[ocean waves sloshing, crashing]
[seagulls squawking]
[Pamela] Oh. What have I got in here?
[birds chirping]
[Pamela] God. I'm scared. This is not naked, I hope.
[on TV] Baby, I'm recording you.
I love my Pamela.
[Pamela] Your Palema?
I didn't know I had all these tapes here.
[Pamela] No, you see... [laughing]
[Tommy] The very incredible Pam.
- [Pamela] Baby. - [laughs]
[Tommy] Oh, this is awesome.
Oh my God.
Baby, you're ruining it with a cigarette.
- [Tommy] Yeah. - You've been shunned.
You're ruining it with your breath.
My breath?
[Tommy chuckling]
[Pamela] God, this is crazy to see.
[nostalgic music playing]
[man] What is going on?
I don't know.
[man] Look at this guy.
[Pamela] Oh my God.
[man] Oh wow.
[Pamela] Wow.
Pamela, I have said it before, and I'll say it again.
I have waited my entire life to meet a woman as wonderful as you.
I've only ever wanted to be your knight in shining armor.
So here I am.
Come, my angel, take my hand.
Would you marry me again?
[Pamela] Yes. [giggling]
[crowd cheering]
[crowd] Bye!
[Tommy] Bye, guys.
[indistinct chatter, chuckling]
[Pamela sighing]
Tonight, June 1st...
Hearing the tone of my voice, I was happy.
When I saw those videos, I got so emotional 'cause I thought,
that was it, that was my time to really be in love.
Right now, I feel like it's almost like I'm looking for something.
[Tommy] Whoa, baby. You look so beautiful.
[Pamela] And I really don't know where I'm gonna go next. I feel restless.
I'm looking for a feeling I can't find.
[upbeat music playing]
Please welcome Pamela Anderson!
[audience cheering]
Pamela Anderson is this generation's sultry sex goddess.
[anchor 1] Hollywood and the blonde bombshell.
[Conan] International superstar from her role on Baywatch...
[anchor 2] ...is perhaps the most famous blonde on the planet.
Whether she's racing across the sands of Malibu in her red lifeguard suit,
or posing on the cover of Playboy.
I'm Pamela Anderson, Miss February 1990.
[Jon] You do the Playboy and Baywatch.
The whole exploitation angle, do you worry about that?
- No. - [Jon] Fair enough, let's move on.
[audience laughing]
[paparazzi] Tommy, Pamela, turn around!
[anchor 3] Pamela wed Tommy Lee four days after meeting the Mötley Crüe drummer.
[Larry King] Why do you think printed materials are so obsessed
with your sex or love life?
[Pamela] Maybe the tape had something to do with it.
[anchor 4] That infamous sex tape stolen from their home.
[Letterman] How many times have you been married? You've married four times?
One man can't do it all.
[all laughing]
[Pamela] If they've heard any of the tabloid rumors,
it paints a whole idea of another person and who I am.
So hopefully, I can only surprise people.
- [Larry King] You're not an actress? - [Pamela] No.
- [Larry King] What are you? - [Pamela] I don't know yet.
- What do you wanna be when you grow up? - You tell me. I don't know.
[music continues]
[music fades]
[lawn mower starting]
[Pamela] Hi, Mom.
[gentle music playing]
[Pamela] I'm here.
I'm living in the house that I grew up in,
which is triggering and crazy,
just like marrying a rock star.
It's like coming home to this nutty place where, you know, my childhood happened.
Okay, good girl.
I've always come home when I have some kind of trouble going on,
and I always kinda know what I'm doing when I leave.
It's, like, the truth serum.
You sit in the middle of that field,
you look at the stars,
and everything comes to you.
[seagulls squawking]
[Pamela] Oh my God. [giggling]
This is not an easy beach to film. This is not California.
[Pamela chuckling]
Believe me, I can't run in slow motion on this beach.
April 1st, my dad would pick me out of bed,
put me over his shoulder, and throw me in the water.
Like, happy April Fool's.
That was the first day we were allowed to be in the ocean, swimming.
And we had to swim, April 1st, and it is freezing here.
And see where the brick wall is? That's where my house was.
It was a tiny little shack.
[nostalgic music playing]
[Pamela] My mom was a waitress, and she worked at Smitty's Pancake House.
But my dad was a poker player,
con man, chimney sweep with a top hat and everything.
Everyone has a story about my father, the notorious bad boy of Ladysmith.
My dad liked to race cars.
And my mom has a scar across her whole forehead.
because her head went through the windshield while pregnant with me.
And we like to joke that's probably the reason I'm a little bit crazy.
[Pamela chuckling]
[woman] I love the island.
Living by the water.
People are very friendly.
Ladysmith is a beautiful little town.
And Vancouver Island is the place to be.
[chuckling]
Pamela was born July 1st, '67.
She hit the paper the minute she was born.
Pam was the first centennial baby.
So they issued medals for babies born that day.
[man] Pamela was always at the store.
And I'd go up there and they would say,
"That'll be $50 for Pamela's bill."
And I says, "Bill? What bill?"
She says, "Well, she charges up chocolate bars here
and puts it on the tab." [chuckles]
She was a little rebellious, all right.
[chuckling]
[Pamela] My parents were married
I think when they were, like, 17 and 19, when Mom was pregnant with me.
So they were just still raging.
And my dad drank a lot.
They fought quite a bit.
A lot of name-calling and physical abuse too.
My mom was vacuuming during a hockey game.
So my dad picked up the vacuum cleaner, and threw it over her head,
over the thing, onto the beach.
No vacuuming when there's hockey on.
I just kinda knew when to take my brother out.
We just had to wait for them to stop screaming,
then we'd come in and they'd be, like, up against the wall, or on the table,
just kissing, or throwing themselves in the room, slamming the door,
and we thought, "Okay. Well, that's better."
Felt like the same energy, though. [chuckling]
[inaudible]
[Pamela] We ended up leaving my dad a couple times.
[somber music playing]
We were living in an apartment and we were living on welfare.
Powdered milk, all the... I just... I can taste the powdered milk right now.
I remember when my dad called.
There was mail by the phone.
I gave him the address where we were, and he came and got us
and we moved back to the island.
Then they didn't wanna move back to Ladysmith,
too many bad memories, I guess, for my mom,
so they just moved a couple towns up. [chuckling]
So, there. She put her foot down.
But I realized no one has a perfect childhood.
I had some horrible things happen when I was little.
I had a babysitter.
And my parents thought she was a great babysitter
'cause she brought presents all the time,
but she was molesting me.
It was, like, three or four years of abuse.
She always told me not to tell my parents.
I tried to protect my brother from her.
I tried to kill her.
I tried to stab her in the heart with a candy cane pen.
And then I told her I wanted her to die. She died in a car accident next day.
So, I thought I killed her with my mind and I couldn't tell anybody.
But I was sure that I did it. That I wished her dead and she died.
I lived with that my whole really young life.
When those traumatic moments happen, I would just leave my body
and float away, and I'd make my own little world.
I was digging a hole to China, thinking,
"I hate this, I hate this. I wanna get outta here."
I just thought I had to get off the island.
As I got older, I was, like, a little tomboy.
I was a gymnast and so I was tiny.
I bloomed very late.
Then I got one lump on my chest,
and I was rehearsing for a long time how to tell my mom I was dying of cancer.
'Cause I thought it was cancer, I tried to pound it back into my chest.
And when I finally told her, she laughed and said, "Oh, you're becoming a woman."
Then everything was like, bam, bam, bam, and then crazy from there.
And so it began. [chuckling]
And now here we are.
More than two lumps later. [laughing]
[birds chirping]
[objects clattering]
[Pamela] What's this?
Oh my God.
For some reason, when I was traveling around the world,
everything that was important to me, I sent here.
I figured one day I'd get here.
But I didn't realize it was gonna be so soon
'cause now I'm here surrounded by my stuff.
[paper rustling]
I kept diaries and stuff from my childhood and all the events in my life.
There's just tons of yellow legal pads.
I mean, basically, my life is all yellow legal pads.
I wanted to write things down in case I forgot them.
So I wrote down things thinking,
if something were to ever happen to me, that there'd be evidence.
Sometimes I was writing like that,
and sometimes I was writing out my feelings,
not thinking anyone would ever see it.
[director] Since you've given us your journals,
I was wondering,
are you open to reading them in the film?
Or what are you thinking about that?
I don't know if I want to go there and read them.
I don't even think I'll watch this documentary.
I mean, I just don't... I like to do things just for the experience of doing it.
I wanna move on with the next part of my life.
So, it might give you more access if you have somebody else read them
because I might say, "I don't wanna read this or that."
So, it's just, like, you can... you have my permission.
It's tough to go through it again
'cause you go through it again like you're going through it for the first time.
It's... it's painful.
[somber music playing]
[seagulls squawking]
[Pamela] "I'm glad I got this diary."
"It should really help."
"Maybe I'll write a book one day."
"I love words."
"They send me leaving this ludicrous situation behind."
"Come with me. I'm paving the way."
"The world opens when I write."
"In school, I always wrote stories about parents deserting their children."
"I must have been hurting a lot."
"Life keeps playing tricks on me."
"I try to find ways to be seen amongst the nonsense."
"I know everyone creates their own level of drama in their lives."
"Some more than others."
"I guess you could say I'm very creative or very dramatic."
"Who knows?"
"XO, Pamela."
From the beginning, I've been drawn to different types of bad guys.
One of my first boyfriends,
he had a habit of trying to chase me and run me off the road.
Like, run me over if he saw me.
He kicked me out of a moving car,
and I did a gymnastic dismount into a ditch.
[laughing]
So... things that come in handy.
After I graduated, I wanted to see what was over in Vancouver.
And when you grow up on an island, the mainland is a very scary place.
And my mom would say,
"You can't go to Vancouver 'cause someone got shot in Texas."
I was like, "That's pretty far away from Vancouver."
And she'd go, "It's all attached. Don't go to the mainland!"
I went on the ferry, and I got there, and eventually I met somebody.
I moved in with him,
and he was having an affair with somebody.
When you see your boyfriend washing his penis in the sink,
that's a sign that they're probably having an affair.
And I wrote down, "Washing penis in the sink, suspicious."
[laughing]
Looking back, it's funny. In the moment, you're horrified.
[pensive music playing]
My girlfriend had friends who were Labatt's beer representatives
and they had free tickets to a football game.
BC Lions, Canadian football.
And I didn't even wanna go.
I mean, I wasn't interested in football, but she really wanted to go.
So we went to the stadium,
and we're all wearing the Labatt's beer T-shirts.
The cameraman zoomed in on me, and put me up on the jumbotron.
And I remember seeing it going, "Oh my God, that's me."
I couldn't believe it.
And my friend that was with me worked for Labatt's
and he said, "Stand up and show your T-shirt."
So, I stood up and they had me kind of going back and forth on the jumbotron.
They brought me down to the 50-yard line and they asked me to do a draw.
So I had to pick a number out of a bowl.
And I remember looking up and thinking,
"It looks like a million eraser heads in the stands."
Like, it was just huge and just...
[crowd cheering]
[Pamela] They started calling me the "Blue Zone Girl."
