Dollitics

It's verbal judo. She's the best interviewee on the planet. Nobody does interviews like Dolly. I'm very outspoken politically, but I try not to talk Dolly tics at all. Anyway, so we're getting ready to go. We're just waiting here in the wings. Gotcha. Then we're going to go get in the car. I'm excited about that. Ask me whatever you ask me, and I'm going to tell you what I want you to hear. I'm Chad Iboomrod. This is Dolly Barnes America, Episode 5, Dolly tics. Hat tip to Brian Sievert, Dolly's nephew and bodyguard, for coining the term. We begin this episode in London, in room 327 at the Savoy Hotel. Well, they actually changed it. Oh, they did. Just a few minutes before Dolly is supposed to walk the red carpet for the premiere of 9 to 5, the musical. 9 to 5, if you don't know, massive film from 1980 about three women who rise up against their sexist, egotistical boss. Spawned one of the great political anthems of our time. I'll go into all that later. For the moment, just know it's being revived as a musical in London. That's why we're here. How are you feeling about everything so far? Oh, it's exciting. I'm really more excited than anything because I haven't seen it all. I've been working with them, writing new stuff and putting things together, but I'm just excited to see the new cast and to hear the new songs, how they work. I can feel the energy of the event, and so it's hard for me to even focus. Outside the hotel. It's mayhem. Can we clear the back door just for the photo call? Not only are thousands of people waiting for Dolly to emerge, but all weekend long, all throughout London. I don't want to be abused. Shame on you. There have been protests. I guess they're protesting some kind of fashion something, and then the environment. I guess there's thousands of people out in the streets doing other things. Everywhere we go! Everywhere we go! So it goes to show you there's a life within the life of world within other worlds. So they just tell us, OK, well, if we if we get blocked off because of the protesters, we go in this other door, we go around this side of the building. So my security people, they've scanned all that out. They know everything that's going on. They're very aware of everything. But it's kind of exciting, all that energy. Everybody here for different reasons. Inside the room. Accommodate everybody. It's a spooky mix of energy. It's a beautiful hope, the weather hope is up good for you. We were lucky. Dolly's team, led by Danny Nizel, her manager, are zipping around like all electric. Dolly. Now I have to sign some autographs. See, it never ends. Yeah. Totally chill. It's never out. It's never over. It's going on all the time. Gotcha. Danny brings in some posters with her face on it that she's supposed to sign before the show. I'm going to capture the sound of your pen. OK, well, I don't know if this is going to show. And that don't even make a noise. It's not going to make a noise on this. Danny, that's not a good one. My hair colored that one out. I don't know. Would you like a black Sharpie for that? It's too late now. Go time. All right, we're walking down the hall, I guess we're on our way to the red carpet. Now we're going to go down, get in the car, because we have to drive around to the red carpet, to the front of the building. Dolly hums her way down the hall, her dress has all of these glass beads on it that say, Swish back and forth musically as she walks, and she hums to the rhythm of their swishing. She's flanked by, I don't know, 12 men, many of whom have very big guns. Hello. Good morning. Thank you. Thank you. Just going down. Where are you going? We all crowd into this tiny elevator, where there's a middle-aged British couple who happen to be standing there and are totally stunned. It's a special weekend for me. It's my birthday. Oh, happy birthday. Thank you. You're 27 today. Oh, I think 21. 21? I'm sorry. Happy birthday. Thank you. We're just having to go around the building. We hop into a black SUV and drive literally halfway around the block, from one side of the hotel to the other, where the red carpet is. No, you're going to get on my side, but I got to get out before you. We're on a time frame. Got you. If you hear them ask questions, you're welcome to. All right. I'll do it. I'll do it. And if you decide to ask one right in the middle of the building, you're welcome. If you decide to ask one right in the middle of the building, I'd like to hear you, too. Again, icy calm. Oh, my God. Look at all these people. You ready? Are you ready for me? Yep. Ready? Two thousand people go bonkers. She steps out onto the red carpet. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, Dolly. Hey. How you doing? Good to see you. She starts to feel questions. Why is the show still so relevant? Well, I think we've made a good point. When we did it 40 years ago, we did a lot of good. What kind of modern resonance do you think this story has for modern audience now? I mean, the women in work is a different world now. So how modern do you think this story is? Well, I don't think it's as relevant as it was before and in a way with the new Me Too movement. I think this is really a good time for it. People ask her, what advice does she have for working women? So much. A lot of other questions related to workplace harassment, which was a big one for me. I think it's a good time for it. So much. A lot of other questions related to workplace harassment, which was a big part of the original 9 to 5. But very quickly, the questions broaden out. Now, at the moment in the UK, we've got Brexit looming. Have you got any Dolly advice to help the UK get through? We can hardly even take care of our own problems. So let's try to solve yours. Several reporters ask her about Brexit. We've got a lot of work to do. We're going through a very funny time here in Britain at the moment with Brexit, with people being very frustrated, very angry. She gets asked about climate change. What does she think about the protests that are sweeping London? She spends about four minutes swatting all those questions away. But then maybe about 10 minutes later, she gets asked about the climate change. She gets asked about the climate change. that the U.S. was then fighting. Hanoi Jane would henceforth rank right up there with World War II enemy propagandists Tokyo Rose and Axis Salad. It's what would get her the label Hanoi Jane and make her, in some circles, the most hated woman in America. She will always be a traitor. Hanoi Jane sucks. She needs to go down in history for what she is, the traitor. Okay, so as all of that was happening, Karen says she was in Boston organizing against the war. I thought of myself as an activist, but I also had to, you know, pay the rent, and so I had to get a job. And I ended up getting a job that was the most typical job for women, which was to be a clerical worker. Remember, keep in mind, the 1970s is this moment when you have millions of women working for wages for the first time. This is Lane Windham, labor rights historian at Georgetown University. You can't overestimate just the level of change that was happening in the 70s, she says. Wow. Then she says you had a bunch of economic forces coming together, a bunch of civil rights legislation coming together, and suddenly 12 million women, like Karen, enter the workforce en masse. The single most common job, for women to hold, is a secretary or office clerical. And the women who held those positions were treated as the wife. You know, they were expected to get the coffee. Expected to, you know, be a sex symbol in the office. I wasn't thinking about it. It was really just, okay, this will bring in a paycheck every week. So Karen was at Harvard, working as a typist, pretty much hating her job, but seeing it as a way to fund her activism, which had to do with the war and things happening out, there. But then one day she's walking home from work and she passes by a restaurant. And actually what happened was there was a group of waitresses holding picket signs. There's just these eight working class waitresses who, you know, got hit on the butt one time too many or disrespected by the boss or whatever it was. And they decide that they're going to go on strike. Karen says she started to march with them and it was a lightbulb moment. Like, oh, I could do activism about my work. So she gathered 10 clerical workers together. Working in different workplaces, a hospital, an insurance company, a publishing house, a shoe factory. They formed a group, began to meet weekly. And after a few months, we decided to create a citywide organization that we decided to call 9 to 5. 9 to 5. For the next couple of years. They created an office worker's bill of rights. We want these minimum standards implemented now. And launched a big press conference. They did studies of, like, the publishing industry and the banking industry. The pay runs up to 40% less than men get for jobs at the same skill and effort level. There's also Phil Donahue. He had a popular TV talk show, Daytime. 9 to 5 used to do an annual, bad boss contest. Oh, they were so funny. They were hilarious. Okay, so, like, they would hold contests. Donahue would invite the 9 to 5 activists onto the show and they would hold these big contests. We held a contest to determine the worst thing your boss makes you do. And they'd do it in a big public way. So, for instance. A winner was a man who owned his own business. He was late for a meeting and he had a rip in his pants. Right in the back of his pants. And he asked his secretary to sew the rip while he kept the pants on. He dropped his pants and she sewed the rip. Give me some other winners, just briefly. Then there was the boss who required his secretary to vacuum up his nail clippings from the floor. He won the personal hygiene award. Oh, that makes my stomach turn. So they would have a bunch of women go deliver it to him in front of the news cameras. Okay, so Karen was doing all this, holding on these contests, filing all these lawsuits, fighting for equal pay. She had this movie star friend. Jane and I saw each other regularly as we worked on ending the war. You know, every time we would see each other, she would tell me stories about what the women