
Dolly Parton:
You can ask me whatever you ask me, and I'm going to tell you want I want you to hear.
Jad Abumrad:
I'm Jad Abumrad this is Dolly Parton's America, episode five, Dollytics. Hat tip to Brian Seaver, Dolly's nephew and bodyguard, for coining the term. We begin this episode in London, in room 327 at the Savoy Hotel.
Dolly Parton:
Well, they actually changed it.
Jad Abumrad:
Oh, they did.
Jad Abumrad:
Just a few minutes before Dolly's supposed to walk the red carpet for the premier of Nine to Five the musical. Nine to Five, if you don't know, massive film from 1980 about three women who rise up against their sexist, egotistical boss. Spawned one of the great political anthems of our time. I'll go into all that later. For the moment, just know it's being revived as as musical in London. That's why we're here.
Jad Abumrad:
How are you feeling about everything so far?
Dolly Parton:
Oh, it's exciting. I'm really more excited than anything because I haven't seen it. I've been working with them, writing new stuff and putting things together, but I'm just excited to see the new cast and to hear the new songs, how they work.
Jad Abumrad:
I can feel the energy of the event, and so it's hard for me to even focus.
Jad Abumrad:
Outside the hotel it's mayhem.
Speaker 5:
Clear the back door just for the photo call.
Jad Abumrad:
Not only are thousands of people waiting for Dolly to emerge, but all weekend long, all throughout London there have been protests.
Dolly Parton:
I guess they're protesting some kind of fashion something, and the environment. I guess there's thousands of people out in the streets, doing other things. So it goes to show you, there's a life within the life of world, within other worlds. So they just tell us, "Okay, if we get blocked off because of the protestors, we go in this other door, we go around this side of the building." So my security people, they scout all that out. They know everything that's going on, they're very aware of everything. But it is kind of exciting. All that energy, everybody here for different reasons.
Jad Abumrad:
Inside the room...
Dolly Parton:
Accommodate everybody.
Jad Abumrad:
It's a spooky mix of energy.
Dolly Parton:
It's beautiful. I hope the weather holds up good for you. We were lucky-
Jad Abumrad:
Dolly's team, led by Danny Nozell, her manager, are zipping around all electric. Dolly...
Dolly Parton:
Now, I have to sign some autographs. See, it never ends.
Jad Abumrad:
Yeah. Totally chill.
Dolly Parton:
It's never out, it's never over. It's going on all the time.
Jad Abumrad:
Got you.
Jad Abumrad:
Danny brings in some posters with her face on it that she's supposed to sign before the show.
Jad Abumrad:
I'm going to capture the sound of your pen.
Dolly Parton:
Okay, well, I don't know if this is going to show on it. That don't even make a noise on this. Maybe that's not a good one. My hair colored that one out. Oh, well.
Speaker 6:
Would you like a black Sharpie for that?
Dolly Parton:
It's too late now.
Jad Abumrad:
Go time. All right, we're walking down the hall. I guess we're on our way to the red carpet.
Dolly Parton:
Now, we're going to go down, get in the car because we have to drive around to the red carpet, to the front of the building.
Jad Abumrad:
Dolly hums her way down the hall. Her dress has all of these glass beads on it that swish back and forth musically as she walks, and she hums to the rhythm of their swishing. She's flanked by, I don't know, 12 men, many of whom have very big guns.
Dolly Parton:
Hello.
Jad Abumrad:
We all crowd into this tiny elevator.
Dolly Parton:
Some -
Jad Abumrad:
Where there's a middle-aged British couple who happen to be standing there and are totally stunned.
Speaker 7:
Special weekend. It's my birthday weekend.
Dolly Parton:
Oh, happy birthday.
Speaker 7:
Thank you.
Dolly Parton:
You're 27 today, I bet.
Speaker 7:
Oh, I think 21.
Dolly Parton:
21. I'm sorry, I insulted you. Happy birthday.
Speaker 7:
Well, thank you.
Dolly Parton:
We're just having to go around the building -
Jad Abumrad:
Okay.
Jad Abumrad:
We hop into a black SUV and drive literally halfway around the block, from one side of the hotel to the other, where the red carpet is.
Speaker 6:
You're going to get out on my side, but I've got to get out before you.
Dolly Parton:
Okay.
Speaker 6:
We're on a timeframe.
Jad Abumrad:
Got you.
Dolly Parton:
If you hear them ask questions, you're welcome to...
Jad Abumrad:
All right, I'll do it. I'll do it.
Dolly Parton:
And if you decide to ask one right in the middle of that, I'll answer you, too.
Jad Abumrad:
Again, icy calm.
Jad Abumrad:
Oh my god, look at all those people.
Speaker 6:
Ready?
Dolly Parton:
Are you ready for me?
Speaker 6:
Yep.
Jad Abumrad:
2000 people go bonkers, she steps out onto the red carpet.
Speaker 8:
Hello, Dolly.
Dolly Parton:
Hey.
Speaker 8:
How you doing, good to see you.
Jad Abumrad:
She starts to field questions.
Speaker 8:
Why is this show still so relevant?
Dolly Parton:
Well, I think we've made a good - when we did it four years ago, we did a lot of good.