And then Labatt's reached out to me to do a commercial for them.
And a poster.
Then it was on Monday Night Football ads, and then it was all over the place.
[phone ringing]
Not too long after that my phone rang and I picked it up.
This woman says, "It's Marilyn Grabowski from Playboy,
and we want you to be on a... some cover."
And I was like...
"Playboy?"
And she goes, "Yes, we've been looking all over the world
for this October '89 cover and we think it should be you."
I was like, "You think it should be me?"
"So is it for real or is it not?"
She goes, "It's for real, guaranteed."
[upbeat music playing]
[Pamela] And then they were going to get me down to LA,
but I'd never been on a plane before.
And so I had my problems at the airport.
And they said, "What are you doing in LA?" And I said, "I'm posing for Playboy!"
And I remember showing them my letter I got from Hefner, and they were like,
"Oh no, no. You're Canadian, you can't work in America."
And I was like, "What?"
So I went in the bathroom, I changed my clothes, I put a hat on,
and I went to another airline.
I get there, and the same lady was there like this, like, "Nice try."
I was like, "Oh my God."
So the only other way to get through, get on a Greyhound bus.
And sometimes they check you, sometimes they don't across the border.
It really made me nervous.
But they only checked the person in front of me and behind me.
So I got into America, to Seattle.
Then the next morning I got on the plane and they got me down to LA.
"Arriving."
"Off the plane, big city LA."
"I go straight to the guy holding the bunny sign."
"Very low-key."
And I landed on gay Pride day.
So I called my mom and said,
"Gay people exist, they walk around handcuffed together in pink hot shorts."
She goes... [gasps] "You've arrived." [laughing]
"I get out of the limo, out of the front seat of course."
"I thank him way too much for letting me sit up there."
"There was no one to talk to in the back."
The limo pulls up around the fountain and they bring you in.
The Playboy Mansion is like a castle, basically.
"Marilyn rushes out,
looks me up and down."
"I'm sure she's going to say, 'Go home.'"
"I'm a mess."
"But she tells me they're so happy I'm here."
"I'm lost in amazement."
"Fifteen-foot posters of naked women all up and down the halls."
[lively music playing]
[Pamela] The environment was the sex, drugs, rock-and-roll
kind of underground art world.
And... But I thought to myself, I think I knew who this person was.
Is that Tony Curtis? Was that Scott Baio and Sean Penn?
And just beautiful women in long silk gowns,
like Monique St-Pierre with the cropped hair,
kind of like Michelle Pfeiffer.
"A girl goes running by in a bathrobe, giggling."
"Then another one comes out and chases her with a glass of champagne."
"Wow, gorgeous."
"I feel very average at this point."
I was there in my acid-wash jeans, my Nirvana T-shirt,
and I was obsessed with those socks with balls on the back.
"It looks like they're going to have to color my hair."
I got that Sun-In stuff
and I had sprayed my whole head with it as much as possible
'cause I wanted a few highlights,
and my hair basically turned into the color of a manila envelope.
It was not a pretty color.
So when I got to Playboy, that's the first thing they did.
Put my whole hair in tinfoil and everything
just to make it look like a natural kind of color.
"This is definitely as blond as I've ever gone, but I'm thankful."
"I feel blessed and embarrassed at the same time."
"What am I doing here?"
When I was young, I was painfully shy.
I hated my body.
I remember seeing Playboy magazines, my dad had them.
Hidden under his Donald Duck comic books,
but I saw them and I thought, "God, these women are so beautiful."
"Like, why don't I look like that?"
And I always thought girls were beautiful and guys were beautiful in school,
but I never thought I was one of them.
And with the things that I went through as a kid,
I had so much shame about my body,
so much shame about what had happened to me.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] "I was 12, 13-years-old with my friend."
"She had a crush on a guy much older than us."
"We went to a friend's condo."
"She went upstairs with the guy she had a crush on."
"I started to play backgammon with her friend downstairs
while I waited for her."
"We played for a while until he said I looked like I needed a massage."
"He was 25, I was 12."
"He raped me."
"I felt like it was my fault."
"My mom was always crying about my dad."
"I couldn't bear to hurt her more."
"I didn't tell her or anyone."
I tried to forget it.
I tried to forget it, but I felt like it was tattooed on my forehead.
Like, I really had this image of "I had sex" on my forehead
when I didn't want anyone to know that I had it.
Those were kind of my first exposure to sexual experiences too, so
I think a lot of confusion.
What it made me was very, very shy.
It made me super self-conscious.
[indistinct chatter]
[Pamela] When I got to that first Playboy photo shoot,
I just said, "Like, why am I so freaking paralyzed by this shyness?"
"I'm so sick of all this past that's created this insecurity in me."
It's like a prison. I have to break out of it.
From the first snap of the picture, I felt I was throwing myself off a bridge
and falling in the... Just like snap!
That was the first time I felt like I'd broken free of something.
"Photo shoot."
"Shy at first,
by end of the week, you had to stop me from running out the door naked."
[camera shutter clicking]
[Pamela] "To the side. Am I doing this right?"
"I could kind of see myself from the camera's perspective in my head."
"Once I got it, I had a blast."
[screaming playfully]
[Pamela] I just remember at some point
when I was in the fountain splashing around and there's a little bit of nudity.
And I could feel, like, the silk,
I'd pull it across my skin, then I would get goosebumps.
And I was like... Like, that's where a wild woman was born.
And I felt like it was kind of like a gateway to another world.
Now I was gonna take the power of my own sexuality,
and take my power back, and I did it I think in a really big way.
[upbeat music playing]
[Pamela] "I jumped all over the place, rolled around,
put my fingers in my mouth,
and then my hair became my prop."
"After all, eventually that was my only wardrobe."
"And shoes."
"If I kept my shoes on, I didn't feel naked."
And then it clicked to me and I realized, "Oh, this is something I can do."
I felt like this is something that I'm good at.
Not that I'm good at good-looking, but I'm good at it.
This whole Playboy centerfold, gatefold is like playing a character for me.
And I've had a lot of fun doing it.
Playing a character. What would you do if you were a person in that situation?
But you are that person in that situation. [laughing]
I had been in LA for a few weeks.
And I thought, "Okay, I did it. I did Playboy."
"I'm going home."
But the next day Marilyn Grabowski took me for lunch.
She said that Hefner really wanted me to be a playmate.
I was like...
Like, I just couldn't... It was so much to absorb.
And she just said, "I think you should stay in LA."
"I think you have a career here."
Would I consider it?
And I called my mom, she said, "Do it."
I told her to live her life.
[chuckling] Be free.
I didn't do Playboy 'cause no one ever asked me. [laughs]
[music fades]
[Pamela] "Dear diary, I'm way out in the boonies."
"I have to take three connecting freeways to get into Hollywood."
"The price you pay for clean air."
"I like driving here."
"Everybody seems to know where they're going and want to get there fast."
"Even the grannies go 80."
"That's miles per hour."
[nostalgic music playing]
[Pamela] "I got my new dog, Star, today."
"He's going to be so loved."
I moved to a little apartment. I had one plate, one fork, one spoon.
No furniture, nothing.
I just sat there and thought, "Okay, well, this is it."
"There's really no way I should be here."
"Coming from a very isolated small town, an alcoholic father."
"I lived in an imaginary world."
"I certainly don't blame my parents for my upbringing."
"I'm grateful because I gained a lot of good qualities along with the bad."
"I'm a survivor."
"XO, Pamela."
[music fades]
[birds chirping]
Well, it used to be... Don't think we need more.
[Pamela] No, these are nice, actually. These are a nice size.
[sizzling]
These are not vegan, for sure.
[Carol] Where's all your nice-fitting
dresses?
[Pamela] No one needs to see my body anymore.
[Carol] You can see right through that thing, I'll have you know.
Well, a silhouette is much thinner than the real thing. [laughs]
[both laughing]
[Pamela] My mom always talked about beauty, hair, makeup, and all that stuff.
And she taught me how to color my hair from the drugstore.
That's, like, two minutes.
Everything in Ladysmith is two minutes away, with traffic.
Five dollars for a box.
I do it for myself in 20 minutes.
Scandinavian blond, here I come.
Except for the blond hair, the boobs, and plastic shoes,
I am real underneath it all.
I've never sat across from an interview subject before and said,
"May we talk briefly about your breasts?"
[giggling]
What are they? Who are they? Those things I'm just tagging along with?
I always said my boobs had a career and I was just tagging along.
You wanna see them? No, I'm kidding.
[giggling, exclaiming]
No, you don't wanna see them now. They're in rough shape.
Um... [chuckling]
- Where'd I get my boobs done? - [anchor] Yeah.
Jesus, that's a personal question, but I'll let you...
Let's talk about this.
I didn't know to lie or withhold anything in interviews.
So, when people would ask me if I had surgery or anything like that,
then I'd just answer.
And so that just kind of set the ball rolling.
- You were not under-endowed, were you? - [Pamela] No.
I remember being in a gym at Playboy... at the mansion
and looking around at these women going, "God, look at the bodies on these women."
"I mean, this is just incredible."
I remember when I was with Kimberly Hefner,
and she's married to Hefner.
She said, "Well, you know, they all had surgery."
And I was like, "Really? Where do I sign up?"
[chuckling]
[Pamela] So that was it.
Choices in the moment.
You know, not a lot of thinking went into anything.
I don't know why my boobs... people were so interested,
they weren't that newsworthy.
But I was just pretty naive.
And I think at the time, it was pretty nervy to say the truth.
When someone asked me, I said, "Yeah!"
Have you ever had work done?
Why, yes. These are implants, Larry.
- Oh, they are? - [chuckling]
- [Larry] No... Are they or aren't they? - Yes, they are. [laughs]
It was disturbing 'cause it was, like, "Oh my God. Really?"
"Is this what we're talking about again?"
But you roll with it.
Yeah.
[Jay] Those are beautiful, uh, jewelry.
- Thank you. - [audience laughing]
So much has been written...
- She's looking at me... - You got your hands out like this.
- "So much has been written." - [Matt] I didn't mean to do that.
[Jay] Who would you wanna be, and why?
I could be you.
Why would you wanna be me? I'm curious as to why...
So I could torture you. Ask you about your implants.
Yeah, that'd work.
[audience laughing, cheering]
[music fades]
I don't see how it's so interesting.
I think it's kind of inappropriate to ask women those kind of questions.
There has to be some line that people don't cross.
[pensive music playing]
I always hoped something would come along where I would do something
which would be more interesting to people.
You know, than my body.
I moved here when I started working for Playboy, so everybody that I've met
has been because I started working for Playboy.
So who knows? Maybe one day I could be an actress.
"May 21st, 1991."
"I'm making a plan of action for my career now."
"I think I stood back too long."
"This is my time to shine,
not as a sex symbol, but as an actress."
Playboy was kind of like my agent almost at that time.
Like, people were calling Playboy to ask me to do things.
And they called and said,
"Would you come for an audition for Baywatch?"
It was about the California dream.
[upbeat rock music playing]
[David] I've been proud to be the star of a show called Baywatch,
a weekly series about the brave men and women called lifeguards.
