Dolly Parton once recalled how she initially clashed with her Steel Magnolias director, Herbert Ross, who was apparently also harsh on a young Julia Roberts. Parton starred in the 1989 film – about a group of women supporting each other through life’s ups and downs – alongside Roberts, Sally Field, Shirley MacLaine, Daryl Hannah and Olympia Dukakis. However, it wasn’t the smoothest of experiences, with the queen of country, who played beauty salon owner Truvy Jones, claiming Ross “didn’t particularly like me” and “resented” having to use Roberts.
It’s your job to make me look like I’m acting.’ By the end of the film, we had all made peace and become friends.” Parton’s memory of the shoot with the late director was echoed by Field, who in a 2024 interview with Vulture confirmed that they had helped Roberts when Ross “picked on” her. While Field said she was given the “freedom to do whatever”, Ross was “very, very, very hard on [Roberts]”, who at the time was in the early stages of her career and filming her fourth credited movie role. And she was wonderful, and [Ross] just picked on her.
It was awful.” Enjoy unlimited access to 100 million ad-free songs and podcasts with Amazon Music Sign up now for a 30-day free trial. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent. Field said that they would all come to Roberts’s aid, and remembered Parton once turning on Ross, “always with humour, but usually the most vulgar humour you ever heard so that it was like, you just literally don’t have a leg to stand on”.
Stories of Parton’s kindness and generosity have been doing the rounds since news broke of the “9-5” star’s death on Tuesday 25 August, aged 80, after a “brief battle” with cancer. Another Steel Magnolias anecdote that has resurfaced comes from an interview with Roberts on The Oprah Winfrey Show while promoting the movie. There, the Pretty Woman star shared the crucial lesson she’d learned from Parton on a particularly sweltering day of shooting in Louisiana.
Come on, it’s hot, sweat a little, you know? Just say ‘I’m hot,’ you know. And she said to me, ‘When I was a little girl, I wanted to be famous and I wanted to be rich, and now I’m both those things.
I’m not going to complain about it.’” Roberts said that she took the advice to never complain very seriously and that she’s “never forgotten it.” Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
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