Speaker 9:
This story has a modern audience now. The women in work is a different world for them now, how modern do you think the story is?
Dolly Parton:
Well, I think this is relevant now than it was before, in a way, with the new Me Too movement. I think this is really a good time for it.
Jad Abumrad:
People ask her what advice did she have for working women, a lot of other questions related to workplace harassment, which was a big part of the original Nine to Five, but very quickly the questions broaden out.
Speaker 10:
The climate in the UK where we've got [inaudible 00:06:00] looming, have you got any Dolly advice to help the UK get through?
Dolly Parton:
We can't hardly even take care of our own problems, much less try to solve yours.
Jad Abumrad:
Several reporters ask her about Brexit.
Speaker 10:
We're going through a very funny time here in Britain at the moment, what with Brexit. People are getting very frustrated, very angry.
Jad Abumrad:
She gets asked about climate change, what does she think about the protests that are sweeping London. She spends about four minutes swatting all those questions away. But then, maybe about 10 steps and 20 questions in [inaudible 00:06:30] something shifts. I couldn't tell what was going on at the time, but all of a sudden, Dolly's security detail snapped into a tight circle around her. I was caught in the middle. I actually started to feel like I couldn't breathe. And then the whole circle started moving really fast. I'd find out later, when I spoke with Brian, Dolly's head of security, that what was actually happening at that moment was that a guy with a knife had rushed the red carpet. Somebody had tackled him, disarmed him, and the rest of the security guys had made a circle around Dolly, which I was inadvertently in the middle of, and then they whisked her away from the red carpet, and in the process, they ejected me out onto the sidewalk.
Jad Abumrad:
That was bananas. That was bananas.
Jad Abumrad:
When [inaudible 00:07:27] asked Brian like, "what did the guy want?" He said, "I don't know. He probably just saw an opportunity." He was like, "This is just what happens. Dolly's trying to do her job, open a new show, and somebody rushes in, tries to attach themselves to that so they can be heard." Actually, we don't know what the guy wanted. But her team did what they always do, circumvent disaster. Dolly seems to be able to do that time and time again. Not just on red carpets, but countless times in her career, every political election, she manages to glide above the fray. So much so that we started calling her the great unifier. It's one of the through line ideas of this series. But in these intensely divided times, can she do that much longer?
Brian Seaver:
Well, people will always try to pull what her opinion is on certain politics or try to attach her to certain candidates.
Dolly Parton:
There's a lot of pressure. People seem to be expecting a lot from me. But I figure, I can't think about that. I hope I don't let people down. They've put me up on this pedestal, and I hope they don't knock me off of it.
Jad Abumrad:
Truth is, the expectations, the pedestal, it's not new. She's been navigating that for a while. But what has raised Dollytics to the level of an art...
Jad Abumrad:
It's like judo.
Brian Seaver:
She is. It's verbal judo.
Jad Abumrad:
Is that she has sidestepped controversy, stayed above the fray, while standing at the center of a giant political movement that she wrote the anthem for, that is still being used by politicians to this day.
Speaker 6:
Go ahead.
Karen Nussbaum:
Hello?
Jad Abumrad:
And that brings us to Karen.
Karen Nussbaum:
So my name is Karen Nussbaum. My title, that's tough, man. I am a founder of Nine to Five, the national association of working women and working America.
Jad Abumrad:
And so as I understand it, this story begins for you in the early '70s with your friendship with Jane Fonda.
Speaker 12:
Jane Fonda, the most beautiful creature of the future.
Jad Abumrad:
Is that right?
Karen Nussbaum:
That's right. Jane Fonda and I were both in the Indochina Peace Campaign.
Jad Abumrad:
What was that, exactly?
Karen Nussbaum:
In the early '70s-
Richard Nixon:
Good evening.
Karen Nussbaum:
Nixon had said-
Richard Nixon:
I've asked for this television time tonight-
Karen Nussbaum:
The war is over-
Richard Nixon:
Make public a plan for peace that can end the war in Vietnam.
Karen Nussbaum:
But it wasn't over.
Speaker 14:
The American public is not being told the truth. Richard Nixon is telling us the war is over, and the war is escalating.
Karen Nussbaum:
And Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden created an organization called the Indochina Peace Campaign. And it was to go back out into the public and say, "We have a big responsibility here."
Speaker 14:
And we, as political people, have to be sure that we don't ever stop.
Karen Nussbaum:
We have to bring it to an end. [inaudible 00:10:16]
Jad Abumrad:
This campaign famously included Jane Fonda touring North Vietnam in 1972 and broadcasting messages of support to the communist forces that the US was then fighting.
Speaker 15:
Hanoi Jane would henceforth rank right up there with World War II enemy propagandist Tokyo Rose and Axis Sally.
Jad Abumrad:
It was what would get her the label Hanoi Jane and make her, in some circles, the most hated woman in America.
Speaker 16:
She will always be a traitor.
Speaker 17:
Hanoi Jane sucks.
Speaker 18:
She needs to go down in history for what she is, the traitor.
Jad Abumrad:
Okay. So as all of that was happening, Karen says she was in Boston, organizing against the war.
