Dolly Parton, who died Tuesday at 80 after a brief battle with cancer, kept working right up until her final days, according to her longtime manager Dany Nozell. In a statement released Wednesday, Nozell said Parton loved watching her dreams take shape and knowing her work brought people happiness.
Parton had assembled a handpicked team to map out projects meant to be released after she was gone. Nozell said the team overseeing her legacy would carry those unfinished dreams forward, noting that many projects were at different stages of development and that fans should know that going in. He added that anything released through official Dolly Parton channels going forward, whether music, books, products, or experiences, carries her personal stamp of approval.
Among the confirmed projects is “Dolly: A True Original Musical,” a Broadway show based on her life, which will move ahead on its original schedule. Previews begin December 7 at New York’s St. James Theatre, with an official opening set for January 19, 2027, the date that would have been her 81st birthday.
A Song Sealed for Decades
Parton also left behind unfinished business of a different kind: an unreleased track called “My Place in History,” locked away in a chestnut box at Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. The park confirmed the arrangement to ABC News.
She wrote and recorded the song back in 2015, the year the resort opened, with strict instructions that the box stay sealed until January 19, 2046, the date of what would have been her 100th birthday. The recording sits on a CD, and Parton even packed a CD player into the box itself so future listeners wouldn’t be stuck without a way to play it.
In her 2020 book “Dolly Parton, Songteller: My Life in Lyrics,” she poked fun at her own plan, joking that there was no telling what music technology would even look like by 2046 and hoping the whole setup wouldn’t have rotted away by then. She was 69 when she recorded the song and hadn’t ruled out being alive to see the box opened herself, writing that if she was still around, she’d be there for the unveiling.
Funeral Plans Made in Advance
Parton had also arranged her funeral long before her death, requesting a small, private service for immediate family, according to her representatives. In a 2014 Entertainment Weekly interview, she said she wanted the country-gospel hymn “If We Never Meet Again” performed at her funeral, a song that had also been sung at her father Lee Parton’s funeral in 2000 and was one of his favorites.
Her nephew and head of security, Bryan Seaver, has also said Parton wanted to be buried in what she described as a bed of plush cotton.