office workers were up against. And it was exciting to her. Yeah. This is Jane Fonda, of course. One day, Jane just came to me and said, what if we made a movie? So Karen invites Jane to a meeting of 40 clerical workers that she'd organized. Jane brings some Hollywood people with her. One of them asked the women, have you ever dreamed of getting even with your boss? And the place lit up. They all had dreamed of getting even with their boss. Yes, I remember one woman said she imagined cutting up her boss and putting him in a coffee grinder and then making drip coffee out of him. Wow. Another fantasized breaking his knees with a bat as he walked by. I mean, they were, you know, some of them were so violent that we couldn't possibly use them in the movie. Which is funny. She says when she heard all those dark fantasies start spilling out. And I thought, oh my God, there it is. There's the movie. 20th Century Fox presents a tribute to anyone who has ever been overworked, underpaid, and pushed to the edge by an ungrateful boss. Quick refresher on the movie in case you haven't seen it or haven't seen it recently. 9 to 5 is the story of three female office workers. Hi, this is Violet. There's Violet. Welcome to the front lines. Played by a little girl. There's Julie Tomlin. There's Dora Lee. I think he told everybody I was sleeping with him. Played by Dolly Parton. And there's Judy. Couldn't we just all get together and complain? Played by Jane Fonda. Let's face it, we are in a pink-collar ghetto. So they've got this boss, Mr. Hart, who's played by Dabney Coleman, who demeans the female employees, openly harasses Dolly's character. Mr. Hart, I told you before, I'm a married woman. I'm a married man. That's what makes it so perfect. And the story of the movie is these three women getting revenge. Get him. And hunt him down. And it's, of course, hilarious and over-the-top. They inadvertently kidnap him. At one point, they string him up from the ceiling. Let's go! Help! Let me go! Let me go! Help! Did you see the look on his face? One of the interesting things we learned is that the original script for the movie was way darker. A little closer in spirit to that 9 to 5 meeting. I mean, there was a cyanide scene written in, an electrocution scene. But Jane Fonda nixed that version because she felt that the only way the movie would work as a political vehicle was if it were a farce. You know, the way I think you make these kind of movies is you make a movie so that even if people don't want to deal with the issues that we're raising, they'll like the movie anyway because it's really funny. And as we know, a man in Hollywood, Jim Brown, goes behind the scenes of the movie 9 to 5 to find out what the office talk is. People did like the movie. It blew up. Jane remembers women shouting, shouting at the screen. These were their stories. And I knew that the fact that we were putting their issues up on the screen this way would make a real difference. This was really the first national conversation about workplace harassment. It was like Me Too beta. And it allowed us to explode. Karen says 9 to 5 became a full-fledged union and added 20 local chapters almost immediately. It just took off like a rocket. Office workers all over the country felt empowered and uplifted and seen. For the first time because of the movie. So now we come back to Dolly, who at this point had never been in a movie. No. And what gave you the idea to cast her? It went like this. During the process of development. She says she was driving home one day. I turned the radio on and Dolly Parton was singing Two Doors Down. And I suddenly had a vision of Dolly as a secretary. Just the vision. You know, she can't see her hands. Typing with those long fingernails. Everything about it made me laugh. And I thought, wow, she's never been in a movie. Even if she can, which I had no idea if she could or not, I thought people would want to see the movie because of her. You know, I didn't realize how fabulous the choice would end up being. I wonder, was there any thought in your mind that like you're trying to deliver a message, like a political message in a movie, but you are a polarizing figure at this point and that maybe she was a way to bridge to an audience that you wouldn't normally be able to reach? Well, I didn't. That would have implied that I was smarter than I am and more strategic. A real business person would have thought, oh, that would bring in the Southern demographic. That's a good business idea. No. I didn't think that way. Dolly, in her autobiography. She was wrong about the fact that she thought I'd help the film do well in the South. says the exact opposite. But as for what Dolly was thinking at the time. I'd like to thank all of you for coming this afternoon. I'm sure you knew. And she explained this at a press event on the day of the film's opening. Well, I was attracted to the idea of doing 9 to 5 because I'd been looking through scripts for a few months. And so it just seemed like it would be a good idea and working for the first time in a film with great people like Jane and Lily, I figured if it