[Pamela] They always tried to get me to come and audition in Marina del Rey,
which sounded very exotic and far away. [chuckling]
I was like, "That sounds really far, I can't go." I just ignored it.
Susie and I knew this was the girl. And she canceled on us 11 times, okay?
By the eleventh... And we kept going into these auditions
with these guys saying, "Guys, there's a girl you gotta see."
They said, "Are you Pamela Anderson? Like, one famous never for showing up?"
And I said, "Yes."
And she just had so much energy
and so much, uh, personality.
She was the one.
[rock music playing]
[Pamela] So that's how CJ was born.
[man] And action!
[Pamela] Baywatch was my first, kind of, acting job.
I wouldn't say it was any good. I still didn't know what I was doing.
[both exclaiming]
Oh my God, Mitch, I'm sorry.
I was just so surprised to see you standing there.
Not as surprised as I was.
How are you, CJ?
How's Larry?
Mention that name again, you're going back in the river.
The notes of the director would say was like, "Pretend it's real. Action!"
[Mitch groaning]
Hold on!
Or if something wasn't working, they'd say, "More seagulls!"
The cracker-whacker would get out there and he had crackers in a little sling
and he would be slingshotting, like, crackers in the air.
[man] Scare the birds, please! Scare those birds!
[Pamela] We were having a ball. We couldn't believe we were working.
We were on the beach every day, getting paid for this.
We didn't realize on the show that it was becoming very, very popular.
When it comes to viewers,
there's one show that's in a class all by itself.
It's the most popular television show in the entire world.
[Spanish dub playing]
[Pamela] It was one of the first American shows shown in China.
[Katie] Baywatch is being dubbed in Mandarin,
not that it really needs much translation.
[panting]
[Pamela] You could watch that show with the sound off, actually.
[chuckling] It wasn't really about the storylines.
[anchor] And when it came to eye candy, no one was sweeter than Pamela Anderson.
[man] She turned slow-motion running into an art form.
The slow-motion run is really hard to... learn. [laughs]
[man 2] Her magnetism just radiated.
And we realized we had something in Pamela that was different.
[crowd shouting]
[man] Pamela!
[Pamela] Going to Europe to promote Baywatch was crazy.
People were falling over backwards and falling down escalators.
I remember looking behind us going, "Well, who's here?"
[in French] I saw her! She's more beautiful than on TV!
[Conan] My first guest became an international superstar
from her role on Baywatch.
Please welcome Pamela Anderson.
[audience cheering]
Please welcome Pamela Anderson.
Pamela Anderson.
[anchor] One of the most well-known stars in the world.
[anchor 2] The very lovely Pamela Anderson.
[crowd cheering]
[Pamela] "Hi, Mom. It was nice to finally talk to you this morning."
"I hope this year's a great one for everyone in our family."
"Maybe soon, I can buy you guys a house."
"That is my dream."
"I'm going to work very hard to help that happen."
[gentle music playing]
[boat motor revving]
Whoo!
[giggling]
Faster, baby!
I've always had this property and I abandoned it for, like, 25 years.
So it was really rotten and decayed.
But I knew I'd have to come home when my parents were older
to look after them.
And then COVID hit and I said, "Okay, I'm staying."
And then, of course, I got a little bored and thought, "I need to build this."
So the contractors came and I was like, "Oh, he's cute."
[chuckles]
Darn it.
Then I got married Christmas Eve.
But he's a good Canadian guy. Normal.
I just felt like, maybe I need to try that.
Yeah.
Don't know.
Again, sometimes I don't know if I'm alive or dead.
[Pamela chuckling]
[ducks quacking]
[Pamela] But maybe this is just the time I was supposed to be home, I guess.
I'm like a spawning salmon, just coming home to die.
No, I'm kidding!
[laughing]
[Pamela] Terrible.
[birds chirping]
[Pamela] Nineteen-ninety.
What?
Oh my God, this is fun to read.
I was, like, making a cake for Mario's 33rd birthday.
That's a long time ago.
"January 8th, 1990."
"I miss Mario Van P."
"I just want to be loved by one person,
and I want to spoil that person rotten."
"I think I want that person to be Mario."
"I woke up at Mario's, and went home to change, went to Scott's..."
I'm sorry, that's weird.
[director laughs]
[Pamela laughing]
Why would I even write that down?
'Cause God forbid you do a documentary one day in your life
and find out what kind of a whore you are.
[Pamela laughing]
[Pamela] I dated a few other actors, but only for short periods of time.
Who else was I dating when I got there? There was quite a few men around.
Well, just... Well, Scott Baio.
Oh, I might buy a Hyundai.
Oh, off Scott's dad, for $5,000.
He was really mad because I would drive Scott's Mercedes
and he said I wasn't worth a Mercedes yet.
That I had to drive something like a Hyundai.
He was... He was not very nice to me.
- [director] Dean Cain, did you date? - Oh God.
[upbeat music playing]
[Pamela sighing]
Yes, but I don't think we need to go through all those.
[director chuckling]
[director] Eric Nies?
[Pamela] Oh God. Yes, I was dating Eric Nies.
I don't even know why it ended.
But you're very much in love now with a Frenchman. Mon dieu!
- [Regis] What's the Frenchman's name? - [Pamela] Um, David Charvet.
- [Regis] Charvet? - [Kathy in French accent] David Charvet.
This is it for you, you think.
- This is the love of your life. - Definitely the love of my life.
"December 18th, 1992."
"David isn't sleeping in the same room with me anymore."
"I know this is the end of us."
"I'll never get married. I know that now."
"Maybe I'll live with my parents when I'm old and we'll all die together."
"Well, Star is with me at least."
"We are finally off Baywatch until May."
"This hiatus from the show has been quite an adventure,
but I love shooting on the beach and in the ocean."
"It's me."
"Totally Pamela."
CJ Parker was based on me.
She was kind of like this hippie little romantic.
Mitch, I think I'm in love.
Oh no, CJ. Come on, not again.
You just met the guy.
[sighing] I don't know.
He just... he brings out feelings in me I never knew I had.
You say that every time.
No, this time's different.
I met Kelly Slater on the set of Baywatch.
He was my big love, actually.
He was such a sweetheart to me, and so good to me.
Oh, there's Kelly.
When he had hair. [chuckling]
So handsome.
Uh, he's definitely handsome.
I dated Kelly all the time.
I mean, Kelly and I were together between lots of boyfriends
and lots of girlfriends for him too, but it wasn't just me.
Uh, I'd like to say thanks to, uh, my girlfriends and my...
my girlfriend and my friends.
[crowd laughing]
[Pamela] He definitely was a heartbreaker.
I mean, he just was a free spirit. You couldn't get your hands around him.
But you don't own anybody.
Nobody owns anybody and you just, uh, let them be who they are.
Sometimes it's better... not with you.
[upbeat music playing]
[Pamela] "I'd rather have loved for an instant than a miserable life."
"I love being in love and being vulnerable and being giving."
"It's the only way to live life."
"Vulnerable."
I love to live a romantic life every day.
I remember talking to Sylvester Stallone one time.
And he offered me a condo and Porsche to be his number-one girl.
And I was like, "Does that mean there's number two? Uh-uh."
He goes, "That's the best offer you're gonna get, honey."
"You're in Hollywood now."
I wanted to really be in love.
And I didn't want anything less than that.
[music fades]
[record scratching]
[indistinct chatter]
[man] Say hi!
[Pamela] I was part owner of this club called Sanctuary.
It was New Year's night, and I was with my best friend, Melanie.
- [Pamela] Melanie! - Hi!
[Pamela] Tommy was there.
[anchor] Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee.
[anchor 2] Rocker Tommy Lee.
[anchor 3] The Mötley Crüe drummer with the bad-boy image.
[Tommy laughing]
[rock music playing]
[Pamela] I gave everyone a Goldschläger shot to celebrate,
but Tommy thought it was only for him, so he came bounding over everybody
and sat next to me and licked the side of my face.
And I licked Melanie's face, and it went all the way around.
After that night, the phone wouldn't stop ringing.
And he was leaving messages saying,
"My Bologna has a first name, it's L-A-R-G-E."
[laughing]
[inaudible]
[Pamela] I didn't answer him back.
I was so busy at that time, and I just was shooting every day.
I was shooting Baywatch and shooting for Playboy.
But I was out the door one day when the phone rang,
and it rang again, I was like, "Oh, shoot. Maybe it's my agent."
He goes, "Hello?" I was like, "Tommy?"
And he sounded really sad, he goes, "Hi."
I said, "Hi. I'm so sorry. I kind of ditched you before."
"But I just, you know, I'm busy right now. I'm going to Cancun."
He goes, "Without me?"
And I said, "No, you're not coming to Mexico."
I go, "I'm going, I've got a photoshoot." And he goes, "Oh. I'll see you there."
I was like, "No, you can't come there."
He goes, "No, no, I'll be there. I'll find you."
And I was like, "Shit!"
And when I got there, I told everybody,
"If anyone with tattoos comes near the hotel, don't let him in."
Well, we're in Cancun.
Un-freaking-real.
That is where we're going tonight, La Boom.
It's somewhere over there.
And then Tommy was leaving messages.
"I'm in Cancun now, this is my hotel. This is where I'm staying."
"I'm here with some buddies. I'm going hotel by hotel to find you."
And so I was nervous and then finally I went,
"What could possibly go wrong?"
I said, "We leave tomorrow."
"Let's call him and let's have one night with these guys."
Famous last words. "What could go wrong?" [laughing]
[techno music playing]
[Pamela] So then we went to La Boom.
So it's, like, super techno.
They were walking in, I was walking towards them.
I looked at my girlfriend, "Which one's Tommy?"
They were all dressed in those white wifebeaters, chains, jeans.
They all looked the same.
And my girlfriend, Alexis, she said, "That one."
We had champagne and we put ecstasy in my champagne,
which I'd never tried before.
[techno music playing]
The pupils of my eyes were this big.
You know, I have light eyes. And I thought it looked so cool.
[nostalgic music playing]
The rest is all a big blur.
All a big happy blur.
[laughing]
We felt pretty invincible.
Later on that night, he just looked at me and he goes,
"You wanna get married?" And I was like, "Yeah, I do."
And he goes, "Have you ever felt this way before?"
I go, "Never. I've never felt this way before."
And he goes, "Okay."
And he took his friend's skull ring off, put it on my finger, and that was it.
We were just hours in the booth talking, planning our wedding. [laughs]
[Pamela] "Tommy and I couldn't stay away from each other."
"I thought. Why not? Clean slate?"
"It will be an adventure."
"And from then on, it was a fantasy, my fantasy."
- [Tommy] Hey, lover. - [Pamela] Hi, baby.
[elevator bell dinging]
[Pamela] People marry after knowing each other two years and go,
"Now I finally like you enough to get married."
Everyone changes every day.
So I think you have to be pretty brave.
[Tommy] Whoo! We're getting married today.
- I know. - [Tommy] What do you think about that?
Awesome!
[Tommy] Yup.
[Pamela] And so, after a few days together in Cancun, we got married.
