Glam rock legend Noddy Holder’s wife, who wrote a novel about a Dolly Parton tribute act, says she has “never met a single person who doesn’t adore” the legendary country artist.
The singer, actress and philanthropist, who has died at the age of 80, was known as the Queen of Country.
Suzan Holder, who was born in Halesowen in the West Midlands, said people would call Parton a dumb blonde, but “you underestimate Dolly Parton at your peril”.
“Dolly Parton’s ethos was ‘never dim your light to make somebody else feel better, shine as brightly as you want to’, and I just think that’s just a beautiful message.”
Holder said the singer-songwriter was “such a figure and such an enormous presence in the world that you just think she’s gonna be around forever”.
She added: “She would get to the punchline of any joke about Dolly Parton faster than you could – and be funnier for it.”
The author and wife of the former frontman of Wolverhampton band Slade wrote the novel What Would Dolly Do? featuring a tribute act “who can’t really find her own way in the world”.
Holder said the real-life Parton “knew exactly who she was and how she [wanted] to present herself to the world”.
The writer stated: “When I go round talking… [at] bookshops or to readers about my books… I have never met a single person who doesn’t adore Dolly Parton, whether that’s through [music], through her comedy kind of timing, through her personality, through her philanthropy and charity work.”
Asked whether she and the ex-Slade performer sang Islands In the Stream together, as Parton did with Kenny Rogers, Holder replied “that would be telling, wouldn’t it?”
“But he [Noddy] has been known to get his guitar out. It’s never been done publicly, but I mean you can’t beat a bit of [a] Dolly and Kenny duet, can you?”
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