Available since March 23 on Disney +, In the eyes of Tammy Faye tells the story of a real American televangelist, who was, with her husband, at the head of an empire in the 80s before scandals marred their picture.
In the eyes of Tammy Faye, which could earn Jessica Chastain her first Oscar, traces the life of Tammy Faye Messner, from her modest youth in the 1950s to her consecration as a televangelist in the 1970s and then the fall of the empire she had created with her husband played on screen by Andrew Garfield.
Daughter of a divorced woman, Tammy Faye grew up in a large blended and very religious family in Minnesota. It was in 1960, in a course on the Bible at university, that she met the man who would change her destiny, Jim Bakker. They marry the following year and, eager to share the word of Christ, begin to preach in an itinerant way.
From 1964, now settled in Virginia, the couple made a name for themselves on television in a very popular puppet-based children’s show on Pastor Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network. Jim and Tammy are also the founding members of The 700 Club, a kind of Christian talk show, which still airs on CBN to this day.
Glory…
Barely 10 years later, the couple with boundless ambitions decided to launch their own religious channel, The PTL Satellite Network (meaning Praise The Lord). Very quickly, the channel’s programs, including the flagship program The PTL Club, were a hit and in the 1970s, they generated 120 million dollars a year.
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Boosted by their success, the two televangelists built a Christian amusement park in 1978, Heritage USA, which became almost as popular as Disneyland! Their network prospered in the 80s, when Tammy Faye did not hesitate to talk about taboo subjects and to invite a gay pastor with AIDS on her show, but trouble began at the end of that decade.
… to disgrace
In 1987, it was thus revealed that Jim Bakker bought the silence of one of the secretaries of his ministry who accused him of rape for nearly 300,000 dollars. The couple is also accused of numerous financial embezzlements, including using church money to support their lavish lifestyle.
Jim was eventually charged, convicted, and imprisoned on multiple counts of fraud and conspiracy in 1989, ending their PTL adventure. Tammy Faye, who supported her husband during all these scandals, ended up filing for divorce in 1992 while he was in prison.
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During her years at the top, the eccentric and glamorous Tammy Faye also recorded several records of Christian songs. She has also written three autobiographies: I Gotta Be Me in 1978, Tammy: Telling it My Way in 1996 and I Will Survive and You Will Too! published in 2003, four years before his death from colon cancer.