[Tommy] Hey, lovely girl.
[Pamela] Some of the people that were hanging out with us at La Boom
were our wedding party.
My maid of honor was somebody that we met in the club that night.
We were lying in lawn chairs, sipping Chi Chis.
And I got married in a bikini, and Tommy was in board shorts.
I'm the luckiest girl on the planet.
My beautiful husband.
Yum, yum, yum.
What's your problem?
I don't wanna be cheap or anything, but we should go get a bottle of vodka
because it's, like, eight bucks for one of these.
[Pamela] Well, what time is it? It's, like, quarter after three.
We've had two bottles of champagne.
- So we're out of vodka? - Ah!
[in Spanish accent] Little baby Coronitas.
- [Pamela] Coronitas. - Coronitas!
And I remember asking, "What's our last name?"
He goes, "Lee." I go, "I thought it was Tommy Lee Jones or something."
He goes, "No! That's somebody else."
Baby doll.
I got your booty.
[Tommy] Hey, gorgeous.
[Tommy blowing kiss]
[Pamela] What was different about Tommy is there was no secrets, no deception,
there was no game playing.
It was really just full-on heart-to-heart, explosive kind of love.
[Tommy] Yum, yum, yum.
That's my baby.
Look at those toes.
[Pamela] All sandies.
[Tommy] No, no, no. I like it.
No, leave it.
[children playing]
[Pamela] Kiss me.
Bye, Cancun.
But I was dating Kelly Slater at the time,
and I was supposed to go see him in Florida and meet his family.
My first phone call I told him I was married. He's like, "What?"
That was horrible.
And then from the plane back to LA, I remember going to Tommy,
"Do you eat eggs?"
[Pamela chuckling]
[inaudible]
[Pamela] We didn't know anything about each other.
And it ended up being one of the wildest, most beautiful love affairs ever.
[crowd clamoring]
[Pamela] We landed to so much paparazzi.
[camera shutters clicking]
[Pamela] It was crazy.
Everyone was in shock. [chuckling]
[anchor] Pamela and Tommy marry after spending only four days together.
[anchor 2] A four-day courtship on the beaches of Cancun.
[anchor 3] Right now, Tommy and Pam could not be happier.
They're in newlywed bliss.
[anchor 4] Some have said that marriage to Pamela Anderson
will have a calming influence on the wild ways of rocker Tommy Lee.
[Tommy yelling]
[camera shutters clicking]
- Soon, soon, soon. We wanna have babies. - Yes.
[music fades]
[Pamela] We're moving in today.
Whose are you?
Get up, sleepy.
I'm recording the whole thing.
Our bedroom.
Temporary drapes that close because of stalkerazzis.
We filmed everything back then.
We always had these camcorders.
Then you fill the tape, and put the tape away and label it,
and then you get another and you label it.
But those were moments I'm glad we captured.
When are you gonna get me preggos?
I know.
I'm trying.
[upbeat music playing]
[reporters clamoring]
[Pamela] It was my first time at the Cannes Film Festival.
And we went there to announce that we were going to do Barb Wire.
Barb Wire was the only real movie role I had.
[anchor] Most press conferences here are with film critics
asking articulate questions about the art of moviemaking.
That wasn't the case at Pamela's though.
[reporter] Are you trying to get pregnant?
And how many children do you want?
Well, how many do we want, baby? Two or three.
- Two or three kids. - [Tommy] Two.
Two. Yeah, but we're working on it.
This whole Barb Wire was crazy before we shot one bit of film.
But after the Cannes Film Festival,
they changed everything because they thought this is gonna be huge.
So they switched directors and they switched storylines,
and I don't even know what that movie's about.
I have no idea.
- [man] Rolling. - [man 2] Rolling.
And action.
I should blow your head off right now.
I had the BWV, the Barb Wire Voice.
I really just tried to talk very low.
Don't call me babe.
I was like, "Oh God, that sounds terrible."
I was shooting all the time. I was shooting Baywatch during the day,
Barb Wire at night and on the weekends.
[Tommy] What's up?
But then during the filming on Barb Wire,
Tommy and I found out that I was pregnant.
[indistinct chatter]
[Pamela] We were making our nursery.
[nostalgic music playing]
[Pamela] We just were so excited.
How cute!
We never had a baby before,
so I've gotta see how this is gonna... how this is gonna change my life
and... and take up my time.
Everyone was like, "Well, we know you're pregnant,
but you still have to kickbox in that 17-inch corset,
and you still have to work 18 hours a day."
That's business, what you have to do, and I said, "I can do this."
[Tommy] There they are, hard at work.
[Pamela] I just feel fortunate I'm doing a movie in my career, so...
I mean, I'd like to do more projects.
"I'm so excited about my career."
"I'm wanting it more now."
"I'm going to be the best actress I can be."
"I won't give up."
This is real challenging, it's a real demanding role,
and, you know, you can really only work so hard.
And your body can only take so much.
And on the set, there was a time I wasn't feeling too well.
She came in and she looked horrible.
She was pale and shaking so bad.
[Pamela] I ended up in the hospital, and they told us we miscarried.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] I remember, Tommy slept in the hospital bed with me.
We just were completely devastated
because we really wanted to start a family.
When we were leaving the hospital, paparazzi were following us,
and we were definitely a little bit out of our minds.
Tommy was trying to evade the paparazzi.
Starting to, like, swerve, like, "We're not getting anywhere."
I'm talking to him, "Please, please stop." Then I'm like, "Ah, screw it!"
And then I slam the door open
and my door hit that paparazzi's driver door.
I just snapped.
We jump on the car,
and Tommy's putting his boot through the windshield.
It was crazy.
We were just like, "Everybody, stay away from us."
Emotionally, I was really upset after that and went back to work.
You know, that was... that was the hardest part,
was just trying to get back into the film and get back into the groove.
This is when all those rumors came up, you're on drugs...
Well, I had a miscarriage.
- [anchor] Barb Wire did not do well. - [Pamela] It didn't do well, no.
[anchor] So, in many ways, your first failure.
[Pamela] It wasn't the box office hit everyone imagined.
But after the miscarriage, I wasn't really thinking about Barb Wire.
"I'm so depressed."
"I just did what was in front of me to numb the pain."
"I never got to deal with the grief of losing my first baby."
"I'm devastated."
- [birds chirping] - [dogs barking]
- [Pamela sighing] It's why... - [Brandon] What's this?
[Pamela] Halloween party? This was before Dylan.
This is... that's, uh, Tommy's 37th.
- I don't want... - No, you don't...
- Does it have to be on another setting? - I'm sure it does.
[Pamela] It's three. In the old days it was three.
- [Brandon] One time for three. - [Pamela] There it is.
- [Brandon] Let's push play. - [Pamela] Okay. I guess.
[Tommy] Merry Christmas.
[Pamela] Merry Christmas.
[Tommy] We're at Mainsborough Hotel where we're staying
and having a fucking blast.
Whoa! A double-decker!
[nostalgic music playing]
[indistinct chatter]
[Pamela] I have that shot so many times.
[Tommy] I just paid, which is, um...
[Pamela] We're learning all about beer, and this is what I'm having.
- [Tommy chuckling] Well, that's good. - [Pamela] Water!
Videotape me preggos. You haven't videotaped my preggo belly.
- [Tommy] Bust it out, baby. - [chuckles]
[Pamela] We got pregnant again.
I was so happy.
[Tommy] My wife looks like she's having just a wonderful time. [laughs]
[Pamela] Today's not a good day. I feel sick.
Every other day I've been feeling fucking great.
No filming Pamela on those days.
If Mommy doesn't get her tea, she'll yell at me.
[Pamela laughing]
[Pamela] Well, you're drinking, so I'm already mad.
- [Pamela laughing] - [indistinct chatter]
I kissed him and I just didn't know what happened.
[Tommy] Kiss me, kiss me.
[Pamela] "Tommy."
"He is love, sex, rock and roll,
sweet,
don't forget talented, romantic,
and a bad drunk."
[belching]
Crown me.
[Pamela] "We are reckless and hopeful,
and may just have a unique way of living that's right for us."
[Pamela chuckling]
[Pamela] Fish and chips with vinegar.
- What do I do with these? - [Tommy] Put them over your boobies.
[Tommy chuckling]
[Tommy] Whoa, baby!
[Pamela] That's about the size of my nipples.
[Tommy chuckling]
[Pamela] I love you.
I love you.
[Pamela] How much?
Yeah.
Bye.
Press the fader.
Now press... No.
Now do your thumb.
[nostalgic music playing]
Baby, look what you did to me.
[Tommy chuckling]
[Pamela] "March 20th, 1996."
"I wonder how our life will be."
"I can't wait to play with our little baby."
[Pamela] Dad's already drinking beer.
- Dad's already drinking beer. - [Pamela laughs]
Yep, 'cause Dad's fucking stoked right now.
[Pamela] That's me!
Brandon's in there. I can see my belly button right there.
"I feel Brandon moving."
"It's wild."
"I have a little person inside of me, depending on me."
"I love him so much."
"I will be the best mother ever."
All the paparazzi dudes are out there.
They suck.
[indistinct chatter on video]
Go film the paparazzis, they were all around our house.
Hanging from trees. They're waiting for the baby to be born.
[Dylan] That's insane.
Yeah, it was awful.
Someone's gonna be a daddy in a couple days.
We're having Brandon tonight!
June 1st.
"I'm aching with excitement."
[Tommy] Is he coming, baby?
[Pamela] I don't know.
"The wildest experience of my life is about to take place in our home,
in our bedroom."
"The birth of our beautiful child, Brandon Thomas Lee."
[birds chirping]
[Tommy whispering] Hey, Momma.
[whispering] Hi, baby.
[Tommy] Congratulations.
Baby, we made a burrito.
Seventeen hours of natural labor.
[Tommy chuckling]
[Tommy] Hi, Brandon.
- [Pamela] Hey, now, hey. - [Brandon cooing]
[Tommy] It's Daddy and Mommy.
- [Pamela] Look, he's playing with Daddy. - [whistling]
[Pamela] Baby, you're a daddy.
[Tommy whistling softly]
[Pamela] It's a whole new life now.
[chuckling]
[Tommy] He was born at 3:05.
[Pamela] 3:02, I think.
[Tommy yawning]
It was very late, that's all I know.
[Pamela chuckling]
[Pamela] It was such a really happy time in my life.
But we didn't realize everything was about to change.
[Tommy] Okay, say bye, guys.
Bye.
[indistinct chatter]
[Pamela] We're slowly getting it done.
[Tommy] The koi pond.
[Pamela] We had construction going on in the house.
And in the garage, we had a safe the size of a refrigerator.
It was a gun safe. It was behind a carpeted wall.
And Tommy had all his guns in there, I had, like, the bikini I got married in,
I had all the corks from every champagne bottle saved in there.
Corny stuff like that.
[Tommy] Hey, your radness.
[Pamela] We were in the house one day
and Tommy went to get something out of the safe.
And then he came up and goes, "Okay, this is a joke, right?"
"Like, who... Where'd you put the safe?"
And he was looking at my assistant, John Roberts, at the time.
And John was like, "What are you, crazy? I have no idea."