Karen Nussbaum:
I thought of myself as an activist, but I also had to pay the rent. And so I had to get a job. And I ended up getting a job that was the most typical job for women, which was to be a clerical worker. (music)
Laine Wyndham:
Remember, keep in mind the 1970s is this moment when you have millions of women working for wages for the first time.
Jad Abumrad:
This is Laine Wyndham, labor rights historian and Georgetown University. You can't overestimate just the level of change that was happening in the '70s, she says.
Laine Wyndham:
Women, until 1970, '73, '74, couldn't even get credit in their own name. They had to get a man, their brother or husband or whatever, to get credit.
Jad Abumrad:
Wow.
Laine Wyndham:
That was the culture.
Jad Abumrad:
Then she says you had a bunch of economic forces coming together, a bunch of civil rights legislation coming together, and suddenly, 12 million women, like Karen, enter the workforce en masse.
Laine Wyndham:
The single most common job for women to hold is a secretary or office clerical. And the women who held those positions were treated as the wife.
Jad Abumrad:
They were expected to get the coffee.
Laine Wyndham:
Expected to be a sex symbol in the office.
Karen Nussbaum:
I wasn't thinking about it. It was really just, okay, this will bring in a paycheck every week.
Jad Abumrad:
So Karen was at Harvard, working as a typist, pretty much hating her job but seeing it as a way to fund her activism, which had to do with the war and things happening out there. But then one day, she's walking home from work and she passes by a restaurant.
Karen Nussbaum:
And actually, what happened was that there was a group of waitresses-
Jad Abumrad:
Holding picket signs.
Karen Nussbaum:
This was just these eight working class waitresses who got hit on the butt one time too many or disrespected by the boss or whatever it was, and they decide that they're going to go on strike.
Jad Abumrad:
Karen says she started to march with them, and it was a light bulb moment. Like oh, I could do activism about my work. So she gathered 10 clerical workers together...
Karen Nussbaum:
Working in different workplaces. A hospital, an insurance company, a publishing house, a shoe factory.
Jad Abumrad:
They formed a group, began to meet weekly, and after a few months...
Karen Nussbaum:
We decided to create a city-wide organization that we decided to call Nine to Five.
Jad Abumrad:
Over the next couple of years...
Laine Wyndham:
They created an office workers bill of rights.
Speaker 20:
We want these minimum standards implemented now.
Laine Wyndham:
And launched that at a big press conference. They did studies of the publishing industry and the banking industry-
Speaker 20:
The pay runs up to 30% less than men get for jobs at the same skill and effort level.
Karen Nussbaum:
There's also Phil Donahue.
Jad Abumrad:
He had a popular TV talk show, daytime.
Karen Nussbaum:
Nine to Five used to do an annual bad boss contest.
Laine Wyndham:
Oh, they were so funny. They were hilarious. Okay, so they would hold contests.
Jad Abumrad:
Donahue would invite the Nine to Five activists onto the show, and they would hold these big contests.
Speaker 21:
We have a contest to determine the worst thing your boss makes you do.
Laine Wyndham:
And they'd do it in a big, public way. So for instance-
Speaker 21:
Our winner was a man who owned his own business. He was late for a meeting, and he had a rip in his pants, right in the back of his pants. And he asked his secretary to sew the rip while he kept the pants on. He dropped his pants, and she sewed the rip.
Phil Donahue:
Give me some other winners, just briefly.
Laine Wyndham:
Then there was the boss who required his secretary to vacuum up his nail clippings from the floor. He won the personal hygiene award.
Jad Abumrad:
Oh, that makes my stomach turn.
Laine Wyndham:
Right? And so they would have a bunch of women go deliver it to him in front of the news cameras.
Jad Abumrad:
Okay, so Karen was doing all this, holding all these contests, filing all these lawsuits, fighting for equal pay. She had this movie star friend.
Karen Nussbaum:
Jane and I saw each other regularly as we worked on ending the war.
Jane Fonda:
Every time we would see each other, she would tell me stories about what the women office workers were up against.
Karen Nussbaum:
And it was exciting to her.
Jane Fonda:
Yeah.
Jad Abumrad:
This is Jane Fonda, of course.
Karen Nussbaum:
One day, Jane just came to me and said, "What if we made a movie?"
Jad Abumrad:
So Karen invites Jane to a meeting of 40 clerical workers that she'd organized. Jane brings some Hollywood people with her.
Karen Nussbaum:
One of them asked the women, "Have you ever dreamed of getting even with your boss?" And the place lit up. They all had dreamed of getting even with their boss.
Jane Fonda:
Yes, I remember one woman said she imagined cutting up her boss and putting him into the coffee grinder. And then making drip coffee out of him.
Jad Abumrad:
Wow.
Jane Fonda:
Another fantasized breaking his knees with a bat as he walked by. They were-
Jad Abumrad:
Oh my god.
Jane Fonda:
Some of them were so violent that we couldn't possibly use them in the movie.
Jad Abumrad:
But she says when she heard all those dark fantasies start spilling out...
Jane Fonda:
I thought, "Oh my god, there it is. There's the movie."
Speaker 24:
20th Century Fox presents a tribute to anyone who has ever been overworked, underpaid, and pushed to the edge by an ungrateful boss.
