Hollywood's Abandonment of the Star-Making System and Ideological Shift Explains the Lack of Successors to Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, and Peter Cullen
Source: Nathan Stone. "Why Hollywood Has No Successors For Dolly, Curry, Or Cullen." September 4, 2026. thefederalist.com
The Gist
The author argues that Hollywood used to have a deliberate system for grooming new stars to replace aging ones, which is why we don't have anyone like Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, or Peter Cullen today. He blames this on Hollywood abandoning popular movie genres due to ideological concerns about gender equality and representation, plus social media exposing celebrities' controversial political opinions, which together destroyed the star-making pipeline.
Conclusion
Hollywood no longer has a system capable of producing successors to beloved stars like Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, and Peter Cullen, because it has dismantled the traditional star-making apprenticeship process and replaced popular, broadly appealing genres with ideologically driven content.
Premises
- For most of Hollywood's history, studios deliberately groomed successors for their stars, treating this as an 'iron law' of the business (e.g., Karloff succeeding Chaney, Lancaster succeeding Flynn, Turner replacing Harlow).
- This apprenticeship model, similar to guild and Renaissance artist training systems, reliably produced new stars and quality films across genres and decades.
- Hollywood has largely abandoned profitable, broadly appealing 'programmer' genres (action films, romantic comedies) that historically served as entry points for creating new stars.
- This abandonment was driven not by lack of profitability but by ideological shifts, including hostility toward masculinity and adherence to standards like the Bechdel Test.
- Without these programmer films, there is no longer a structural pipeline or 'space' to discover and cultivate new stars.
- Current major films (e.g., One Battle After Another, The End of Oak Street, recent Star Wars and Indiana Jones films) reflect ideological messaging rather than the kind of universally appealing entertainment that created past icons.
- Social media has additionally damaged stars' public images by exposing their private political views, further undermining the mystique necessary for stardom.
Assumptions
- The classic Hollywood studio system's approach to star-making was fundamentally sound and desirable, and its loss is a net negative for culture.
- Modern films with progressive themes or diverse casting are inherently less appealing to general audiences than older genre films.
- The Bechdel Test and #MeToo-related industry changes are primarily responsible for creative and commercial decline, rather than other market or technological factors.
- Audience preferences have not evolved, and older genre formulas (action films, traditional romcoms) would still succeed commercially today if made.
- A star's public political statements (via social media) meaningfully diminish their potential to achieve the same kind of iconic status as prior generations of stars.
- The examples chosen (Dolly Parton, Tim Curry, Peter Cullen) are representative of a broader pattern rather than being idiosyncratic or exceptional talents unlikely to be replicated by any system.