And then we went down there and it was gone.
[tense music playing]
[Pamela] I didn't know what to do. I called 911.
We filed a police report.
But nothing happened.
We had no idea when it was stolen
because we had construction going on at our house for quite a while.
It could've been stolen in a six-month time period,
so we had no idea that it was missing.
We didn't have any idea that anything in there
was gonna be something that would hurt us.
Baby, I'm recording you.
But then, one day, we got something in the mail.
It was wrapped in brown paper.
Tommy opened it.
It was a VHS tape.
Tommy, he told me to go upstairs, and he watched it.
And I didn't watch it. I've never watched it.
Later, he came upstairs and he goes, "This is gonna be disturbing."
"This is a VHS tape of us having sex."
[music intensifies]
[music fades]
Oh my God.
We realized they have our home videos.
That's the "Oh shit" moment.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] We were newly married.
I love you, Tommy.
I love you!
[Pamela] We just were naked all the time and filmed each other on vacations.
This was just us being goofballs.
- You know, honking a horn with his penis. - [horn honking]
[Pamela] Talented man.
What they did is they found all the nudity they could from different Hi8 tapes,
and they spliced it together.
Where's Daddy?
But we had no idea who sent the tape.
Here we go. Caught on tape.
If anybody is watching this, go to hell.
If anyone steals this tape, you're going to hell.
So I'd turn it off and send it back to the original owner.
- [phone ringing] - [Pamela] Brandon.
Not too long after that...
[Tommy] Hello.
[Pamela] ...we got a letter from Bob Guccione from Penthouse.
He offered to buy it from us.
He said, "I'll give you five million in cash for the rights to this tape."
We said, "Fuck you. Give us our tapes back."
This was not supposed to be for anybody else.
We just really had no clue.
We thought that if we got the tape back, it would stop.
We had no way to navigate it 'cause no one else was going through anything like this.
You know, so we didn't really have the playbook on how to,
you know, get it all back, or make it go away.
[birds chirping]
Couple weeks later, Tommy watched the news and he came up and goes,
"Okay, this is gonna be upsetting to you."
He told me that there's this girl at Tower Records impersonating me,
some porn star outside signing copies of the Pam and Tommy tape.
We saw it all over the tabloids, the newspapers.
The tape is out.
Such an invasion.
We're angry and hurt and upset.
[Tommy] We feel very violated.
Some psycho decided to mass produce it and put it all over the world.
Do you have any remorse for exploiting celebrity or non-celebrity lives?
No, no. I mean, I... I don't feel like we've... we've done anything negative.
[reporter] Pamela, can you stop? Can you stop?
[reporters clamoring]
[reporter] Pamela, please have a word...
[Pamela] After that stolen tape came out, we were under a lot of stress.
There was paparazzi everywhere.
It was our first night out after I had Brandon.
And we went to The Viper Room.
My parents were watching Brandon.
We were leaving, and the camera was right in my face.
[camera shutters clicking]
- [man] Hey! - [Tommy] Fuck outta here!
[man 2] Hey, Tommy!
[Tommy] Fuck off!
[man 3] Tommy, get in.
[Pamela] Then we got pepper sprayed.
How dare you spray fucking pepper spray down my mouth!
[man 2] We didn't spray anything.
You're a drug fiend.
How dare you do that to me!
[man 2] Where's your child this time of the morning?
- With my mother! With my mother! - [man 2] Where's your baby?
Where is your baby?
With my mother! I'll fucking kill you.
You fucking asshole!
[indistinct clamoring]
[man 4] You deserve it, Tommy. You're a fucking prick!
[pensive music playing]
[Pamela] I think both of us didn't know how to handle any of it.
I mean, who knows how to handle something like that?
But we had to have some recourse, we had to do something.
We had to... we had to at least try to fight back
because this was stolen out of our home.
And there's no way that people should be able to steal something from your home
and then sell it in front of the whole world.
[reporters clamoring]
[man] Come closer.
[Pamela] A tape was stolen from Tommy Lee and myself.
IEG is now selling that tape worldwide illegally without my or Tommy's consent.
We have not received one penny or signed an agreement
permitting them to merchandise this tape.
At some point, Ed Masry, he was the lawyer in Erin Brockovich,
he contacted us and said he would take it on.
And we said, "Sure."
Pam and Tommy were definitely the victims in this, uh, Pam and Tommy tape.
There's no question of that.
[Pamela] It's been exploited all over the world,
and everyone's making money off it.
Especially at this time in my life, this is absolutely horrendous.
I really feel that... that we'll... we'll get them.
And they'll pay for this because this is illegal.
And I want to make it real clear
that Pam and Tommy turned down five million dollars cash.
They didn't wanna release that tape.
[Pamela] My fight is not for me alone,
but for all celebrities whose privacy has been invaded.
I will continue to fight not only for myself and my children,
but also for legislation that would make what they're doing to me a crime.
It was a big case, it was a right to privacy case.
So it was an important case to set a precedent.
[reporters speaking indistinctly]
[Pamela] When the deposition started, I was pregnant again.
I was nervous that it was all gonna affect the health of our baby.
[pensive music playing]
[Pamela] I didn't know that I was gonna be completely humiliated.
And I remember walking into the room.
All these guys in there they had up naked pictures of me.
The lawyers basically said,
"You're in Playboy, you have no right to privacy."
And that was a little bit shocking, but...
[Pamela sighing]
[Pamela] They would ask about my sex life.
And I kept on thinking,
"How am I getting questioned about my sexuality,
and my preferences, and my body parts,
and where I would like to make love, when it's stolen property?"
It made me feel like I was such a horrible woman.
I'm just a piece of meat.
That this should mean nothing to me because I'm such a whore, basically.
They didn't have a lot of sympathy, you know, for me.
They're all, "Oh, she's in Playboy, she likes being naked in public."
First of all, it was my choice to be in the magazine.
Playboy was empowering for me.
But in this case, it felt like a rape.
Not to bring up something really heavy from my childhood,
but when I was attacked by this guy, I thought everybody would know.
When the tape was stolen, it felt like that.
And the depositions were so brutal.
I remember looking at them thinking, "Why do they hate me so much?"
"Why do these grown men hate me so much?"
I don't know how many days I was deposed,
but they wanted me to come back and come back.
I just said to Tommy, I said,
"I can't take it, I can't take it anymore."
And this would've been probably years of fighting.
I know some people would've fought to the death on it,
but I'm pregnant.
I don't want this to affect the baby.
Tommy and I had a miscarriage first.
We were scared that it could happen again.
We're not going to put Dylan's life at risk,
'cause it was just tearing me apart.
It absolutely devastated me.
But I just closed my eyes and signed the papers.
[anchor] The Lees dropped their lawsuit against cyber-sex company IEG.
IEG is now playing the video, which is spreading quickly,
and is already available on many World Wide Web sites.
[Pamela] Well, this was the beginning of the Internet.
We weren't thinking about anything like that.
We had no idea that it was gonna go all over the world,
you know, in an instant.
It really was the first viral video.
You can only sell so many fucking DVDs,
but when you open it up to the Internet, it's endless.
Really? The world's gonna see this?
[anchor] People from around the world joined the Internet
to view the Anderson/Lee sex tape,
causing a cyber traffic jam on multiple websites.
- [anchor 2] Their most intimate moments... - [anchor 3] ...took the Web by storm.
[anchor 4] Viewed by millions of strangers...
[anchor 5] Private affairs are now a public record.
[music fades]
[Pamela] We never made a dime off that.
And I hate when people say that we settled.
We never settled on anything, we just told everyone to get lost.
If anyone watches it, if anyone buys it, if anyone sells it, it's just pathetic.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] You can't put a monetary number
on the amount of pain and suffering that it caused.
Well, jump on the bandwagon, everyone's making fun of us and...
Making fun? What? What are you talking about?
I'm shocked.
Pamela Lee... Pamela Lee and Tommy Lee
Pamela Lee and Tommy... Pamela and Tommy...
Pamela and Tommy Lee...
[Pamela] I was the punch line of a lot of jokes on talk shows.
It was super humiliating.
- It's not funny. - [laughs]
It's not funny. This is devastating to us.
Well, look...
- It is? - It is!
If they fall in love with you one way, that is it.
A sex tape and you're kinda of always gonna be that kind of image.
- [Howard] I have it on DVD. - [man] Yeah?
[Robin] Gotta get a clear picture.
Is it on DVD?
- It's on DVD? - [Howard] It is.
[Pamela] Oh, that's pathetic.
After that, it just felt like that solidified kind of the cartoon image too.
You become a caricature.
I think that was the deterioration of, kind of, whatever image I had.
[anchor] The world's most famous sex icon.
[anchor 2] Know my favorite part?
- Doesn't she have the prettiest vagina? - [anchor 3] A pussy taking a pounding...
[anchor 4] ...image she cheerfully exploits on television...
[camera shutters clicking]
[Pamela] It was different for me than it was for him.
Tommy is a rock star.
It all adds to the image of the craziness and everything.
But I knew at that point my career was over.
- I've always loved fairy tales. - Would you wanna be a serious actress?
- I am a serious actress. - [chuckling] I mean...
[audience laughing]
[Pamela] I was thinking maybe I could have a more serious career.
But had to kind of make a career out of the pieces left.
Then everything kind of blew up after that.
[music fades]
Yeah. I don't feel very good.
And I wanna articulate it the best I can because I... I mean, it's hard.
Sometimes you wonder why you're talking about it all again,
but, you know, it's part of what we're doing and...
It's good to get it out at least once or twice in your own words.
[laughs] In my own words.
[Pamela sighing heavily]
[birds chirping]
[pensive music playing]
[Pamela] I have romanticized the past.
So, I mean, now that we're talking about it,
I could remember some things that were really big red flags.
But if I didn't think about it too much, I'd think our relationship was perfect.
Tommy comes by every day.
He's here every single day.
He's basically moved into my trailer.
While I was on Baywatch, I would be in my trailer,
he would sneak in because it was his time with his wife.
Tommy was so jealous.
I thought it was cute.
I thought it was cute and I thought that was what love is.
Oh, that's so romantic.
"It's my last season of Baywatch."
"I had to kiss David Chokachi, but I didn't tell Tommy."
"He lost it."
"He came and trashed my trailer on the set."
"Put his fist through a cabinet."
"I apologized for not telling him,
lying, as he put it,
and told him it wouldn't happen again."
He would always know when to show up. He would look at the call sheets.
He would see what scene she was in.
He probably had access to the script, and would show up in the scenes
where there could be an opportunity for him to get pissed.
[Pamela] The whole Baywatch crew, if they saw Tommy coming,
they would change the dialogue, change the scene.
He was always in my eyeline, he would always be behind the camera.
Tommy was always there.
It was too much, you know.
[inaudible]
[Pamela] I was working, always working.
And we had two beautiful kids, so I was busy with them.
And I think Tommy went through a little bit of postpartum.
Hi, Dylan. Happy Valentine's Day.
- There's our flowers Dada got Mommy. - [Dylan cooing]
There was a terrible night when Tommy was just rocking on the floor.