Jad Abumrad:
Quick refresher on the movie, in case you haven't seen it or haven't seen it recently. Nine to Five is the story of three female office workers.
Lily Tomlin:
Hi, this is Violet.
Jad Abumrad:
There's Violet.
Lily Tomlin:
Welcome to the front lines.
Jad Abumrad:
Played by Lily Tomlin. There's Doralee.
Dolly Parton:
I think he told everybody I was sleeping with him.
Jad Abumrad:
Played by Dolly Parton. And there's Judy.
Jane Fonda:
But couldn't we just all get together and complain?
Jad Abumrad:
Played by Jane Fonda.
Jane Fonda:
Let's face it, we are in a pink collared ghetto.
Jad Abumrad:
So they've got this boss, Mr. Hart, who is played by Dabney Coleman, who demeans the female employees, openly harasses Dolly's character.
Dolly Parton:
Mr. Hart, I told you before, I'm a married woman.
Dabney Coleman:
I'm a married man. That's what makes it so perfect.
Jad Abumrad:
And the story of the movie is these three women getting revenge.
Jane Fonda:
Get him and hunt him down.
Jad Abumrad:
And it's, of course, hilarious and over the top. They inadvertently kidnap him. At one point, they string him up from the ceiling.
Dabney Coleman:
Help. [inaudible 00:17:08]
Dolly Parton:
Did you see the look on his face?
Jad Abumrad:
One of the interesting things we learned is that the original script for the movie was way darker. A little closer in spirit to that Nine to Five meeting. I mean, there was a cyanide scene written in, an electrocution scene. But Jane Fonda nixed that version because she felt that the only way the movie would work as a political vehicle was if it were a farce.
Jane Fonda:
You know, the way I think you make these kind of movies is you make a movie so that even if people don't want to deal with the issues that we're raising, they'll like the movie anyway because it's really funny.
Jad Abumrad:
And as we know...
Speaker 27:
On that, in Hollywood, Jim Brown goes behind the scenes of the movie Nine to Five to find out what the office [inaudible 00:17:48] is.
Jad Abumrad:
People did like the movie. It blew up. Jane remembers women shouting at the screen.
Jane Fonda:
These were their stories. And I knew that the fact that we were putting their issues up on the screen this way would make a real difference.
Jad Abumrad:
This was really the first national conversation about workplace harassment. It was like ME Too beta.
Karen Nussbaum:
And it allowed us to explode.
Jad Abumrad:
Karen says Nine to Five became a full-fledged union and added 20 local chapters almost immediately.
Karen Nussbaum:
It just took off like a rocket.
Jane Fonda:
Office workers all over the country felt empowered and uplifted and seen for the first time because of the movie.
Jad Abumrad:
So now we come back to Dolly, who at this point had never been in a movie.
Jane Fonda:
No.
Jad Abumrad:
And what gave you the idea to cast her?
Jane Fonda:
It went like this. During the process of development-
Jad Abumrad:
She says she was driving home one day.
Jane Fonda:
I turned the radio on, and Dolly Parton was singing Two Doors Down. (music) And I suddenly had a vision of Dolly as a secretary, just the visual. You know, she can't see her hands, typing with those long fingernails. Everything about it made me laugh. And I thought, "Wow, she's never been in a movie. Even if she can [inaudible 00:19:09]," which I had no idea if she could or not, I thought people would want to see the movie because of her. I didn't realize how fabulous the choice would end up being.
Jad Abumrad:
I wonder, was there any thought in your mind that you're trying to deliver a message, a political message, in a movie, but you are a polarizing figure at this point, and that maybe she was a way to bridge to an audience that you wouldn't normally be able to reach?
Jane Fonda:
Well, that would've implied that I was smarter than I am and more strategic. A real business person would have thought, "Oh, that would bring in the southern demographic. That's a good business idea." No. I didn't think that way.
Jad Abumrad:
Dolly, in her autobiography...
Dolly Parton:
She was very upfront about the fact that she thought I'd help the film do well in the South.
Jad Abumrad:
Says the exact opposite. But as for what Dolly was thinking at the time...
Speaker 28:
I'd like to thank all of you for coming this afternoon. I'm sure you knew -
Jad Abumrad:
And she explained this at a press event on the day of the film's opening.
Dolly Parton:
Well, I was attracted to the idea of doing Nine to Five because I'd been looking through scripts for a few months. And so it just seemed like it would be a good idea and working for the first time in a film with great people like Jane and Lily, I figured if it was a success, that we would all enjoy the benefits. And if it was a flop, they could take the blame for it.
Jad Abumrad:
Dolly said, in a very tongue in cheek sort of way, but she was very upfront about it, that she was making a political calculation. She knew that for her country music fans, appearing with Jane Fonda, Hanoi Jane, was risky.
Dolly Parton:
Because she's so outspoken and so political and a lot of stuff she talks about I don't necessarily agree with, but then a lot of stuff she talks about, I do. I just thought this ought to be real interesting because I'm also very opinionated in what I believe in, although I respect anybody's beliefs and the fact that they're willing to stand up for whatever it is. But I'm also the kind of person that if I don't like where you got it, I can tell you where to put it. But-
Jad Abumrad:
But then she says the real reason that she agreed to do the movie, to take that political risk, was for the chance to write the music for the film.
