Inside Dolly Parton's mysterious marriage and hidden tattoos that cover her body

29 December 2023 , 20:00

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Dolly has been happily married for almost six decades (Image: Getty Images for ACM)

Dolly Parton's marriage is an ongoing mystery, and that's just the way she likes it.

The legendary country singer, 77, first met her husband Carl Dean when she was just 18 and they have been together ever since. However, after decades in the limelight with Carl notably absent, cruel rumours have swirled that he doesn't actually exist.

But the star insists she and her husband of 57 years are still madly in love, and it's simply down to his distaste for all the 'hullabaloo' that comes part in parcel of her A-list celebrity status. Carl has managed to remain in the background of his wife's glitzy life in front of the cameras ever since he first laid eyes on the star outside Nashville's Wishy-Washy laundromat. Then 21, the now keen farmer caught her attention by joking that she was going to get sunburn in her revealing outfit.

It was love at first sight for Dolly and Carl

The couple tied the knot in 1966

"My first thought was I'm going to marry that girl," Carl once said. "My second was, ‘Lord she’s good lookin.' And that was the day my life began." She signed with Monument Records soon after and married Carl in a small ceremony in Ringgold, Georgia in 1966, with only her mother as a witness.

But fame wasn't something Carl wanted or enjoyed and he instead chose to live a quiet life on their sprawling farm, running his paving firm until his recent retirement. "Listen, he’s a homebody and doesn’t like to go out in public," Dolly previously told The Mirror.

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"We have a farm and he’s more than happy keeping the fields mowed, the barns painted and working away on his farm equipment." In fact, the singer - whose 1973 song Jolene was inspired by a woman trying to steal Carl - describes her husband as a "loner".

"He doesn't particularly care about being around anybody but me. He's just always asked me to leave him out of all this. He does not like all the hullabaloo," she explained.

Dolly and Carl renewed their vows on their 50th wedding anniversary

Dolly always keeps her arms covered

Dolly has previously described their relationship as being "open" - but not in a physical sense. She explained: "He’s not jealous and I’m not jealous of him. He knows I flirt. He flirts too. Yes, it’s an open relationship, but not sexually and I would kill him if I thought he was doing that. He would shoot me too. At the end of the day we love each other madly."

To keep the love alive, she makes sure her off-duty clothes are still "cute and sexy" and says Carl is a hopeless romantic who likes to shower her with gifts. From picking her buttercups to writing her poems, the couple recently marked their 50th wedding anniversary by renewing their vows.

As for the key to their longevity, Dolly says they love to make each other laugh. "The humour has kept us together over the years," she said. "Carl has a crazy, warped sense of humour. He is extremely funny and I suppose I am pretty funny too.

She recently opened up about her secret tattoos (KeystoneUSA-ZUMA / Rex Features)

She uses her inkings to cover her scars (KeystoneUSA-ZUMA / Rex Features)

"Even if we get p**sed off with each other, we have never said anything that we would regret if one of us died. We usually laugh our way out of it." Another long-standing rumour about Dolly is that she's secretly covered in tattoos.

Indeed, she always wears long sleeves which has only served to fuel the gossip. Jennifer Saunders once said she'd seen Dolly's mysterious inkings over dinner in Los Angeles.

"It was 9.30 in the evening, which meant that the restaurant was empty, because that's what happens in LA, everyone goes home, no one stays out drinking late," Jennifer once recalled. "And so the restaurant was empty and she just opened her jacket and showed us, can I say, the most beautiful tattoos."

And in 2019, Dolly finally confirmed that she does indeed have a secret collection of pretty pastel-coloured tattoos which she uses to hide her scars. She told CNN: "If I have to get a scar for any reason, I never can kind of get rid of that purple look. So I thought, 'Well, I'm going to kind of decorate these with some flowers or little butterflies or whatever.'"

Frances Kindon