Brandon was crying in the playpen and I was holding Dylan.
But Tommy was going, "I want my wife back. I want my wife back."
At that point, I didn't know what to do.
And I just said, "I need some fucking help around here."
I said, "You gotta grow up. It's not about you anymore."
And I'd never spoken that way to him before.
I'd never ever.
I didn't recognize him. He went black.
And then I started hyperventilating, scared.
Brandon was shaking and screaming, and holding my leg.
So I called 911, I put the receiver off.
[tense music playing]
[dogs barking]
[anchor] Lee was arrested at the couple's Malibu home
and charged with spousal and child abuse.
He allegedly kicked his wife while she was holding the couple's infant son.
The injuries that they noticed to Pamela were an injury to her right hand,
a broken fingernail, and also bleeding to that hand.
They also noticed that she had redness to her lower back area.
Deputies offered her medical treatment, she declined.
[reporters clamoring]
[anchor] The rock musician was released on half a million dollars' bail,
but prohibited from telephoning or going near his spouse.
[camera shutters clicking]
I... I miss my family very much
and, uh, you know, I'm very sorry that this is happening to us.
I never hit Pamela.
Uh... uh...
Grabbing, uh, a woman and shaking a woman is not...
not cool either,
but that's... that's what was done.
[Leslie] Why would you do that?
I mean, what was it about your anger that would make you lash out physically?
[Tommy sighing heavily]
[Tommy] It's a lot of pressure.
We've been going through a lot of stuff, sex tapes appearing, postpartum,
and two new babies.
Tommy comes third now, instead of first.
I don't know how to deal with that.
Just start stacking them all up and you got a guy who...
Really, the whole argument stemmed that evening
from me wanting some love.
[somber music playing]
[anchor] Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee was taken away in handcuffs
after being sentenced to six months in jail.
I'm happy that he took responsibility for this.
And I think it's the first step towards healing.
[reporter] Do you think he deserves six months?
[indistinct chatter]
[Leslie] What did you think, sitting in jail,
that Dylan, at six or seven weeks, was in Pamela's arms?
I mean, at six- or seven-weeks,
fate could have left you with one son instead of two.
Has that ever crossed your mind?
Not during it.
Afterwards, absolutely.
If you had the chance to apologize, would you apologize?
Oh, I have.
I have.
I apologized several times.
[Pamela] I tried to end the marriage, he didn't want to.
I mean, I have all the letters from him from jail.
[Pamela sighing]
Aw, picture yourself here and he had 'em all like...
Brandon, Dylan, Tommy, Pamela.
[clearing throat] Yeah.
I'm sure I can't read these.
These are gonna be way too much for me to read right now, but I don't know.
He really fought for us to stay together.
I mean, I had to bifurcate the divorce 'cause he wouldn't sign the papers.
He thought we could get through it. I just took my kids and was like, "No."
You know, it wasn't a gray area for me.
It was, like, you can't do that.
Yeah.
"I've never loved someone so deeply."
"And by deeply, I mean, I loved his soul."
"I feel like part of me has died."
- [music fades] - [birds chirping]
[Pamela] That's the San Fernando Valley over there.
[Brandon] Where are we?
That's when we were living in Wayne Gretzky's house.
Oh, no way.
[Pamela] Hi, baby!
Yeah. This is when I moved out, I guess.
I think Dad might've even been in jail at this time.
Terrible.
I hate that. [sniffles]
- Night night, baby. - [Dylan squealing]
[Pamela] There he is.
[laughing] Dylan looks like a little doll!
Dylan. Smile, baby.
[Pamela] "October 11th, 1998."
"My little Dilly."
I can't see Dylan!
There he is. He's got a hat like Grandpa.
"I felt compelled to write to you, my little man."
"You've seen a lot in your nine months, and I wanted to write you
so one day you can read this and maybe understand
how we came to be where we are."
Oh, Dylan, you have not seen your baby stuff. Come here, come here!
That I have this. This is when we first moved into the house.
Say "I'm Dilly-do."
- I Dilly-do. - [Pamela] And I love you!
I'm, like, all cute, and Brandon's like a little devil.
[Pamela laughing]
- [Pamela] Oh yeah, I know you were. - [all laugh]
"Your daddy, Tommy Lee Bass, and I were married
after knowing each other for four days."
"Love at first sight."
This is his mobile on the Baywatch set, he likes...
[Carol] Mommy's bra.
[Pamela] Isn't that pretty?
"Mommy and Daddy will eventually be able to be friends, I hope."
"But I want you to know that I would rather be alone
than ever live with that abuse again."
"You will always be in a safe place."
It was challenging when Tommy and I separated
and they didn't see their dad a lot.
I'm trying to sleep!
Now get out, you!
[Pamela] You don't talk to Mommy that way.
- You warming your butt up? - Yep.
[Pamela] "Dylan, you are lying right next to me as I write this in Mommy's big bed."
"I love you so much, I'm crying."
[exhaling heavily]
[Pamela] "And with my tears, I've marked on your little forehead."
[Dylan] What?
[Pamela] Say goodbye to Lake Tahoe.
Here comes the private plane, on, um, Bob Seger's jet.
Yo, ho, ho, ho!
[Pamela] There's only one ho in here.
[Dylan] "There's only one ho in here." Oh, no.
[Pamela] "My mom taught me the most important lesson in life."
"When you are hurt, you have two options,
to close off, become bitter,
or love more, persevere."
"Love is the greatest healer."
"I choose love."
[water sloshing]
[Pamela] I always gravitated towards animals.
I just felt like I could trust animals more than people.
And since the stolen tape,
I've always questioned everything, everyone.
[dog panting]
[Pamela] I didn't feel like I had a lot of respect.
"People always have projects for me,
but they're usually very sexual roles."
[suspenseful music playing]
[gasping]
[screaming]
[Pamela] And I sometimes get really caught up in being a caricature.
I catch myself living more like that than myself.
"I want more."
"I need more."
"I want to be proud of my accomplishments."
I was sick of talking about my boyfriends and my boobs all the time.
[funky music playing]
[Pamela] But I thought if I can attach it to animal activism,
or activism for the environment, then it meant something.
So I joined forces with PETA.
[anchor] This McDonald's has had meat-free burgers on its menu for a while,
so this is really nothing new.
But what is new is this huge PETA poster
of Pamela Anderson, urging New Yorkers to veg out.
Well, activism is sexy.
You have to be brave, and you gotta use what you got.
How's your show doing, VIP? You ever go over budget?
Yeah. Just not on my clothes or anything like that.
[Jay] No, you save money on those. Goes without saying, doesn't it?
[Pamela] I've learned how to deflect.
"Speaking of that, let's talk about..."
It's getting colder out, and people are, um, tending to maybe put on fur coats.
I don't think anyone would wear something they knew so much cruelty went into.
[anchor] In London, Pamela used a book signing
to ask for signatures on a petition
to use fake fur on hats worn by the Royal Guards at Buckingham Palace.
For each autograph Pamela signed, she asked fans to return the favor
by signing PETA's petition to the queen.
[Pamela] Comedy Central asked me to do a roast and I said I'd do it
but only if they gave $250,000 to PETA.
We love you, Pam. Thank you for inviting me to do this.
Uh, thank you for agreeing to get fucked on camera one last time.
[audience laughing]
[Pamela] It was so raunchy. It was so not my kind of humor.
The reason I went through this was to benefit the PETA organization.
I wanna thank them for all their incredible work.
But I still got to talk about things that were important to me,
so it was kind of a trade-off.
Media is powerful, and it is a tool.
I was already getting teased and made fun of.
I wanted to take that and use it for good.
[Piers] You made a surprising ally in President Vladimir Putin.
Well, I wrote to him and asked him to stop the importation of seal products
because this was 95% of the market
and that could potentially shut down the Canadian seal hunt,
which is one of my big goals.
So he did.
He made it actually illegal to import seal products even into the country.
- [Piers] Right. - Yes.
- [audience laughs] - Any relationship with North Korea?
- Kim Jong-un? - No.
[audience laughing]
Not yet.
- [laughs] - [audience applauding]
...a forward-thinking compassionate move.
I think that awareness and education is the most...
[Brandon] She wants to always use her voice for people
and animals that don't have a voice.
He's offered such an amazing and generous offer...
And it's definitely brought her into some controversial places.
[anchor] WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange could face the death penalty
if tried and convicted for publishing government secrets through WikiLeaks.
[Pamela] I met Julian Assange through my very good friend, Vivian Westwood.
[camera shutters clicking]
[reporter] Hello, Ms. Anderson. How is he?
[Pamela] Every time I was in London, we talked for four hours.
I'd say, "The Internet's bad,"
and he'd say, "No, it's good 'cause you keep on learning everything you can."
"And then you can make an informed decision."
Lying, to me, is the most damaging thing people can do to people.
For me, it's just nice to know that someone's whole life
is about truth and discovering truth.
He just believes in justice, believes in honesty,
believes in, um, exposing governments for what they're really doing,
and people have the right to know.
[Brandon] I think she just doesn't have a problem
with getting in trouble for these things.
You know, and I'm always like, "Please, don't do that."
We don't want this kind of attention anymore.
No. Like, let's just have some peace.
- How's the family? - Very good. The boys are great.
They've seen... have they seen pictures of you? Like in Playboy and stuff?
- No! - Oh.
[audience laughing]
[Pamela] I wasn't thinking when I was in Playboy
that I was gonna have kids soon
and they were gonna grow up and it was gonna be embarrassing for them.
But I always thought I'll tell them, age-appropriate.
But I never got the chance.
You know, they always found out before I could really talk to them about it.
Dilly.
Dylan.
But a tape of your parents having sex is another level.
[Brandon] When I was a kid,
I thought everyone knew things about me and my family
that they never should've known.
And, like, everyone had this dirty little secret about my family.
[somber music playing]
[Brandon] I just remember in school, like, if anyone ever brought up my mom,
I was very quick to fight.
I would just flush with anger.
Sidekick, bottom fist, chop.
[Pamela] Whoa.
I remember one day after school,
Dylan coming to me in tears saying, "Mom, why did you do that tape?"
I was like, "Oh gosh, really?"
We didn't make a sex tape."
- How did that tape get out? - It was stolen.
[anchor] Rumors began to circulate that Pamela and Tommy planted the video
to bolster their own publicity.
[Pamela] People actually thought we put it out there for some ridiculous reason,
'cause that became kind of a trend afterward
for celebrities that were using a sex tape to become famous.
So kind of left us in that category.
And still to this day,
people say that we made money off it, which was never the case.
I never received a dime from that.
[director] Do you ever regret not having monetized the stolen tape?
Oh God, never! I would never monetize the stolen tape.
I don't regret that at all.
You could give me hundreds of millions, a billion dollars, I'd never take it.
Never.
Come on, Brandon, focus now.
[Dylan] I think it would've been a different story
if she did cash in on the tape.
It just shows you, right?
Like, that thing guaranteed made people millions of dollars,
and she was like, "No."
She 100% cared about her family being okay and me being okay.
Never cared about money.
[indistinct chatter]
I wish she made the money.
She would've made millions of dollars if she just signed a piece of paper.
