Miley Cyrus has shared details of her final conversation with her late godmother, Dolly Parton.
The Flowers singer revealed how her late godmother influenced her life as a performer, and credited Dolly as a role model for keeping one’s on- and off-stage identities separate.
“There was a time in my life (where) so much of my life was about persona,” Miley, 33, told Apple Music in an interview published on 17 September.
“And I think a way that I could look at that as you can have a persona and still be who you are is because I had Dolly.”
She added the split between her two selves sometimes felt so wide, she considered her performance identity a kind of “drag”.
“Sometimes I call what I do drag because the way that I present myself is just someone that is so different from the person that feeds the (pet) tortoise every morning,” Miley joked. “But again, that person’s inside of me. I just kind of have her off.”
The singer explained she had always sent Dolly, who died on 25 August at the age of 80, an early vinyl copy of all her new albums.
“Dolly has been the first person that when I get a vinyl printed, that’s the first person I send it to since I’ve been making vinyls, and this time around I’m going to send her a vinyl because I always do,” she said.
Miley also revealed the last time she and Dolly spoke was to discuss her upcoming album, Bass Persuades.
“But the time that we talked, which was the last time we would talk, it was actually me telling her about this record because even though we are so different – that’s what made us so perfect for each other is that, and she knew this and I know this; she’s like, known for the fake, the hair, the makeup and the show of it. But there’s a part of her that is what everyone gravitates towards… is how real she is and how authentic she is.