Dolly Parton:
Because the music is most important to me. And I wouldn't have agreed to do Nine to Five if I hadn't of seen it as an outlet for my music, which part of my deal was to do the theme song, and-
Jane Fonda:
One day, Dolly arrived on the set, and she said, "Hey, y'all, come over here, I think I got a song for us."
Dolly Parton:
Nine to five, what a way... on the set, when we did that with Jane and Lily, I wear these acrylic nails...
Jane Fonda:
And she used her fingernails like a washboard, kind of keeping time, rubbing her fingernails together. Clickity clickity click.
Dolly Parton:
I thought it sounded like a typewriter, too. So I'd do... I tumbled out of bed and stumbled in the kitchen (music) A cup of ambition. I loved that line. And I remember when I was writing that, poured myself, and I was going to say coffee, and I thought, "A cup of ambition! Yeah!" And I thought, "High five!"
Jane Fonda:
And she sang the Working nine to five. (music) And both Lily and I looked at each other, and we had goosebumps. Because we knew this was it and that it going to be a huge hit and it would become a movement anthem.
Jad Abumrad:
Did you know that immediately?
Jane Fonda:
Yeah. (music)
Jad Abumrad:
Jane says from the moment she heard this song, she just knew this was the entire working women's movement captured, that this was going to outlive the movie because it was all there.
Jane Fonda:
Yeah. When people think about working women working, that's the go to song.
Jad Abumrad:
And as for why it worked so well...
Lynn Neary:
Nussbaum says it's a perfect anthem.
Jad Abumrad:
Here's how Karen Nussbaum broke it down to Lynn Neary of MPR. She says, "Check out the sequence of ideas in the song."
Karen Nussbaum:
It starts with pride. Pour yourself a cup of ambition. And then it goes to grievances. They always take the credit. (music) It then goes to class conflict. You're just a step on the boss man's ladder, and then it ends with collective power. You're in the same boat with a lot of your friends. (music) So in the space of this wildly popular song with a great beat, Dolly Parton just puts it all together, all by herself. (music) And if you feel like the Nine to Five song is on a continuous loop in your brain, it's because you're hearing it all over the place. When Elizabeth Warren...
Speaker 30:
Please join me in welcoming the next President of the United States of America.
Karen Nussbaum:
Went to make her announcement that she was going to run for President...
Speaker 30:
Elizabeth Warren.
Karen Nussbaum:
She was playing Nine to Five.
Elizabeth W.:
I'm a huge Dolly Parton fan. I mean, what's not to love, right?
Jad Abumrad:
Before her...
Speaker 30:
The next President of the United States, Hilary Clinton.
Karen Nussbaum:
She was playing Nine to Five.
Jad Abumrad:
But here's where you get to the Dollytics of it all. You've got one of the great political protest songs of the last, I don't know, 50 years. You can debate me on that. I'll stand by it. It's a song that was born from a movie literally made to promote a union. And yet, when Elizabeth Warren tried to use the song, Elizabeth Warren who is a huge supporter of unions, Dolly's manager, Danny Nozell, issued a statement saying...
Danny Nozell:
We did not approve this request. And we do not approve requests like this of a political nature.
Jad Abumrad:
Coming up, we ask Dolly what's really behind that. That refusal. And her answer, I got to say, it is stuck so deep in my head that literally, I've been thinking about it every day for the last 18 months. I'm Jad Abumrad, Dolly Parton's America will continue in a moment.
Jad Abumrad:
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Jad Abumrad:
I'm Jad Abumrad. This is Dolly Parton's America. I'll admit that when I learned about Nine to Five, the labor movement, and how it inspired Nine to Five the movie, and how that gave birth to Nine to Five the song, which probably right now is being sung at 95 different protests, I'll admit I was a little puzzled by the thing you hear often from Dolly and her team, which is that we don't do politics.
Danny Nozell:
We do not approve requests of a political nature.
Jad Abumrad:
Well, isn't the song a political song? I mean, that's where I was at. Wasn't sure what to make of this thing, which seemed like a contradiction to me. But then [inaudible 00:26:48] got to talking about this one moment. Came up the first time in the lobby of the Savoy Hotel in the UK, talking to this guy.
Sam Haskell:
I am Sam Haskell.
Jad Abumrad:
He is one of Dolly's production partners.
Sam Haskell:
We produce movies together. We've done things for NBC, Lifetime, Netflix-
Jad Abumrad:
We were sitting in the lobby, and we started to talk about Dollytics. How anytime a political subject comes up...
Sam Haskell:
She'll deflect, and I'll give you a perfect example. We found ourselves nominated for best movie of the year at the Emmys (music) in 2017.
Speaker 34:
The nominees for lead actress in a comedy series are...
Sam Haskell:
Well, it just so happened that-
Speaker 34:
Jane Fonda. Lily Tomlin.
Sam Haskell:
Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda were also nominated for Grace and Frankie. So I had this idea that I let become everybody else's idea, but I had this idea that we should have the three of them reunite for the first time since Nine to Five because they're all three Emmy nominees at the same award show.