was a success, that we would all enjoy the benefits and if it was a flop they could take the blame for it dolly said in a very tongue-in-cheek sort of way but she was very upfront about it that she was making a political calculation she knew that for her country music fans appearing with jane fonda hanoi jane was risky because she's so outspoken and so political and uh you know a lot of stuff she talks about i don't necessarily agree with but then a lot of stuff she talks about i do but i i just thought well now this ought to be real interesting because i'm also very opinionated in what i believe in although i respect anybody's beliefs and the fact that they're willing to stand up for whatever it is but i'm also the kind of person that if i don't like where you got it i can tell you where to put it but but then she says the real reason that she agreed to do the movie to take that political risk was for the chance to write the music for the film because the music is most important to me and i wouldn't have agreed to do nine to five if i hadn't seen it as an outlet for my music which you know that part of my idea was to do the theme song one day dolly arrived on the set and she said hey y'all come over here i think i got a song for us on the set when we did that with jane and lily i wear these acrylic nails and she used her fingernails like a washboard kind of you know keeping time rubbing her fingernails together clickety clickety click so i thought it sounded like a typewriter too so i'd do a tumble out of bed and stumble to the kitchen cup of ambition i love that line and i remember when i was writing that pour myself and i was going to say coffee and i said a cup of ambition yeah and i said high five and she sang the working nine to five and i mean both lily and i looked at each other and we had goosebumps hmm because we knew this was it and that it was going to be a great movie and i was like oh my god it's going to be a huge hit and it would become a movement anthem oh did you know that immediately yeah jane says from the moment she heard the song she just knew that she was going to be a huge hit and it would become a movement anthem oh did you know that immediately yeah i swear sometimes that man is out to get me jane says from the moment she heard the song she just knew that she was going to be a huge hit and it would become a movement anthem oh did you know that immediately yeah i swear sometimes that man is out to get me this was the entire working woman's movement captured that this was going to outlive the movie because it was all there yeah yeah when people thinking about think about working women or working that's that's the go-to song and as for why it works so well nussbaum says it's a perfect anthem here's how karen nussbaum broke it down to lynn neary of npr she says check out the sequence of ideas in the song it starts with pride pour yourself a cup of ambition and then it goes to grievances they always take the credit it then goes to class conflict you're just a step on the boss man's ladder and then it ends with collective power you're in the same boat with a lot of your friends so in the space of this wildly popular song with a great beat if dolly parton just puts it all together all by herself and it's and if you feel like you're you know the the nine to five song is on a continuous loop in your brain it's because you're hearing it all over the place but elizabeth warren please join me in welcoming the next president of the united states of america went to make her announcement that she was going to run for president she was playing nine to five oh i'm a huge dolly parton fan i mean what's not to love right for her the next president of the united states hillary clinton she was playing nine to five but here's where you get to the dollatics of it all you've got one of the great political protest songs of the last i don't know 50 years you can debate me on that i'll stand by it it's a song that was born from a movie literally made to promote a union and yet when elizabeth warren tried to use the song elizabeth warren who is a huge supporter of unions dolly's manager danny nizel issued a statement saying we did not approve this request and we do not approve requests like this of a political nature coming up we asked dolly what's really behind that that refusal and her answer i gotta say it is stuck so deep in my head that literally i've been thinking about it every day for the last 18 months i'm jad abumrad dolly parton's america will continue in a moment i'm jad abumrad this is dolly parton's america i'll admit that when i learned about nine to five the labor movement and how it inspired nine to five the movie and how that gave birth to nine to five the song which probably right now is being sung at 95 different protests i'll admit i was a little puzzled by the thing you hear often from dolly and her team which is that we don't do politics we do not approve requests of a political nature well isn't the song a political song i mean that that's where i was at wasn't sure what to make of this thing would seem like a contradiction to me but then we