Instead, she sat back with nothing and watched her career, like,
fizzle into thin air.
She was in debt most of her life.
Is it weird to feel like so many people are making money off of you?
I mean, you... you had a number-one video. You had lots of home videos.
You don't get a whole bunch of money from...
I never get anything from Playboy. Yeah.
[reporter] Never got money from the videos?
No.
You're a very famous person,
and everybody would imagine you'd have a lot of money.
Well, everyone... A lot of people made a lot of money off me.
Yeah, that's true.
- [Howard] You're not good with money? - I'm not.
[dramatic music playing]
[Pamela] My friend David LaChapelle says I'm the least calculated person.
I just couldn't wrap my head around the business part of branding myself.
I'm not that person when it comes to money.
I just want my credit card to work and I wanna be able to get my nails done.
But for years I was always scared.
Give you my credit card, like, "Please, please, please work."
[Dylan] And I also think it's just she's so giving.
She's always supported everyone, grandparents, friends, and the family.
She's never worried about if she's okay.
She's always made sure everyone else is okay.
- Tommy Lee, how is he? - [Pamela] Great. We're like a family.
Like a little bit dysfunctional family, I guess,
but, um, he loves his kids, and we love each other and...
- [Larry] So why can't you be together? - And, um, well, there's... Who knows why?
There's lots of complicated reasons, right? [chuckles]
That was a very long 18 years
of co-parenting. [chuckling]
- [Tommy] Go to first base. First base! - [Pamela] Good throw, Brandon!
It wasn't always easy.
Whoo!
And never has any partner of mine liked Tommy.
It was always, like, a jealousy.
So it never really gave us too much opportunity to be friends.
Hey Dilly, do wanna go behind the boat?
I wanna go in.
[Pamela] You just wanna go in there?
Let Bob help you.
- [Dylan] I know how to do it. - [Bob] Let me help. I'll hold your hand.
[Dylan] I know how to.
I know how.
- Is this Detroit? - Is it Detroit? This is Detroit.
This is when we moved to Detroit. [laughs]
We moved to Detroit that point in our lives.
- [Pamela laughing] Ortonville. - [Dylan] By the way.
- How long were we there for? - Not long.
- [Dylan] Yeah, we... we left pretty quick. - [laughing]
[director] When did you live in Detroit?
- I was married to Bob. - When she was married to Kid Rock.
[Dylan chuckling]
[rock music playing]
[reporters clamoring]
[reporter] What is special about Kid?
You see that?
[Pamela] Look at this, look at that, that's why.
That's it right there.
- Purely superficial, that's it. - [laughs]
[inaudible]
- [Pamela] And I married Kid Rock. - [crowd applauding]
His name is Bob Ritchie.
I take you, Kid Rock, to be my husband, my constant friend,
my faithful partner, and my loving cowboy
that I'll ride forever from this day forward.
[crowd exclaiming, cheering]
There's Bob.
Bob and I and a pineapple.
We had a great time, we had fun together.
He was really good to the boys.
[contemplative music playing]
[Pamela] But I didn't feel like this is love
because I have an impression of what love is, and this isn't it.
We just didn't have that height, that frenzy I was used to.
I didn't want anything less than that.
I mean, we know you as someone who was married to Pamela Anderson.
The bottom line is, you know, I...
I... Yes, I... I touched the stove.
- The stove's very hot. - [anchor laughing]
I think I'll not play with the stove anymore.
After we got divorced, I started thinking, "Maybe I should be married to a friend."
[host] Salomon calls.
What are you doing, kid?
[host] Rick Salomon, what are you doing?
[Pamela] Rick Salomon.
He's a professional poker player.
- I'm all in. - Salomon's all in, wow!
[uplifting music playing]
[Pamela] And then we got married.
And he ended up being a big drug addict.
[music distorts and fades]
We found a crack pipe in the Christmas tree.
He still to this day denies it. He says it's somebody else.
Who else would have a crack pipe in the Christmas tree? Wasn't me.
[chuckling] It wasn't me.
So we were only married a few months.
It was annulled. But we're still friends.
Then, when he got sober and was sober for years,
we decided to try it again.
[uplifting music playing]
It didn't last long either.
[music fades]
[Pamela scoffing]
[Dylan] She loves getting married, you know?
Maybe it's her favorite thing in the world is falling in love.
And then, like, I guess, loves the idea of falling out of love too, I guess.
[Pamela] I felt guilty 'cause of my kids,
I wanted to show them a traditional relationship,
or a marriage, or a man that's consistent,
and giving them good examples in their life.
Only person I looked at as a father figure was my dad. And that was, like, it.
The other ones were just people who came in and came out.
- [Pamela] Oh my goodness. - I'm going to Daddy's house today.
[Pamela] Uh, tomorrow.
- It's been a while. - [David] It has.
- How long ago was it? - How many husbands ago was it?
- Exactly. - [audience laughing]
I'd go to the Playboy mansion and I'd see Smokey Robinson and he'd say...
I'd say, "Oh God. I got divorced again."
He goes, "Baby, you're a romantic. Keep on trying."
He goes, "You are my hero. I love it. I love it."
"Just keep trying. Some people get bitter, and you just keep going." [laughs]
[seagulls squawking]
[Pamela] When the kids graduated, I wanted to go to the south of France,
and so I went, and...
I met a professional athlete.
He was very strong.
And he was very jealous.
[anchor] TV goddess Pamela Anderson has just released this disturbing video.
A French soccer star allegedly crushed her hands to the point of cracking.
[anchor 2] The soccer player denies all allegations,
calling them completely false,
and said he was incapable of doing such things.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] Just because you're in a relationship,
if there's any abuse, or emotional abuse you don't have to stay in it.
Doesn't matter if it's your fifth marriage.
Doesn't matter what people think.
I'm attracted to these very hetero, masculine men.
Their initial attraction to me might be, oh, she's the Playboy thing,
or this kind of sexual thing, but I'm not the damsel in distress.
I am very capable,
and some men hate you for being something else.
And then it can become violent.
For me, because I could leave at any time,
I used to always say, "I don't need to be with you. I want to be with you."
"And if I want to leave, I can."
And if I ever really stated those facts it made people more insecure,
and sometimes they start grabbing you by the hair and throwing you into walls,
and, like, stripping your clothes off.
Craziest stuff would happen.
It just touched some kind of weird part of a man, in my relationships anyway.
- Are you guys getting married? - Yeah.
- Again? - We're gonna try again.
[Pamela] My parents, they fought a lot, but they also made up.
My mom used to always say to me, "I feel bad. I set an example for you."
"I know your dad's an asshole, but I love him."
"You don't love these assholes."
"Rip the Band-Aid off and just get rid of these guys
'cause you don't love them like I love your father, or like he loves me."
'Cause I would pick people similar, I guess, in some ways.
Maybe because of how I grew up and saw my parents
and maybe because of some of the relationships I had,
I didn't equate being in love with being nice, maybe.
[objects clattering]
[Brandon] You know what's the funny thing?
I'm hardwired to just be, like, the most, like, loving and insane person, ever.
You have to be insane to be in love. So...
Yeah, I know. You know what I say to all my girlfriends?
I go, "My mom tells me to be fearless to be in love."
They're like, "What the fuck does that even mean?" [laughs]
[both laughing]
- Means you gotta be brave to be in love. - Yeah.
[R&B song playing]
- [Pamela] As I record this... - [gasping]
[Pamela] ...before the madness starts,
happy birthday, lover.
Balloons, a thousand balloons for my baby.
A thousand purple balloons.
You have no idea what's going on.
- [Tommy] Hey, baby. - [Pamela] Look up.
[Tommy] Oh my God.
Baby?
This is fucking incredible.
That's your first present right there.
Happy birthday.
- [Pamela giggling] - [Tommy] I love you.
[Pamela] I love you, baby.
To us.
[song continues]
Whoo!
[Pamela exclaiming]
[breath shuddering]
[Pamela] I think I need a break. Let's take a break.
- I can fear what's next. - [exhales]
So crazy. You know?
My parents were, actually, probably the two most insane people
ever to live on planet Earth.
[Pamela] It's snowing!
It's snowing!
[Brandon] I just know he was so happy too.
[Pamela screaming]
[Brandon] But I don't even remember that.
You know, like, 'cause by the time I was three, four-years-old,
by the time I'm starting to remember things,
it definitely wasn't all, um, sunshine and rainbows.
[somber music playing]
[Pamela] There's two Greek words for love, like eros and agape.
Eros is more about passion and sex and crazy.
Agape's more commitment and supportive and that kind of love,
and they're two different words, where love is very conflicted.
[laughing] Hello!
Robert A. Johnson says, "Romantic love is not sustainable."
As soon as I read that I was like, "Ugh. This is the worst thing I've ever read."
It's so disappointing.
Why can't we live a romantic life every day?
- [Tommy] Whoa. - Gimme, baby.
[Tommy] You look beautiful.
- Give it to me, I wanna do you. - [Tommy] No.
Wait, wait. Don't move.
[Pamela] Let me do you. Please?
I was just thinking about it upstairs. I was thinking, you know...
It's probably gonna get me a lot of shit for saying this,
but I really loved your dad, like, for all the right reasons
and I don't think I've ever loved anybody else.
[Tommy] What up, gorgeous?
- What? - [Pamela] Would that be awesome, or what?
[Tommy] What is the deal with that?
It's fucked. [chuckling]
Let's go for a walk.
[Tommy] Your fucking famous boobs.
I'm crazy for you.
- [Pamela] I love you. - [Tommy] I love you.
- [Pamela] That's hot. - [Tommy] Gimme a kiss?
[dog barking]
[thunder rumbling]
[rain pattering]
[Pamela] Hey, I'm just gonna ramble. I'm in my bathtub.
I think what it all comes down to is that
I never got over not being able to make it work with the father of my kids.
And even though I thought I could
recreate a family, or fall in love with somebody else,
it's just not me.
So I think that's probably why I keep failing in all my relationships.
And my parents, I think, were wild and crazy,
and madly in love, and made stupid decisions,
and hurt each other and hurt us.
But they stuck it out and stayed together, and I can see that they're happy now.
So I think I'd rather be alone
than not be with the father of my kids.
It's impossible to be with anybody else.
But I don't think I could be with Tommy either.
It's almost like a punishment.
- [insects chittering] - [birds chirping]
[Brandon] Here she is after another divorce,
trying to move on with her life.
Trying to have some sort of normalcy.
But then...
[ship horn blowing]
We have recently come into possession of a piece of material.
We hear about a TV show coming out about my parents and about the stolen tape.
New Hulu miniseries Pam and Tommy that so many people are talking about.
True story of the former couples' leaked sex tape.
You can see it all in the new limited series Pam and Tommy.
[Dylan] Why bring up something from 20 years ago
that you know fucked someone up?
The worst part of her life and making a semi-comedy out of it didn't make sense.
[Pamela] It really gives me nightmares.
I didn't sleep last night at all.
I have no desire to watch it. Not gonna watch it.
Never watched the tape, I'm not gonna watch this.
Who knows how they're gonna portray it?
Nobody really knows what we were going through at that time.