Jad Abumrad:
That was your idea.
Sam Haskell:
That was my idea.
Jad Abumrad:
Okay.
Speaker 34:
Ladies and gentlemen, here they are again, and still working a Nine to Five. Here are [inaudible 00:27:51] tonight's nominees, Lily Tomlin, Dolly Parton, and Jane Fonda.
Sam Haskell:
If you'll remember, they came out with Dolly in the middle.
Dolly Parton:
Thank you, oh, that's nice. Well, we appreciate that, and personally, I have been waiting for a Nine to Five reunion ever since we did the first one.
Jane Fonda:
Well...
Jad Abumrad:
Can you walk me through that moment from your perspective?
Dolly Parton:
Yeah.
Jad Abumrad:
So it's [inaudible 00:28:15] about 10 months, nine months at this point. The three of you walk out, you're going to present an award for best supporting actor. The first thing that happens is Jane Fonda says... I forget what it was.
Dolly Parton:
Well, it was a line, actually, from the movie. Lying, hypocritical...
Jane Fonda:
You're a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot.
Jane Fonda:
Back in 1980 in that movie, we refused to be controlled by a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot. Really. And in 2017, we still refuse to be controlled by a sexist, egotistical, lying, hypocritical bigot. So...
Dolly Parton:
It was really the famous line from the show Nine to Five, and a lot of people didn't know that, but they were using it, in a roundabout way, to apply to Donald Trump.
Jad Abumrad:
Your eyes got really wide when they said it.
Dolly Parton:
Well, I didn't like it. And I had already told Jane and Lily, I said, "Now, look, I'm not going to get into the politics of anything." So the writers had written up this whole stuff for us to say. I said, "I'm not saying it." I don't do politics. I have too many fans on both sides of the fence. Of course, I have my opinion about everything, but I learned years ago to keep your mouth shut about things. I saw what happened to the Dixie Chicks and-
Jad Abumrad:
Let me just stop the tape for a second. When Dolly talks about what happened to the Dixie Chicks (music) what she's referring to is something that happened in March of 2003. The Dixie Chicks were the highest selling female band of all time. They had a number one song, they were touring Europe. But then in London...
Natalie Maines:
Wanted to say...
Jad Abumrad:
Natalie Maines, the lead singer, is talking to the London crowd... and she says...
Natalie Maines:
We're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas.
Jad Abumrad:
Kind of hard to hear, but she says, "We're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas." She's referring to George W. Bush, who was from Texas. So were the Dixie Chicks. London crowd loves it. But.
Speaker 36:
The London story was picked up by the associated press and printed in newspapers all over the United States.
Jad Abumrad:
This was 18 months after 9/11 and just 10 days before the US would invade Iraq.
Speaker 37:
And how they could say, "I'm ashamed that the President's from Texas"? Come on, man.
Speaker 36:
Traitors. Dixie sluts. Anti-Americans.
Speaker 37:
I think they should send Natalie over to Iraq, strap her to a bomb, and just drop her over Baghdad.
Speaker 38:
I never want to hear another Dixie Chicks song again.
Speaker 39:
We're going to boycott them for their music and we're going to boycott you for playing if you don't-
Speaker 40:
Country radio, overnight, turns its back on the Dixie Chicks.
Speaker 41:
As a result of statements made by members of the Dixie Chicks at a concert, two radio networks banned the Dixie Chicks from their playlist at a chain level.
Speaker 36:
The Chicks' number one hit, Traveling Soldier, quickly fell from the top of the charts.
Jad Abumrad:
Their record sales crashed, and their career kind of crashed too.
Speaker 36:
All because of one split second comment aimed at President Bush right before the war with Iraq.
Dolly Parton:
I have as many fans that are Democrats as I do Republicans. And you don't want to hurt anybody. And it's not my place to be doing that anyway. I'm an entertainer. That's what I said to them. I'm an entertainer. I am not up here to bash somebody else.
Jane Fonda:
Really. And-
Dolly Parton:
Y'all just do what you do. I'm not playing that game.
Jane Fonda:
Egoistical, lying, hypocritical bigot. So-
Jad Abumrad:
So here's what happens.
Jane Fonda:
That being said, tonight we're here to recognize some men who conduct themselves with the utmost integrity. They're nominated for their extraordinary work in supporting roles.
Jad Abumrad:
Right at this moment, Dolly steps in.
Dolly Parton:
Well, I know about support. Hadn't been for good support here, [inaudible 00:32:29] here would be more like Flopsy and Droopy but... and I think...
Dolly Parton:
Try to turn it around and make it kind of funny, instead of doing that. Like I say, I can always depend on a boob joke if I have to. That's why I've got to lean back on them. Like I said, I don't know if I'm supporting them or they're supporting me.
Dolly Parton:
How about a shout out for Dabney Coleman out there? Actually, I'm here to have a good time tonight, and I'm just hoping... well, congratulations on your nomination for your show. I'm just hoping -
Jane Fonda:
You too, by the way.
Dolly Parton:
Yeah, thank you. I'm just hoping that I'm going to get one of those Grace and Frankie vibrators in my swag bag tonight. You think that's possible?
