Pam and Tommy: How True Is the Wild Story?

Posted on March 4, 2022 by resourcefulman

This week we welcome to our screens another installment of one of the hottest new TV shows ever. Pam and Tommy bring us the real story of actress Pamela Anderson and drummer Tommy Lee’s famous sex scandal .

Some events in the series are sure to surprise you and make you reach for your phone to find out: “Did this really happen?”.

Like all adaptations of true stories, Pam & Tommy takes some liberties for the sake of drama. And since neither Tommy Lee nor Pamela Anderson were directly involved in the series, we may never know exactly how true this is.

But as it turns out, there is some truth to many of the wild events in this series.

This article contains spoilers for Pam and Tommy.

Pam and Tommy episode recap: how true is this story?

Table of contents

Has the sex tape been stolen?

Much of the information that shapes Pam and Tommy comes from the 2014 Rolling Stone article Pam and Tommy: The Untold Story of the World’s Most Notorious Sex Tape.

Pam & Tommy showrunner Rob Siegel told EW in an interview that “We didn’t come up with much. Most of what you see in these eight episodes is contained in this article. All the main plot moves straight from the article.”

The main source in the article is Rand Gauthier, who is indeed a real person. Gaultier is played by Seth Rogen on the show and gets a lot of screen time as the man who stole the sex tape from Lee’s locked safe.

For years, many did not realize that the truth behind the sex tape scandal was that it had, in fact, been stolen. Given the huge success of the tape, many assumed that Lee and Anderson were involved in the release of the tape for publicity or compensation, when in fact this is not the case.

In a Rolling Stone story, Gauthier issued a statement to explain exactly how he was responsible for the theft of the tape.

Gaultier explained that he worked as a contractor at Lee and Anderson’s mansion in Los Angeles. He claimed that after a difficult relationship with the couple involving last-minute renovation changes, Gaultier was fired without pay and Lee even poked him in the face with a gun.

After that, Gauthier declared that he wanted revenge on the rock star, so he planned to steal his safe.

Gauthier spent several months surveying the house. The details of the exact theft are convoluted, but Gauthier allegedly disabled the security cameras, moved all of the equipment in the studio to get to the safe, and then wheeled it out on a cart.

A few months later, the couple filed a police report about the stolen safe and confirmed on the list of missing items that they did not really know that the videotape had been confiscated from them.

Did Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee really get married four days later?

One thing that viewers might be surprised to see in ” Pam & Tommy ” is the speed at which the couple’s relationship has taken off.

Their relationship is the definition of a whirlwind romance. Apparently, they first met at a New Year’s Eve party in 1994 at a Los Angeles nightclub. Lee recently divorced his second marriage to actress Heather Locklear and Anderson was on the wave of her Baywatch stardom.

It was reported that after only 96 hours of dating Anderson, Lee flew to Cancun and proposed to her. The couple married on the beach in bikinis and swimming trunks in 1995.

Has the porn business rejected the tape?

Gauthier is believed to have taken the tape to Milton Ingley, the manager of the porn business where he worked. Together they discovered what was on the stolen tape and set out to find it for distribution.

According to Rolling Stone, their first step was to make copies of the tape and then destroy the original Hi8 tape, leaving the remnants outside of Six Flags Magic Mountain in California.

Ingli gave the tape to several companies with which he had connections, but they all refused to take it. At the time, the porn business was notorious for its strictness, and it quickly became clear that the tape had been stolen because neither Lee nor Anderson had signed the release forms.

Thus, the duo turned to the Internet, which in the 90s was still a very modest market.

What is the talking penis in Pam and Tommy?

Pam and Tommy is without a doubt a wild R-rated show, and that’s immediately apparent when Tommy Lee’s very big premise comes along. It also happens that you talk .

The whole idea is strange, but it came from Lee himself. Lee’s memoir ” Tommyland ” has an entire section in which Lee and his penis talk.

Producers Pam and Tommy thought it would be a good way to explore Lee’s character further, so they decided to include all of Lee in the show, including his talking penis. Apparently, they received some “soft rebuff” to this idea, but it was included in the final version.

The result was an animatronic prosthesis, which was completed by four puppeteers. He is voiced by Jason Mantzoukas.

This is definitely one of the weirdest episodes in Pam & Tommy , but it’s definitely not the last wild thing you’ll see on this show.

Pam and Tommy hired a private detective?

According to a Rolling Stone article, Anderson and Lee actually hired a private detective named Anthony Pellicano to find out what happened to their safe.

Don Harvey plays Pellicano, a well-known Hollywood “fixer” in the series.