got to talking about this one moment came up the first time in the lobby of the savoy hotel in the uk talking to this guy i'm sam haskell he's one of dolly's production partners we produce movies together we've done things for nbc lifetime we were sitting in the lobby and we started to talk about dollytics how anytime a political subject comes up she'll deflect and i'll give you a perfect example we found ourselves nominated for best movie of the year at the emmys tv is the vast wonderland in 2017 the nominees for lead actress in a comedy series well just so happen that jane fonda lily tomlin lily tomlin and jane fonda were also nominated for grace and frankie so i had this idea that i let become everybody else's idea but i had this idea that we should have the three of them reunite for the first time since nine to five because they're all three emmy nominees at the same award show that was your idea that was my idea okay ladies and gentlemen here they are again and still working at nine to five here are the tonight's nominees lily tomlin dolly parton and jane fonda well if you'll remember they came out with dolly in the middle thank you was that nice well we appreciate that and personally i have been waiting for a nine to five reunion ever since we did the first one well can you walk me through that moment from your perspective yeah so it's trump's been in office for about 10 months nine months at this point the three of you walk out you're going to present an award for best supporting actor uh first thing that happens is jane fonda says i forget what it was well it was a line actually from the movie lined uh hypocritical for a sexist egotistical lying hypocritical bigot now back in 1980 in that movie we refused to be controlled by a sexist egotistical lying hypocritical bigot really and in and in 2017 we still refused to be controlled by a sexist egotistical lying hypocritical bigot and in 2017 we still refused to be controlled by a sexist egotistical lying hypocritical bigot it was really the famous line from the show nine to five and a lot of people didn't know that but they were using it in a roundabout way to uh apply to to donald trump your eyes got really wide when they said it well i didn't like it and i had already told jane lily i said now look i'm not going to get into the politics of anything so they wanted they had the writers had written up this whole stuff for us to say i said i'm not saying it i don't do politics i have too many fans on both sides of the fence of course i have my opinion about everything but i learned years ago to keep your mouth shut about things i saw what happened to the dixie chicks and uh let me just stop the tape for a second when dolly talks about what happened to the dixie chicks what she's referring to is something that happened in march of 2003 the dixie chicks were the highest selling female band of all time they had a number one song they were touring europe but then in london natalie maynes the lead singer is talking to the london crowd and she says kind of hard to hear but she says we're ashamed that the president of the united states is from texas she's referring to george w bush who is from texas so were the dixie chicks london crowd loves it but the london story was picked up by the associated press and printed in newspapers all over the united states this was 18 months after 9-11 and just 10 days before the u.s would invade iraq and how they could say i'm ashamed that the president's from texas come on man traitors dixie sluts anti-america i think they could send natalie over to iraq strap her to a bomb and just drop her over baghdad i never want to hear another dixie chick song again we're gonna boycott them for their country radio overnight turns its back on the dixie chicks as a result of statements made by members of the dixie chicks at a concert to radio networks and the dixie chicks from their playlists the chicks number one hit traveling soldier quickly fell from the top of the charts their record sales crashed in their career kind of crashed too all because of one split second comment aimed at president bush right before the war with iraq i have as many fans that are democrats as i do republicans and you don't want to hurt anybody and it's not my place to be doing that anyway i'm an entertainer that's what i said to them i'm an entertainer i am not up here to bash somebody else really and so do y'all just do what you do i'm not playing that game line hypocritical business uh-oh you so here's what happens that being said tonight we're here to recognize some men who conduct themselves with the utmost integrity they're nominated for their extraordinary work in supporting roles right at this moment dolly steps in well i know about support hadn't been for good support well yeah shocking off here would be more like flopsy and droopy but and i i think try to turn it around and make it kind of funny and i instead of doing that i'd like i say i can always depend on a boob joke you know if i have to that's why i gotta lean back on them like i said i don't know if i'm supporting them or they're supporting me how