• March 06, 2006
• Vol. 65
• No. 9

Hooray for Dollywood!

Up for Best Original Song for the Transamerica Theme, Oscar Nominee Dolly Parton Is Still Travelin' Her Own Path

BUSY BODY: Her birth certificate may say so, but Dolly Parton insists she isn't 60. "I'm sexty!" jokes the country legend. "I don't have time to get old." On March 5, she'll sing "Travelin' Thru," a Best Original Song nominee from Transamerica, at the Oscars. After being asked by writer-director Duncan Tucker, she wrote the tune in a day. "It's a song of love and tolerance," says Parton. "I'm comfortable with who I am, so I think everybody should be allowed to be."

RED-CARPET READY: She hasn't been to the Oscars since she was nominated for the theme to 1980's 9 to 5, but Parton can't wait: "I'm going to meet whoever I want—I'll walk right up and say hey." Not Carl Dean, her press-shy husband of nearly 40 years. "Carl don't care who I go with as long as it ain't him," says Parton, whose Oscar date is Tucker.

OPRY MEETS OSCAR: As for her dress, Parton, who wrote a children's book and remains busy with her Pigeon Forge, Tenn., theme park, is leaving the spangles to longtime designer Robert Behar. Expect glitz. "I never think of myself as a sex symbol," she says. "A lot of people think I'm way too artificial for any guy with real class. Not my husband—but he's a bit of a redneck!"