Dolly Parton Recalls Johnny Cash’s Hilarious Quip When Asked About Wife June’s Chatty Reputation

Parton opened up about having “the biggest crush” on Cash in an interview on Bunnie Xo’s podcast ‘Dumb Blonde’

Dolly Parton, Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash in 1985. Photo: Jason Kempin/Getty; CBS via Getty

June Carter Cash may have been something of a chatterbox, but Johnny Cash certainly didn’t mind — at least, according to Dolly Parton.

The country queen shared a sweet story about Johnny and June in a new interview on Bunnie Xo’s Dumb Blonde podcast, saying that over the years she became “best friends” with the legendary couple.

“He was a real nice guy and very quiet… She was a loudmouth like me, so we got along just fine,” Parton said. “And I remember when somebody said something about, ‘Johnny, don’t you get tired of hearing June talk all the time?’ And he said, ‘No. I do some of my best thinking when June’s talking.’”

Parton, 78, joked that the response was similar to one that Carl Dean, her husband of nearly 60 years, might give.

“That’s kind of like my husband!” she said. “I think he does some of his best thinking when I’m talking.”

Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash pose for a portrait at an event in September 1969.Michael Ochs Archives/Getty

Johnny and June were married in 1968, and remained together until her death at age 73 in 2003. Johnny died just four months later, at age 71.

“There’s unconditional love there,” Johnny told Rolling Stone in 2000. “You hear that phrase a lot, but it’s real with me and her. She loves me in spite of everything, in spite of myself. She has saved my life more than once.”

Parton, meanwhile, has said that the “Ring of Fire” was her first major crush. The two first met in 1959, when Johnny introduced a 13-year-old Parton at her very first Grand Ole Opry performance. She sang George Jones’ “You Gotta Be My Baby” alongside her uncle, Bill Owens, and received three encores.

“It was scary. I remember my heart was beating like a drum, but I always said my desire to do a thing has always been greater than my fear of it,” she told Bunnie.

Dolly Parton in Nashville in June 2024.Terry Wyatt/WireImage

The podcast host, who is married to country star Jelly Roll, then asked Parton if there was anything about her interaction with Johnny that night that stuck with her throughout her career.

“He said hello. That stuck with me because at the time… See, I had seen Johnny Cash at another time when we were sitting in the audience, and I had the biggest crush on him,” she recalled. “‘Cause he had so much magnetism, and I was young. I was just beginning to feel those hormones.”

Parton went on to admit that at the time, the then-27-year-old Johnny was in the throes of an addiction to amphetamines and barbiturates, which explained his unusual “movement.”

“I found out later it’s because he was coming off drugs. He just had twitches, what I thought was magnetism,” she explained. “For years and years, I told him he was my first crush, and he was.”