about a shout out for dabney coleman out there actually i just i'm here to have a good time tonight and i'm just hoping but congratulations on your nomination for your show i'm just hoping by the way yeah thank you i'm just hoping that i'm going to get one of those uh grace and frankie vibrators in my swag bag tonight within just a few seconds dolly had disarmed the whole room anyway here are the nominees for outstanding supporting actor in a limited series or movie that whole night they had just everything was just bashing you know donald trump it wouldn't make any difference how i feel about him i just thought my god you know it's like and somebody you know just why does it all have to be about politics in the days after the emmys some people praised dolly and how she sort of navigated the situation she's done a very good job of keeping herself from the clean and the narrow but she also came in for a fair amount of criticism from all angles i want to talk briefly about the statements made by hanoi jane fonda and lily libtard at tomlin at last night's emmy award ceremony she knew what was going down she knew that she was going to win the emmy award ceremony we're going to do parton stayed silent does dolly parton support those statements made because i am a lifelong fan of country music and i think that country music fans should be outraged some people on the left attacked her for not speaking out against president trump others on the right attacked her for not speaking out for president trump well you could have upheld him you should have said something i thought no i shouldn't have said nothing because if i'd have said anything about trump anything good or bad said anything just saying well you know this or that i'd have got booed out of that house i'd have been probably up there on my own but i didn't i wasn't interested in that i wasn't going to say anything good or bad no matter what i thought or felt i just knew that i wasn't playing that game it's just but i want to be careful about that because people you know it's like uh anyway it's it's just scary yeah no matter what you say is wrong at this point uh shima jumped in with a question when when you saw when when you're in a room and everyone's attacking this man like trump because of your story of forgiveness does it almost make you feel like you want to protect him yes what was your feeling to say let's pray for the president why don't we pray for the president if we're having all these problems let's just you know why don't we just pray for mr president you know it's like i wanted to say that but i thought no keep your damn mouth shut that won't work either they don't you know so tit joke when all else fails be funny or try to be funny wow that's really interesting i have to be honest that moment messed me up i kept thinking about it you know i mean i came in thinking that her refusal to talk about trump was probably mostly a business calculation and she has a lot that she needs to protect including a massive charitable foundation so i think we can all get that but it's also easy to see that silence cynically like a refusal to speak truth just because it might hurt the bottom line but when she said let's pray for the president it just hit me like a ton of bricks i thought oh no no no there's that's not all that's happening here i mean this is not somebody who is denying the reality of america if you just look at the nine to five album itself in addition to the song nine to five you've got a song about the racist treatment of deportees i'm just becoming man there's another labor rights song on there there's a song about the plight of mine workers dying in mines like she's been singing about political social issues since the 60s we talked about this in episode one so this is not someone who's in denial but the trump comment it made me realize oh i get it she's saying her stake in the sand is that she will not cast anybody out i'd like to say a little bit something about that i love i thought back to those press comments and i was like oh my god i'm not gonna do that i'm not gonna do that i thought back to those press comments and i was like oh my god i'm not gonna do that When Dolly started working with Jane Fonda, her country music fans would boo when Jane's name came up. But in every press conference and interview, she would insist. But there is this sweet, gentle side in Jane that I think is so sweet and lovable. It's a side that the public never sees, and I know that it's hard to believe, but she's a very caring person. I thought back to all our conversations about Porter Wagner. I just finally just thought, I'm going to break myself if I don't go. This is a guy that would be really easy to turn into a cardboard cutout of a misogynistic ass who held her back. And frankly, I was going that direction in my questioning. There's a power thing happening, for sure. Well, it's more complicated than that. Just think about it. He had had this show for years. He didn't need me. She just refused to flatten the guy. He wasn't expecting me to be all that. And it seems suddenly clear to me that yes, while there is