Dolly Parton Reveals What She Said to Kenny Rogers After His Botched Facelift
Parton teased Rogers about his plastic surgery years after it happened.
Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers have a friendship that stems back to their 1982 duet "Islands in the Stream." And in the years that followed, they became close enough that they could joke with each other about some pretty sensitive topics. In a new interview with Howard Stern, Parton revealed what she told Rogers about his much talked about facial surgery. She also opened up about her own plastic surgery experience, and explained what she thinks went wrong when it came to Rogers.
RELATED: Former Bond Girl Says She "Ruined Her Face" With Plastic Surgery.
"Any time you go under the knife, you could come out looking not good," Parton said during her Nov. 15 appearance on The Howard Stern Show. She said that it's important to find the "best doctors," but even then, things can go wrong.
"If you're going to get anything about your face—you can cover up stuff is somebody screws up things on your body—but boy, if you live with your face out there you got to be careful," the country icon said.
After bringing up Rogers, she added that she believes it's "harder" for men if surgery goes wrong "because you can't wear the makeup and all the different eyelashes and stuff."
Stern then said that Rogers was a "good-looking man" before his surgery, and Parton agreed: "very." Stern said that Rogers "should have left it alone," and Parton responded, "You know how we all get that sagging, dragging, bagging thing. You know, like if you're under your eyes, you think, well, I got to get these bags out. Somebody convinces you—'I know the best eye doctor'—but you don't know how you're going to heal. And that's what so hard about it. It changes your expressions. Even if the surgery itself is good, it changes your personality—it can."
Parton went on to say that "of course" she talked to Rogers about his surgery, because they were "very close." Rogers died at the age of 81 in 2020.
"In fact, one of the last times we was together—we were like brother and sister, we just said whatever—and I told him, I said, 'Kenny, I'm glad I got to live long enough to see you grow into your facelift," the 77-year-old recalled. "He thought that was the funniest thing. But he did! As he got older, his skin started to loosen and he looked more natural. But it's always a risk and every time I go in for anything, I think, 'Oh lord, please let this all work out fine.'"
Of her own plastic surgery, Parton said that she prefers to "just do little bits at the time." She added that she gets Botox and Juvéderm. "Just the fillers only when I have to do something, and even then I try to be careful," Parton shared.
Rogers spoke out about his plastic surgery when he was alive. Asked why he made the decision during a 2012 interview with CBS This Morning, he said, "I don't know, I had the money to do it and I had the time off."
He continued, "You look at yourself and you go, 'Could I be better if I did this or I did that?' And I did it, and the guy who did it was one of the world's best. But he just had this concept that the edge of your eyes had to be higher than a certain place. And I regret that."
Rogers went on, "But the truth is, I don't know what I would have looked like if I hadn't done it." Pulling his face downward, he said, "I mean, I could be all down here. You do it and you live with it."
He also opened up about his surgery when speaking to Fox News about his memoir, Luck or Something Like It, in another 2012 interview.
"Yeah I regret the results of the eye job but quite honestly I don't know what I'd look like if I hadn't done it and it may have been way worse," the "Gambler" singer said. "I actually had written a whole segment on it but the publishers said, 'Let's not do that, that's all people will talk about,' and this book is about my journey and my musical connections. It was a phase I went through. I improved myself. I didn't like the way he did my eyes but I see all these other guys who have had it done and theirs are worse than mine. I'm not going to complain anymore."
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