Dolly Parton may have been known to the world as a country music icon, but to Miley Cyrus, she was simply “Dolly.”
The “Jolene” singer shared an unbreakable bond with the former Disney star, as she became her godmother in 1992, when the actress was born. At the time, Miley’s father, fellow country legend Billy Ray Cyrus, asked her to take on the honor.
“I’ve known her since she was a baby,” Parton — who died Tuesday at the age of 80 — said of Miley, now 33, during an interview with “Good Morning America” in 2009. “Her father’s a friend of mine. And when she was born, he said, ‘You just have to be her godmother,’ and I said, ‘I accept.’”
Parton added, “We never did do a big ceremony, but I’m so proud of her, love her and she’s just like one of my own.”
The “I Will Always Love You” singer and Billy Ray, now 65, met in 1992 when the latter toured with Parton following the success of his chart-topping hit, “Achy Breaky Heart.”
“We just got to be good friends,” Parton explained on the “Howard Stern Show” in 2024. “He’s a Kentucky boy. I’m from Tennessee.”
Parton further explained that she and Miley — who was born to Billy Ray and ex-wife Tish Cyrus on Nov. 23, 1992 — have “stayed very, very close through the years.”
When asked if her goddaughter came to her for career advice at the time, Parton told host Howard Stern, “Well, she’s asked me a lot of things, and she mostly just runs things by me. And we talk. She’s very successful. Miley is very smart. She’s very intuitive about the business, and I just think Miley is a spectacular human being and an amazing talent.”
During that same interview, Parton also gushed about collaborating with Miley on her 2023 rock album “Rockstar” — and covering the latter’s 2013 track “Wrecking Ball” on the record.
“I just felt honored,” she said. “I love that song, and I love Miley, and when I started to choose all these people for my record, or songs that I wanted to do, I thought, ‘I have to have Miley.’”
The duo also worked together on Miley’s 2017 track “Rainbowland,” which was featured on her “Younger Now” album. Meanwhile, Miley made Parton’s hit “Jolene” her own during a “Backyard Sessions” performance in 2012.
Additionally, Parton and Miley have shared the stage numerous times over the years.
One of their first onstage duets was for the 2010 Hallmark special “Dolly Celebrates 25 Years of Dollywood,” when they performed Parton’s 1973 track “Jolene” together. They also performed the classic song during an appearance on “The Voice” in 2016, and again at the 2019 Grammy Awards.
Miley and Parton later worked on a T-Mobile Super Bowl LVI commercial in 2022. The following year, the duo co-hosted NBC’s 2023 “Miley’s New Year’s Eve Party,” which Parton referred to as the “thrill of [her] life.”
“Even when we were rehearsing, Miley was crying,” the “Steel Magnolias” star shared during a 2023 interview with Business Insider.
“The fact that we were singing so well together stirred up our emotions very much. Then we went into ‘I Will Always Love You,’ and she would just have these tears coming down and it was so emotional.”
In addition to their musical performances, Parton also made several onscreen appearances as “Aunt Dolly” on Miley’s hit Disney show, “Hannah Montana,” which aired from 2006 to 2011.
Parton reflected on her time on the show in an interview with Vanity Fair in 2020.
“We just worked so great together … and thanks to her, I had a whole new following of people that were turned on to me,” she said of Miley. “These young, little kids that were her fans, and kids that were fans of just the whole show, and the other little artists on the show, but here I am, Miley’s fairy godmother.”
Earlier this year, just a few months before Parton’s death, Miley honored her beloved Disney character for the show’s 20th anniversary special. While promoting the special, she revealed how her godmother influenced her to take a leap of faith and create something spectacular for fans.
“One of my favorite pieces of advice [Dolly] ever gave me was, ‘Start promoting something before it’s real, because then as people get excited, it’ll be easier to make it happen,’” the “Flowers” songstress explained during her guest appearance on “Good Morning America” back in March.
“So I just started talking about ‘Hanniversary’ special before one even existed. And then I went to Disney and said, ‘Look how excited everyone is about this, you know, imaginary ‘Hanniversary.’”
In 2022, Miley also gushed over having the “world’s best godmother,” saying how she was “pretty lucky” to have Parton in her life during an appearance on “Late Night with Seth Meyers.”
Recalling her experiences working with Parton, the actress said, “Every time I coordinate and kind of communicate with Dolly, it’s still through fax … She’s rarely on the phone.”
“She does a fax, and then someone scans the fax, and they put it into a text message, and then that gets sent to me,” Miley explained, before jokingly exposing Parton’s other old-fashioned habits.
“She made me a demo one time, where she talks about being super high-tech, but it was all through a cassette, which she voice-memoed onto a flip phone, which someone then put on to an iPhone, which then got sent to me.”
Miley emphasized that while Parton had “a phone,” she simply didn’t “use it.”
Miley also recalled performing a rendition of Parton’s 1997 song “Light of a Clear Blue Morning” while performing as a musical guest on “Saturday Night Live” in 2021.
“I got a fax. And she loved it,” she told Seth Meyers at the time. “She loves when I introduce my fans to music in a way that’s still me. Dolly doesn’t want anyone to copy [and] paste … she wants them to infuse themselves into her music, cause that’s what I think has made Dolly so loved.”
The “Party in the U.S.A.” singer also said at the time that she believed Parton was “the most loved person on the planet,” adding, “She’s left this big mark on the entire world, that all of us are just trying to fill her crystallized shoes, which is never going to happen.”
Parton served as an honorary mother figure to Miley, with the “Malibu” singer telling W Magazine in 2024, “Dolly’s been like a mother to me.”
“Actually, I was just reading this fax that she sent me two Mother’s Days ago,” she continued. “Dolly wrote to me to say: ‘How much do I love you? As much as my heart can hold and as far as my arms can reach.’”
“It gets me choked up,” Miley emotionally shared. “I just love her so much. Last Christmas, she gave me a whole mannequin, done in her proportions and wearing her outfit. It’s so major.”
After Parton announced her ongoing health struggles last September, followed by various canceled appearances, Miley gave an update on her godmother during an interview with “Entertainment Tonight.”
“She’s always gonna keep the show going,” Miley said in December 2025. “The show must go on. She’s just excited to get back to work.”
Parton was still working leading up to her death on Aug. 25. Her last public appearance was back in June for the Dolly’s Tennessean Travel Stop ribbon-cutting ceremony. The singer had also announced in July that she was working on the Broadway production of “Dolly: A True Original Musical.”
As Page Six reported earlier Tuesday, Parton was hospitalized for “kidney and autoimmune issues” at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville just days before her death at the age of 80. Her husband, Carl Dean, died in March 2025.
While Miley has yet to address Parton’s passing, Billy Ray penned a touching tribute via Instagram Tuesday, writing, “I have so many moments and memories with Dolly, it’s hard to know where to start.”
“Like every little boy, I grew up loving Dolly Parton. She was a part of our lives, on our TV’s, right in our living rooms,” he continued.
The “Old Town Road” crooner added, “In 1992, I’ll never forget walking into her dressing room to apologize for all the tabloid stories which claimed I was having an affair with her. In true Dolly fashion, she just looked at me, winked and said, ‘Honey, this trash sells records!’”
Billy Ray also vulnerably shared how he recently received a “beautiful message” from Parton, saying how “she loved [him] with her whole heart.”
“I will always love her in the same way,” he added. “With my whole heart … and I always will.”
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