a business logic here, this is also a spiritual stance. This is an ethos. That she has chosen. And it is undeniably one of the reasons that she can have the fan base that she has. Because everybody feels safe at a Dolly Parton concert. Afterwards, you know, I realized that it had put Dolly perhaps in a difficult situation because Dolly is not a political activist. And, you know, many of her. Many of her fans are Trump supporters. So I think it was awkward for her, and I felt bad about that. Did you talk about that with her afterwards? I don't remember. I don't remember. But, you know, I heard that there, you know, there were, that there was some, you know, some of the fans objected to it. Yeah. And, you know, I very much respect Dolly's, um, she, she does have a very diverse fan base. She loves her fans, and the, and her fans love her. I mean, I've been to her concerts where her fans are, you know, tears rolling down their face. I mean, there's a connection between Dolly and her fans unlike any that I, I have ever seen in my life. Wow. And she has to protect that. I'm in a very, very different place. Some people, there's almost a symbiotic relationship. With fans. I, I'm not in that situation. It's very different for me. I tried to tuck my waist in, but I don't think I'm ever going to do it like you. Well, you did. We're good. We're just messing around. Gorgeous lighting. Whoever did it, thank you. I'm touched. Hi. Telephone's off if you're near to the party. Thank you. Back in London, a couple hours before the, uh, physical knife situation on the red carpet, we got to watch Dolly continually fend off other, more veiled attempts to pin her down on politics. What do you think, you know, without naming names, there are people in politics who might talk about women in less favorable terms than others, grabbing them by certain parts of their anatomy. I mean, do you think that kind of language is useful or helpful in American politics these days? Any time the president came up, which was often. Uh, what, what, what people do to each other? I'm sorry, I didn't get the first part of it. Um, well, I'm talking about President Trump, trying to allude into him in the language he talks about grabbing women by certain parts of their anatomy. Oh, I'm not even going to talk about it. I don't want to talk about any of that stuff, because I refuse to though, I just think people should treat everybody with respect. Every time Trump came up, Dolly shut it down. And it did make me think at this moment, when like even having serials somehow becomes about President Trump. Is it even possible to do what she's trying to do? Is it even okay? I think this code of silence is what's keeping women down. Just days after we returned from that UK trip, Stella Parton, Dolly's sister, who's also a recording artist, appeared on a podcast called Our Stories and spoke with a woman named Adrena Austin. I find that it's very disheartening to me. Basically pointed a finger at her sister. My sister should speak out more. I honestly call her out. She should speak out more. And I'm ashamed of my sister for keeping her mouth shut. She can run it all day long when it's about something else. Well, speak up against injustice. Now, who is your sister, just for people who may not know? Dolly Parton. Speak up. You know, it's like we've just divided. It's just toward my own family. The part, this political stuff. We can't even have a nice dinner like we used to have. We'd laugh about things was going on, something going on in the family or some jokes or whatever. Now, everybody's arguing about politics. And I said, can we just stop and eat? Let's stop. Don't do that. We don't need to talk about that now. Shima jumped in with one more question. Sometimes when I don't speak up, people get hurt because I don't say what needed to be said. Do you ever? Do you ever feel like by not opposing, like maybe it is hurting others or you could be taking other people's pain away? Do you ever worry about that or think about that? No, because I know that when the time comes, I will speak out. I have a great sense of timing. And that's always worked in my favor. That's why I say I don't just join the marches. I don't just join the group. I know that my time will come. And hopefully when it does, I will say my piece. When she said that, I thought, when would be a good time to speak? What would need to change? What would she say? How would we hear it? Would we hear it? I thought about a Quaker meeting I'd gone to once with a friend where they tell you to wait in silence until the inspiration compels you to speak. And so you wait for something to happen. Then I thought about her music, which never seems to wait. It just comes in this unending stream and she channels that stuff. So in lieu of her saying her piece, I thought about a Quaker meeting I'd gone to once with a friend where they tell you to wait in silence until the inspiration compels you to speak. We certainly have her singing it. I thought about a Quaker meeting I'd gone to once with a friend where they tell you to wait in silence until the inspiration compels you to speak.