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Dolly Parton said she loved working on ‘Rhinestone’ with Sylvester Stallone. Here’s one element of the movie that she wasn’t as fond of.
In 1984, Dolly Parton starred in the broadly panned film Rhinestone with Sylvester Stallone. While critics hated the film, both Parton and Stallone said they loved making it. Parton was less experienced as an actor, but she wanted people to know that the movie was just as much hers as it was his. When she heard the original title, she wanted to have it changed to something else.
Dolly Parton wanted to change the title of a film she starred in with Sylvester Stallone
The title for Rhinestone was originally Rhinestone Cowboy, based on Glen Campbell’s song “Rhinestone Cowboy.” Parton reportedly wasn’t a fan of the original title because it implied Stallone was more of a lead than she was. She wanted equal billing.
“The original working title for the film was Rhinestone Cowboy, but Dolly preferred Rhinestone because she didn’t want people thinking that the film was solely about Stallone’s character,” wrote Stephen Miller in the book Smart Blonde. He added that, “there were rumors that her people had to resist attempts to downgrade her equal billing.”
Parton also asserted control through the soundtrack.
“One of the lessons she claimed to have learned from her previous celluloid outings was the importance of retaining a large degree of control and so it was all the more surprising that Rhinestone was essentially Stallone’s baby,” Miller wrote. “While he had a hand in writing the screenplay, Dolly ensured that she had a large degree of control over the musical content, revealing to interviewer Terry Wogan in 1992 that she had a clause in her movie contracts giving her the right to record the theme song.”
Dolly Parton said she struggled to get through her lines with Sylvester Stallone
Though Parton wanted more control over the film, she didn’t feel competitive with Stallone. They got along well, and Parton found she liked his sense of humor.
“I was really impressed with him, because I wondered myself, because of the role he played, if he would be funny,” she said, per Smooth Radio. “If he really could do comedy.”
She said Stallone often made her laugh so hard that she couldn’t make it through her scenes.
“And he had me laughing, I couldn’t even do my scenes – they just left my laughing in, because I was laughing in places where I wasn’t supposed to,” she said. “I was supposed to be acting. He absolutely tickles me to death. He’s a crazy person.”
She has never considered herself much of an actor
Parton has been in a number of movies, but she has always thought of herself as much more of a musician than an actor. She typically takes roles in which she is able to play a version of herself. When the director of Steel Magnolias criticized her acting, Parton didn’t take it as much of an insult.
“Well hell, I know I can’t act,” she told him. “It’s your job to teach me how. You hired me to make money for you.”
These days, she most often appears in film and television as herself.
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