After five years of dating, Reba McEntire and Rex Linn are getting married – and the country singer has her good friend Dolly Parton to thank for the proposal.
The “Jolene” legend, 79, adores their romance and had been telling Rex to stop dragging his feet. Dolly saw Rex “ignoring Reba’s hints about wanting to get engaged, and it infuriated Dolly,” says an insider. “He joked that they’re like a married couple already and don’t need a ring to prove it, but Dolly’s not afraid to tell it like it is, and she thought he should pop the question already. And he did.”
News of their engagement broke after a reporter on the 2025 Emmy Awards red carpet on Sept. 14 referred to them as fiancés.
Reba, 70, and Rex, 68, first met in the 1990s but didn’t begin dating until 2020, when they reconnected after the death of her mother and bonded during quarantine.
“Their love story,” says the insider, “is sweet. They are both very happy.”