Jad Abumrad:
Within just a few seconds, Dolly had disarmed the whole room.
Dolly Parton:
Anyhow, here are the nominees for outstanding supporting actor in a limited series or movie.
Dolly Parton:
That whole night, everything was just bashing Donald Trump. And it wouldn't make any difference how I feel about him, I just thought, "My god, it's like... somebody just... why does it all have to be about politics?"
Jad Abumrad:
In the days after the Emmys, some people praised Dolly and how she sort of navigated the situation.
Speaker 42:
She's done a very good job of keeping herself on the clean and the narrow.
Jad Abumrad:
But she also came in for a fair amount of criticism from all angles.
Speaker 43:
I want to talk briefly about the statements made by Hanoi Jane Fonda and Lily Lip Tarty Tomlin at last night's Emmy award ceremony.
Speaker 44:
She knew what was going down. She knew what they were going to do.
Speaker 45:
Parton stayed silent.
Speaker 43:
Does Dolly Parton support those statements made? Because I am a lifelong fan of country music, and I think that country music fans should be outraged.
Jad Abumrad:
Some people on the left attacked her for not speaking out against President Trump. Others on the right attacked her for not speaking out for President Trump.
Dolly Parton:
Well, you could have upheld him. You should have said something. I thought, "No, I shouldn't have said nothing." Because if I'd have said anything about Trump, anything good or bad, or if I'd have said anything, just saying this or that, I'd have got booed out of that house. I'd have been probably up there on my own. But I wasn't interested in that. I wasn't going to say anything good or bad, no matter what I thought or felt. I just knew that I wasn't playing that game. It's just... but I want to be careful about that because people... it's like... anyway, it's just scary.
Jad Abumrad:
Yeah.
Dolly Parton:
No matter what you say, it's wrong.
Jad Abumrad:
At this point, Shima jumped in with a question.
Shima Oliaee:
When you're in a room and everyone's attacking this man, like Trump, because of your story of forgiveness, does it almost make you feel like you want to protect him?
Dolly Parton:
Yes.
Shima Oliaee:
What was your feeling?
Dolly Parton:
I wanted to say, let's pray for the President. Why don't we pray for the President? If we're having all these problems, let's just... why don't we just pray for Mr. President? I wanted to say that, but I thought no, keep your damn mouth shut. That won't work either. They don't... you know. So tit joke. When all else fails, be funny or try to be funny.
Jad Abumrad:
Wow, that's really interesting. I have to be honest, that moment messed me up. I kept thinking about it. I came in thinking that her refusal to talk about Trump was probably mostly a business calculation. She has a lot that she needs to protect, including a massive charitable foundation, so I think we can all get that. But it's also easy to see that silence cynically, like a refusal to speak truth just because it might hurt the bottom line. But when she said...
Dolly Parton:
Let's pray for the President.
Jad Abumrad:
It just hit me like a ton of bricks. I thought, "Oh, no, no, no, no, that's not all that's happening here." I mean, this is not somebody who is denying the reality of America. If you just look at the Nine to Five album itself, in addition to the song Nine to Five (music) you've got a song about the racist treatment of deportees. There's another labor rights song on there. (music) There's a song about the plight of mine workers dying in mines. She's been singing about political social issues since the '60s. We talked about this in episode one. So this is not someone who's in denial. But the Trump comment, it made me realize, "Oh, I get it. She's saying her stake in the sand is that she will not cast anybody out."
Dolly Parton:
I'd like to say a little bit of something about that. I love -
Jad Abumrad:
I thought back to those press conferences. When Dolly started working with Jane Fonda, her country music fans would boo when Jane's name came up. But in every press conference and interview, she would insist...
Dolly Parton:
That there is this sweet, gentle side in Jane that I think is so sweet and lovable, and that... it's the side that the public never sees, and I know that it's hard to believe, but she's a very caring person.
Jad Abumrad:
I thought back to all our conversations about Porter Wagoner.
Dolly Parton:
I just finally thought, "I'm going to break myself if I don't go."
Jad Abumrad:
This is a guy that'd be really easy to turn into a cardboard cutout of a misogynistic ass who held her back, and frankly, I was going that direction in my questioning.
Jad Abumrad:
There's a power thing happening for sure.
Dolly Parton:
Well, it's more complicated than that.
Jad Abumrad:
Sure.
Dolly Parton:
Just think about it. He'd had this show for years. He didn't need me.
Jad Abumrad:
She just refused to flatten the guy.
Dolly Parton:
He wasn't expecting me to be all that I was either.
Jad Abumrad:
It seemed suddenly clear to me that yes, while there is a business logic here, this is also a spiritual stance. This is an ethos that she has chosen. And it is undeniably one of the reasons that she can have the fan base that she has. Because everybody feels safe at a Dolly Parton concert.
Jane Fonda:
Afterwards, I realized that it had put Dolly, perhaps, in a difficult situation. Because Dolly is not a political activist and many of her fans are Trump supporters. So I think it was awkward for her, and I felt bad about that.
Jad Abumrad:
Did you talk about that with her afterwards?
