Ever hear the phrase, “when you ‘assume’ something you make an ‘ass’ out of ‘u’ and ‘me’?” Well, we sure have assumed a lot about Tammy Faye Bakker Messner, whose outlandish appearance—those racoonish eyes and overboard accessories for instance—and place in the scandal spotlight had us believing she’s little more than a prattling lunatic for a decade-plus now. Yet Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato’s deliciously tasty documentary, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, opening this week, vindicates the sweet, compassionate, and surprisingly self-aware lady.
Narrated by RuPaul, presented in chapters introduced by a pair of puppets, Tammy’s bumpy ride is presented just as juicily as the tabloids did her smearing. Subtlety is NOT the order of the day. In a nutshell, Tammy Faye fell for a young evangelist named Jim Bakker, married him, raised a family, and took their cheery, surprisingly open-minded, song-filled ministrations to the tube. Screwed over by Pat Robertson (what else is new?) and other Christian network owners, they started their own, PTL (Praise The Lord), which had the added distinction of being the only such network with a satellite. Unfortunately, Jim went financially overboard building a Christian theme park, and an affair with a slag named Jessica Hahn caught up with him, allowing Jerry Falwell and muckraking journalists to come in and reduce all they’d accomplished to a pile of Enquirer-ready rubble.
Poor Tammy! But rather than pity her, Barbato and Bailey allow Tammy to present her side, confront (or try to) those who were there, and even pitch a show or two to a network executive. Falwell and friends come off as the manipulative, power freaks they are, while appearances by Rev. Mel White, Jim J. Bullock (who co-hosted an ill-fated chat show with Tammy), and the Bakker children add fullness and insight.
Entertaining, queer, and a lesson to “u” and “me.”