For years, he helped fulfill the duties of the Hollywood elite, but his tactics eventually caught up with him. In 2008, Pellicano was found guilty of 78 counts of wiretapping and racketeering, as well as other services such as intimidation and identity theft, and was sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Based on that, his tough portrayal in Pam & Tommy seems pretty accurate.

Pamela Anderson crashed paparazzi’s car?

In the fourth series, ” Pam & Tommy “, it is revealed that Lee and Anderson have tragically miscarried. After that, the show has the paparazzi so rampant that Lee stops outside to confront one of their unwanted stalkers, and Anderson goes so far as to smash the man’s windshield.

Did it really happen?

It is difficult to find any evidence for this particular event, however, Lee wrote in Mötley Crüe’s The Dirt that “the paparazzi were so taken with photography that they constantly cut off the ambulance on their way to the hospital.” He said it’s one thing to have everyday paparazzi crowding around an ambulance, “that’s another thing entirely.”

Tommy Lee kicked out of the Snake Room?

Episode 5 of the ” Pam & Tommy ” news reports shows Tommy Lee being thrown out of the famous “Hollywood Snake” room after an argument.

It’s doubtful that this scenario played out exactly as it did on the TV show, but in 1996, Lee was charged with a battery for allegedly throwing a cameraman to the ground outside the Viper Room. According to a Chicago Tribune report, Lee and Anderson were apparently harassed and even pepper sprayed while leaving the club. Lee did not dispute the allegations.

Did Pam and Tommy really sue Penthouse?

Another major event depicted in the Disney+ series is Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee’s attempt to sue Penthouse magazine.

This did indeed happen with an article in The Rolling Stone that reported that Penthouse purchased a copy of the sex tape, but the publication’s lawyer allegedly promised that no images would be released. In 1996, Lee and Anderson filed a $10 million civil lawsuit against Penthouse, as well as anyone they believed owned the tape, including Rand Gauthier.

As soon as the press picked up on the lawsuit, the news that the sex tape existed really exploded.

Pamela Anderson spotted at a football game?

How exactly did Pamela Anderson become a household name? Although many know her from her role in Baywatch , Anderson’s initial revelation came at a football game by surprise.

As shown on the show, when she was 22, Anderson attended a 1989 BC Lions game in Vancouver. While there, she was featured on Jumbotron wearing a Labatt’s Beer T-shirt.

According to ABC News , the look got her so much attention that Labatt’s Beer ended up hiring her as a spokesperson, leading to her poster as Blue Zone Girl.

When did Pamela Anderson’s Playboy career start?

Pamela Anderson has certainly made a name for herself over the years as one of the top Playboy cover models of all time.

Her first adult magazine cover appearance was in the October 1989 issue. In February 1990, she was chosen as Playmate of the Month. Anderson’s partnership with Playboy has been going on for more than 22 years, and she has appeared on the cover of the publication more than any other model.

Did this Jay Leno interview really happen?

In Pam & Tommy episode 7, Pamela Anderson appears on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (with Leno played by Adam Ray) to promote her new movie Barbed Wire. During the interview, Leno jokes about the couple’s sex tape, which makes the relationship between him and Anderson quite tense.

In fact, Anderson did appear on The Leno Show quite a few times. It’s hard to say how credible the interview presented on the show was since only excerpts are available on YouTube .

Rand became a debt collector?

According to Gautier’s recollection in a Rolling Stone article, he did become a debt collector for the mob after Louis “Butchie” Peraino demanded his money back and forced Gautier to work off his own debt.

Gaultier said he allegedly approached victims with a coffee cup full of ammonia, threw it in their faces, broke the man’s collarbone, and then disappeared.

Did Rand really demand money from Tommy Lee?

One of the strange events of episode 7 of ” Pam & Tommy ” was Random’s blackmailing of Tommy Lee.

In the series, Rand confronts Tommy and demands that he pay him what he was owed for renovating his house. Instead of paying him a ransom, Tommy burns the money in front of Rand.

It is difficult to find evidence that this actually happened. Neither Lee nor Gauthier ever mentioned it publicly, so it’s more likely that the writers are using creative license for dramatic effect.

Did Penthouse really win the lawsuit?

Despite their best efforts, the judge dismissed Anderson and Lee’s lawsuit against Penthouse, allowing the magazine to publish written descriptions of the tape and illustrate what was going on.

Because Anderson had previously posed nude publicly and the couple had been open about their sex lives, Penthouse’s attorney argued that the couple had forfeited their right to privacy and that the footage was newsworthy enough to be written about.

Pam and Tommy are now streaming on Hulu , with new episodes coming out weekly.

This article is updated weekly with new episodes of Pam and Tommy.

This article is republished from the Lifehacker Australia website . Read the original article .

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