Jane Fonda:
I don't remember. I don't remember. But I heard that there was some... some of the fans objected to it. And I very much respect Dolly's... she does have a very diverse fan base. She loves her fans, and her fans love her. I've been to her concerts where her fans are... tears rolling down their face. There's a connection between Dolly and her fans unlike any that I have ever seen in my life. And she has to protect that. I'm in a very, very different place. Some people... there's almost a symbiotic relationship with fans. I'm not in that situation. It's very different for me.
Speaker 48:
I tried to tuck my waist in, but I don't think I'm every going to do it like you.
Dolly Parton:
Well, we're good. We're just about the same size.
Speaker 6:
Gorgeous lighting. Whoever did it, thank you.
Dolly Parton:
Hi.
Speaker 6:
Cell phones off, if you're new to the party.
Jad Abumrad:
Back in London, a couple hours before the physical knife situation on the red carpet, we got to watch Dolly continually fend off other, more veiled attempts to pin her down on politics.
Speaker 48:
Without naming names, there are people in politics who might talk about women in less favorable terms than others, grabbing them by certain parts of their anatomy. Do you think that kind of language is useful or helpful in American politics these days?
Jad Abumrad:
Any time the President came up, which was often...
Dolly Parton:
What people do to each other... I'm sorry, I didn't get the first part of it.
Speaker 48:
Well, I'm talking about President Trump, alluding to him. In the language, he talked about grabbing women by certain parts of their anatomy-
Dolly Parton:
Oh, I'm not even going to talk about any of that stuff because I refuse to do it. I just think people should treat everybody with respect.
Jad Abumrad:
Every time Trump came up, Dolly shut it down. And it did make me think. At this moment, when even having cereal somehow becomes about President Trump, is it even possible to do what she's trying to do? Is it even okay?
Stella Barton:
I think this code of silence is what's keeping women down, and...
Jad Abumrad:
Just days after we returned from that UK trip, Stella Barton, Dolly's sister, who's also a recording artist, appeared on a podcast called Our Stories and spoke with a woman named Adrina Austin. And...
Stella Barton:
I find it is very disheartening to me.
Jad Abumrad:
Basically pointed a finger at her sister.
Stella Barton:
My sister should speak out more. I honestly call her out. She should speak out more. And I'm ashamed of my sister for keeping her mouth shut. She can run it all day long when it's about something else. Well, speak up against injustice.
Adriana Austin:
Now, who is your sister? Just for people who may not know.
Stella Barton:
Dolly Parton. Speak up.
Dolly Parton:
It's like we're just divided. It's just torn my own family apart, this political stuff. We can't even have a nice dinner like we used to have. We'd laugh about things, what's going on, something going on in the family or some jokes or whatever. Now, everybody's arguing about politics. And I said, "Can we just stop and eat? Let's stop. Don't do that. We don't need to talk about that now."
Jad Abumrad:
Shima jumped in with one more question.
Shima Oliaee:
And sometimes, when I don't speak up, people get hurt because I don't say what needed to be said. Do you ever feel like by not opposing, maybe it is hurting others? Or you could be taking other people's pain away? Do you ever worry about that or think about that?
Dolly Parton:
No. Because I know that when the time comes, I will speak out. I have a great sense of timing. And that's always worked in my favor. That's why I say I don't just join the marches, I don't just join the group. I know that my time will come. And hopefully, when it does, I will say my piece.
Jad Abumrad:
(music) When she said that, I thought, "When would be a good time to speak? What would need to change? What would she say? How would we hear it? Would we hear it?" I thought about a Quaker meeting I'd gone to once with a friend, where they tell you to wait in silence until the inspiration compels you to speak. And so you wait. For something to happen. Then I thought about her music, which never seems to wait. It just comes in this unending stream, and she channels that stuff. So in lieu of her saying her piece, we certainly have her singing it. (music)
Jad Abumrad:
Dolly Parton's America was produced, written, and edited by me and Shima Oliaee. Brought to you by OSM Audio, that's O-S-M Audio and WNYC studios. We had production help from W. Harry Fortuna, original music by Leroy Anderson. The Typewriter, used with the permission of Woodbury music company. Thanks to the folks at Sony, special thanks to Peter at Harper Collins, huge thanks to Pat Resnik, Karen Nussbaum, and her archives at Wayne State University. Sam Shahi, David Dawson, Pat Walters, Lulu Miller, and Soren Wheeler. Thanks as always to my dad. I also want to take this moment to thank Dolly Parton. And Danny Nozell and the entire crew for being so generous with their time. They did not have to spend the amount of time that they spent with us. They did not have to answer all of our sometimes very annoying questions. But they did, and we are grateful.
Jad Abumrad:
We've partnered with Apple music to bring you a companion playlist that will be updated each week with music you'll hear in the episode, plus some of our favorites. You can find that on our website at dollypartonsamerica.org.
Jad Abumrad:
Next week, on Dolly Parton's America.
Dolly Parton:
I said, "Look, I'm a writer. Jolene's a whore."
Jad Abumrad:
We take a Dolly classic and turn it on its head.
Speaker 51:
I've got my little melodica.
Jad Abumrad:
Oh, I love that verse. It's so good.
Jad Abumrad:
That's coming up next week on Dolly Parton's America.
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