{"id":33581,"date":"2020-07-24T08:10:51","date_gmt":"2020-07-24T12:10:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=33581"},"modified":"2020-07-24T08:10:51","modified_gmt":"2020-07-24T12:10:51","slug":"the-bootleg-files-dolly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2020\/07\/24\/the-bootleg-files-dolly\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bootleg Files: Dolly"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 734:<\/strong> \u201cDolly\u201d (1976-77 television variety series starring Dolly Parton).<\/p>\n

LAST SEEN:<\/strong> On YouTube.<\/p>\n

AMERICAN HOME VIDEO:<\/strong> Six of the 26 episodes were released on DVD.<\/p>\n

REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS:<\/strong> Difficulties in clearing music and performance rights, along with the star\u2019s lack of enthusiasm for the endeavor.<\/p>\n

CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE:<\/strong> It seems unlikely that the full series will get a release.<\/p>\n

Most Americans got their first look at Dolly Parton in her appearances on \u201cThe Porter Wagoner Show,\u201d a syndicated TV variety series. Parton joined the program in 1966, two years into its run, and left in 1974 when her star was beginning to rise as she sought to broaden her appeal from a country music fanbase to a wider mainstream audience.
\n<\/p>\n

In 1976, Parton was approached by Bill Graham, president of Show Biz Inc. and the producer of \u201cThe Porter Wagoner Show.\u201d He convinced Parton to host her own syndicated variety series, with the goal of highlighting her versatility as a star performer. Parton accepted the offer, but later came to regret the endeavor and pulled the plug on \u201cDolly\u201d after a single season of 26 half-hour episodes.<\/p>\n

The problem with \u201cDolly\u201d is that it could never quite figure out its personality. Some of the episodes are typical of the breezy-cheesy variety shows of the mid-1970s, with B-listers and flash-in-the-pan talent being given the spotlight. Other episodes plumbed Parton\u2019s country music heritage and offered memorable pairings with Nashville royalty. And still others tried too hard to widen Parton\u2019s appeal by pairing her with R&B guests whose musical styles never quite meshed with hers.<\/p>\n

Also creating a dilemma was the decision to have Parton perform tunes that were not suited for her singing style. Parton\u2019s upbeat personality combined with heavy Nashville-style orchestrations made a mess of her attempts at moody classics like \u201cIn the Ghetto,\u201d \u201cDock of the Bay\u201d and \u201cBad, Bad Leroy Brown.\u201d One bizarre segment had Parton singing \u201cHello, Dolly!\u201d while dressed as a maid at a fancy mansion. More unlikely moments involved Parton being joined in uneasy duets by Anson Williams on \u201cMack the Knife\u201d and later by Karen Black on \u201cMe and Bobby McGee.\u201d And don\u2019t get me started on Parton\u2019s duet with Rod McKuen on \u201cFeelings\u201d \u2013 he may have been a great songwriter, but who told him that he could sing?<\/p>\n

Parton carried on gamely, but she would later admit that she had no say over the show\u2019s contents or guest bookings. \u201cI liked all of the people that were on,\u201d she said, diplomatically. \u201cBut I would have had a totally different lineup of guests myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

But when \u201cDolly\u201d worked, it was a lot of fun. This was especially true when Parton performed her own music. Each show started with a sampling of \u201cLove is Like a Butterfly\u201d and closed with a piece from \u201cI Will Always Love You,\u201d and during the show\u2019s run all of her hits and some of her more intriguing but lesser-known works like \u201cDown from Dover.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parton seemed particularly bubbly when paired with her fellow country performers. \u201cDolly\u201d marked her first appearance with Kenny Rogers \u2013 albeit in a weird version of \u201cKnock Three Times\u201d where Rogers appears out of a sealed shipping crate \u2013 and other shows paired her with Tom T. Hall, Ronnie Milsap and Tennessee Ernie Ford. One show brought two guests, Linda Rondstadt and Emmylou Harris, and the experience must have been very positive as Dolly would reunite with them a decade later on the best-selling \u201cTrio\u201d album. These episodes are rich with peerless performances of great songs, and they represent the best of mid-1970s television programming.<\/p>\n

Parton would later joke that \u201cDolly\u201d was made on a shoestring budget, but actually each episode cost about $85,000 to produce, which was a fairly hefty sum for a mid-1970s syndicated series. In retrospect, it would appear the money was spent on Parton\u2019s costuming and wigs and her song selection \u2013 the show\u2019s sets looked a bit cheap and booking talent along the lines of Captain Kangaroo, Chuck Woolery and Ray Stevens would not break the bank.<\/p>\n

\u201cDolly\u201d debuted on September 11, 1976 on independent television stations around the country. It became a very popular staple of the syndicated programming orbit, but Parton\u2019s dissatisfaction with the production ensured there would not be a second season. The series\u2019 episodes disappeared from sight for many years until 2007 when six of the episodes were collected for a DVD release \u201cDolly Parton & Friends.\u201d This offering included four country-flavored episodes: the Ronstadt and Harris pairing plus episodes featuring Rogers, Milsap and Anne Murray and Parton\u2019s brother Randy. Oddly, two of the wobblier episodes \u2013 the lamentable Rod McKuen appearance and the arrival of Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. \u2013 were also included.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, an ambitious Parton fan managed to secure all 26 episodes via VCR recordings and has them on an unauthorized YouTube playlist. Surprisingly, the quality of these recordings is not as one might imagine, given the primitive nature of home entertainment videotaping in the mid-1970s. And despite its uneven nature, \u201cDolly\u201d offers a good-natured time capsule to yesteryear\u2019s entertainment and a rare glimpse of a beloved star as she was on her road to greater career glory.<\/p>\n

IMPORTANT NOTICE: While this weekly column acknowledges the presence of rare film and television productions through the so-called collector-to-collector market, this should not be seen as encouraging or condoning the unauthorized duplication and distribution of copyright-protected material, either through DVDs or Blu-ray discs or through postings on Internet video sites.<\/em><\/p>\n

Listen to the award-wining podcast \u201cThe Online Movie Show with Phil Hall\u201d<\/a> on SoundCloud. <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BOOTLEG FILES 734: \u201cDolly\u201d (1976-77 television variety series starring Dolly Parton). LAST SEEN: On YouTube. AMERICAN HOME VIDEO: Six of the 26 episodes were released on DVD. REASON FOR BOOTLEG STATUS: Difficulties in clearing music and performance rights, along with the star\u2019s lack of enthusiasm for the endeavor. CHANCES OF SEEING A COMMERCIAL DVD RELEASE: […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":33582,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1513],"tags":[1416,1309,2498,2499],"class_list":["post-33581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bootleg-files","tag-1970s","tag-country-music","tag-dolly-parton","tag-television-variety-show"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33581"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33581\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33583,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33581\/revisions\/33583"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}