What Dolly Parton Has Said About Her Husband Carl Dean and Their Decades-Long Marriage

Speaking with the New York Times, Dolly Parton looked back at the time she met Carl Dean for the first time at the Wishy Washy Laundromat in Nashville in 1964.

"I was in such a hurry to get here — and after I'd put my clothes in the machine, I started walkin' down the street, just lookin' at my new home, and this guy hollered at me, and I waved. Bein' from the country, I spoke to everybody. And he came over and, well, it was Carl, my husband," she said.

Parton also spoke candidly about their meeting at the laundromat on her website.

"I was surprised and delighted that while he talked to me, he looked at my face (a rare thing for me)," she wrote. "He seemed to be genuinely interested in finding out who I was and what I was about."

The "Islands in the Stream" singer appeared on the cover of People's 1977 issue, in which she commented about her husband.

"He's sort of shy and quiet," she said of Dean. "What we have together is so sweet and good that I'd never want it to get jumbled up with the other."

In May 2016, Parton and Dean renewed their vows after planning it for a long time.

Opening up about the special day, she told Rolling Stone that her husband "looked like a handsome dude out of Hollywood."

"We had a few family and friends around. We didn't plan anything big at all because we didn't want any kind of strain, any kind of tension, any kind of commotion, so we planned it cleverly and carefully. We just had a simple little ceremony at our chapel at our place," said Parton. "We just had just a few people who needed to be there to make sure they got the pictures and the few things that we needed."

Parton and Dean's marriage has remained strong despite never welcoming any children.

In a 2014 interview with Billboard, Parton divulged, "When my husband and I were dating, and then when we got married, we just assumed we would have kids. We weren't doing anything to stop it. In fact, we thought maybe we would. We even had names if we did, but it didn't turn out that way."

Parton rocked her performance at the 2023 Thanksgiving Day game in her iconic Dallas Cowboys cheerleader outfit. After making headlines at the event, she shared Dean's hilarious and unmatched reaction to her overall look.

"It turned out pretty cool and my husband liked it. He said, 'Those shorts were a little too short.' I said, 'Jealous?'" she told People. "And I said, 'They weren't as short as the other girls!' He was just being funny. I think he thought — because everybody's making a to-do over it — he thought, well, maybe you shouldn't be showing your b--- at that age. But anyway, he got a kick out of it too."

Decades ago, Parton turned heads when she donned a Playboy bunny suit for the magazine's cover in 1978. After over 40 years, she recreated the look and surprised her husband for his birthday.

"My husband always loved the original cover, so I was trying to think of something to do to make him happy. He still thinks I'm a hot chick, after 57 years, and I'm not gonna try to talk him out of that. And I hope he agrees," she said in a video.

In an episode of her Apple Music show, Parton opened up about Dean never wanting to be in the limelight amid her successful career.

"He went to one thing with me early on when we first married to a BMI Song of the Year, and he came out there taking off his tuxedo, his tie, and all that, and said, 'Don't ever ask me to go to another one of these d--- things because I ain't going.' I never asked him and he never did," she added.

Parton also called her husband a "loner" while speaking with Entertainment Tonight, saying Dean "doesn't really like being with anybody but me."

She continued, "He's not one to kind of get out there and socialize that much. He loves living on the farm, taking care of the property as he has for all these many years."

Despite Parton's busy career, she found the best way to keep her marriage to Dean healthy.

"I'm just saying, anything new gets old," Parton admitted. "I think if you just kind of stay together so much, you just nitpick every little thing and notice all that."

According to the "I Will Always Love You" singer, their focus on their respective careers made things in their union more interesting.

She explained to E! News, "It's worked for us because we both do different things and it's exciting when we are together. The fact that there's some little space that makes it exciting when you go home."

Parton added she and Dean keep the fire burning by spending time doing things they love.

"I like to cook. And one of the things that we like to do — not necessarily a date night, we have a lot of date days — we have our little RV and we like to travel around. Going down and get some food or I'll make a picnic and we go down to the river and have a picnic and just kind of ride around and do our little things," Parton shared.

When asked if her husband has ever got a glimpse of her without any makeup on, the "Here You Come Again" songstress said, "Carl has seen me every which way. In fact, I remember when we first got married, I had just got out of the shower, and I didn't have my shoes on. He said, 'Well, you ain't big as a bar soap.'"