Fans and admirers nearly didn’t recognize Dolly Parton without her towering blonde wig in a recently resurfaced snap.
Throwback photos and past stories of the iconic singer have been circulating since she lost her life following a brief battle with cancer.
She had recently cancelled a Las Vegas show and was also undergoing treatment for kidney stones for several years.
Fans and admirers nearly didn’t recognize Dolly Parton without her towering blonde wig in a throwback photo
Dolly Parton, who lost her life at the age of 80, was surrounded by her loved ones when she passed away on Tuesday, August 25.
While alive, the “Queen of country” has spoken about her larger-than-life wigs, which became an essential part of her recognizable image.
Even though her husband would joke about her looking “like a Q-Tip,” she said they allowed her to make the “dream” in her head come to life.
Following her passing, a throwback photo showed the country legend without her famous wig, leaving fans floored by her natural look.
The monochrome photo was posted by the singer in 2018 with the caption, “I always love being in the studio.”
“Your natural hair is beautiful,” one commented on the photo, while another wrote, “You are a beautiful woman with or without wigs.”
“You are a beautiful woman with or without wigs,” a fan commented on the throwback photo
“Even though she enhances with wigs and make-up she has always been a naturally beautiful,” said another.
One wrote, “Dolly can take her wig off and all I will see is the beautiful person that she truly is!”
Early in her career, the “Queen of Country” once famously said that it costs “a lot of money to look this cheap”
Over the years, Parton’s looks always reflected her Tennessee roots and her larger-than-life style.
Known for flashy clothes, shoulder pads, colorful nails, and iconic wigs, the 9 to 5 singer anointed herself with the nickname “Backwoods Barbie,” which also was the name of one of her albums.
During the early days of her career, she once famously said, “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.”
The same philosophy resonated with her decades later.
Last year, the then-79-year-old singer said her look was about being “trashy” in a very intentional way.
“I want to look cheap. That’s my look. I want to look a little bit, you know, trashy. I don’t mean it in a bad way. I just like that kind of almost artificial look. I like the overdone. I like the bleached hair,” she told WWD last year.
“I do have some really beautiful clothes, but you would never know how much they cost, because the expensive ones look the same on me as the cheap ones for the most part,” she continued.
The singer refused to listen to critics even when they asked her to “go simpler” with her style
Aaron Rapoport/Corbis/Getty Images
Even when critics would tell her to change her style or or “go simpler” with her outfits, she would never pay heed.
It didn’t matter to her what others thought.
“If somebody doesn’t like the way you look.…Well, say, ‘To hell with you. This is me. I’m the one who has to wear this. You’re not wearing it,’” said the Jolene singer.
Her relationship with wigs began when she got so tired of blow-drying her hair before every show.
“Wigs are just so handy. I’m so busy, and I have so many choices. I never have a bad hair day, and that’s a good thing,” she told Elle in 2019.
Parton said her longtime husband Carl Dean would tease her for her enormous wigs
Apart from being unapologetically confident, she had a vision for herself as an artist and was determined to bring it to life.
“I wanted to look like the dream I carried in my head,” she wrote in her 2021 memoir Dolly Parton, Songteller.
While fans loved her look, Parton said her longtime husband Carl Dean would tease her for her enormous wigs.
“It’s a funny thing because when I wear this big hair, because I’m so tiny, my husband always says I look like a Q-Tip,” she said.
“It’s nothing but a big white wad on my head!”
“Those wigs were something else, everyone one of them was amazing,” one commented online
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