They should've had to have my permission.
Are you surprised it's being told now?
I mean, it's cool, I got...
Nah, I'm stoked, that's cool.
I texted Tommy the other day and said, "How do you feel about everything?"
And he goes, "Pamela, just don't let it hurt you
as much as it did the first time."
- [birds chirping] - [dog barking]
[Pamela] To this day, I do not know who stole the tape.
I don't wanna figure it out.
There's no use figuring out anything about it.
The damage is done.
Why would I wanna go through that again?
I know the storm is coming.
I really don't know where I'm gonna go next, I feel restless.
[woman] How our wanting to love, our yearning for love,
our loving itself, becomes an addiction.
[Pamela] I was taking a month just to kind of regroup after my divorce here.
[woman] ...severity of our problem before we can begin to recover from it.
We who love obsessively are full of fear.
Fear of being alone.
[Pamela] I called Brandon and he said,
"I thought you said you retired and wanna build houses on your property in Canada."
And I was like, "I think I need a little more than that."
I'm starting to get a little restless."
I'm a little bit stir-crazy and... but I'm trying to calm down.
But maybe I'm not meant to be calmed down.
And, literally, just putting that out there into the universe,
Broadway called.
Got it!
[gasping]
It's the real deal. They sent me the script, so it must be real.
They really want me to do this.
Ugh. If I can only see it. Oh my God, is that cool or what?
Roxie!
I know. I'm so excited.
They said, "I want you in LA next week."
"Two weeks of rehearsal, one month of rehearsal in New York,
two months on Broadway, eight shows a week, we're doing this."
[Pamela chuckling]
- [man] I can take this one 'cause... - [Pamela] The others will match.
[man] Yup.
[Pamela] Oh my God.
There we go. I don't have to do the treadmill today.
This is just my shoes.
[chuckling] Mostly my shoes.
Um, we're not gonna get crazy, we're doing classic.
Which one do you think is better? [laughs]
These are New York.
These are Broadway.
[Jonathan] Oh yeah, this is it!
I'm gonna have four months of just, like, I'm gonna do Broadway,
I'm gonna wear whatever the hell I want,
and... and everyone can just suck it.
[Jonathan laughing]
I'm taking both.
I'm not a natural singer, not a natural dancer.
I'm so afraid, but I like those moments that come up and I go,
"Oh my gosh. Can I do this?"
When those moments happen, run with it.
Don't overthink it. I don't overthink anything.
Thinking is overrated.
[Jonathan chuckling]
[Pamela] Oh, my veil!
My wedding veil.
Hmm, one of them.
[Jonathan] Which husband?
[Pamela] I don't know, I may have used it for a couple.
I recycle.
[inspiring music playing]
- [Pamela] They're really expensive. - [both laughing]
You know, it's okay to start something new in your fifties.
Can't believe I even said that word.
[music fades]
[Pamela] And the only thing that can ruin this, as we all know,
don't meet any men.
Just focus.
You know what? For once in my life, just be in love with myself.
[chuckling] Have a love affair with myself.
Wake me up when there's a veggie burger in front of me.
[both laughing]
[Gregory] Even for musical theater performers,
it's a tight schedule.
It's tight, I'm not gonna lie.
It's like jumping on the express train when you thought it was local,
and you're like, "Oh shit, I'm missing my stop."
You know, it's like that all day.
No move in this show is without intention.
And this is why Annie always looked for and hired actors first.
- Then dancers and singers. - Actors first. Right.
[chuckling]
Look, the little gay boy in me was like,
"Oh my God! Pamela Anderson, yes!" [laughing]
I probably, somewhere, in my lifetime, have tried to be Pamela Anderson.
[Gregory humming rhythmically]
Boom! There we go.
I wanna do one more thing, which is the Mess Around, all right?
So it's just rotating the hips around.
Oh, well.
Shit, you got that.
[Gregory laughing]
I've been messing around a long time.
[both laughing]
[Pamela] I feel like it's probably the first time I'm really doing something
for no other reason than just for myself.
I could think, "It's great for the kids if I do this."
And I go, "No, I'm doing this for me, actually."
- Yes. - [sighs]
So this isn't a hot flash, this is actually work?
[Pamela laughing]
[cell phone ringing]
[Pamela] Babe.
- Hello. - [Pamela] Hi, sweetheart.
[Brandon] You know the show? I watched the first three episodes.
How'd you watch the first three episodes? Three episodes were last night?
[Brandon] Yeah, here's the thing, right?
It's like, you know the guy that stole the tape?
They try to, like, give him reasons for stealing this shit
because Dad was an asshole and didn't pay him.
Did Dylan watch it?
[Brandon] Uh, I told Dylan not to.
[inhales deeply]
Yeah. [sighing]
Oh God, I just...
I'm like shaking.
This feels really weird. I'm just sorry that you guys had to go through it.
That people think, "Oh, poor Pamela," or it's poor you, Dylan,
Dad, you know, Grandma and Grandpa.
Okay. Well, thanks for keeping me updated, but just...
If this... [exhales] Yeah, this is a big conversation.
- I love you, baby. - [Brandon] Yeah. I love you.
Oh God.
[Pamela sighing heavily]
Ugh, yeah.
Yeah, I didn't know that.
[gasps]
Oh, well.
This is called an emotional eat.
I'm emotionally eating now.
This is vegan.
Oh my God. This is so good.
If there was ever a moment I could eat a croissant, it's now.
I blocked that out of my life. I had to, in order to survive, really.
It was a survival mechanism,
and now that it's all coming up again, I feel sick.
From my... my whole stomach,
from the middle of my chest all the way down to...
Just my stomach feels right now like it's just been punched.
I don't feel good right now.
[wind whooshing]
This feels like when the tape was stolen.
Basically, you're just a thing owned by the world,
like you belong to the world.
I just feel like it's just...
Just ignore them.
Let it go.
"Now I got me a world full of yes." Right? But what does that mean?
Pamela, what does that mean? World full of yes.
Finally, I got a world full... I'm gonna be respected.
I always think for me, it's like... 'cause I've been looking for that.
And again, she always comes back to the word "me."
You know, Roxie's favorite word.
I don't think so.
Her dream isn't to be famous.
Her dream is to be respected, to be seen, and to have freedom.
- So it's not just superficial. - [Rob] Right.
[piano playing]
♪ The lady raking in the chips Is gonna be Roxie ♪
♪ Who says that murder's not an art? ♪
[piano stops]
Some good stuff, Pamela.
How's it feeling?
Uh, it feels good. It feels good.
But it feels like I'm saying... [chuckling]
♪ And who says that sex tapes Aren't an art? ♪
[all laughing]
♪ And who says That divorce is not an art? ♪
[all laughing]
[sirens wailing]
[man] Welcome.
- [Pamela] Thanks. Oh my God. - [man] Welcome to Broadway.
- Funny words. [chuckles] - Awesome.
[all chuckling]
Are you sure? No. [laughs]
- My sweet... - Yeah.
My sweet!
First freaking note.
So I think that's what it is. I need to start low.
♪ One thing I know ♪
♪ I've always known ♪
♪ I am my own ♪
We both reached for the gun!
[yelling] But I got it first!
[cast cheering]
[Pamela exhales]
It's so good. I know it's exactly setting my hips up.
Okay, that burns.
- [inspiring music playing] - [Pamela humming]
[Pamela] I don't know how I remembered any of this.
I don't even know what happened. I don't even know where I am.
- Who are you people? - [Rob chuckling]
If this is a dream, I'll be pissed.
[Rob chuckling]
[music fades]
[seagulls squawking]
[children laughing]
I feel like I'm doing it with this person.
This is me on Broadway.
So I have kind of like me,
kind of before and after a lot of the abuse in my life.
I'm really visualizing that. That we're doing this together.
That's a cold-blooded murder, Mrs. Hart. They're liable to hang you for that one.
[upbeat music playing]
[Rob] Catch.
[Pamela] I've always gone to a certain point and went, "That's good enough."
But this, I'm gonna have to go further than I've ever gone.
There was a lot of times I said, "I don't care what people think,"
'cause it's the only choice.
If I care what people think, I wouldn't be here right now.
[Rob] Boom, boom, boom, right.
[Pamela] But I care enough.
[music fades]
We're pushing through this, which is not a bad thing.
It's... it's... it's causing you to fight for it.
Just do the very beginning, while you're... while you're tired.
Just, um... [scatting] Look, I'm going to the other side.
[Pamela groaning]
[Pamela] Okay.
♪ Look at my baby and me! ♪
[children shouting indistinctly]
I think it's nice because... the expectations are so low.
[Pamela laughing]
[gentle music playing]
[Pamela] It's out of my hands.
- [Brandon] It's all in your hands. - All in my hands, but not in my hands.
[Pamela humming]
[Pamela] At the risk of complete humiliation,
I'm just gonna go for it. I'm gonna absolutely go nuts!
- He's a little worried about me. - [chuckles]
Don't worry, Brandon.
You know what? This is the thing. It's gonna be an earthquake.
A volcano.
We just don't know what's coming out of the volcano.
[laughing]
♪ Something! ♪
[Gregory] I feel it's unfair,
and it's the way of the world, I'm not naive.
Where we hear something about an actor doing a certain project
and we want to go, "What gives them the right to do that?"
"They're not this, they're not that."
But you know what? Pamela has had that her whole life.
That's what she's had to fight through,
and who are you to try to take away her dream
because of your perception of who she is and what her talent is?
[announcer] Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats.
Let people dream, let people grab stars.
Why not?
[crowd cheering]
[show music playing]
- You wanna know something? - [crowd] Yeah.
I always wanted my name in the papers.
Roxie rocks Chicago!
[crowd cheering]
[Pamela screaming]
[band playing]
♪ The name On everybody's lips is gonna be ♪
♪ Roxie! ♪
[inspirational music playing]
[inaudible]
[Brandon] "Pamela Anderson drives Chicago crowd wild in her Broadway debut."
[crowd cheering]
[Brandon] "She has returned to the spotlight for work,
bending the redemption narrative arc her way."
It's me they wanna see, not you!
"Anderson sings her big solos just fine."
"She won't be headlining Carnegie Hall in September,
but she acts the songs with vulnerability,
a hint of Marilyn Monroe flirting, and hits all the notes."
♪ Like some droopy-eyed pup ♪ [pops lips]
[Brandon] "Anderson is also very funny."
I can't go on, I can't go on, I can't go on.
No, Roxie.
[crowd laughing]
[Brandon] "I can now attest that the actress and Baywatch babe
moves confidently and carries a tune."
[crowd cheering]
[Brandon] "You know, all that jazz."
[cheering continues]
[Dylan] She's not scared of anything.
"I'm gonna go do something that no one would ever think I would do,
and actually kill it."
It's crazy. She's pretty badass.
[Brandon] Now more than ever, she's finally focused
on achieving what she wants to do,
and not worried about pleasing anyone else.
Not worried about what her boyfriend's gonna think,
if her husband's gonna get jealous.
[inspirational music continues]
[music fades]
♪ It's good, isn't it? ♪
- ♪ Grand, isn't it? ♪ - [show music playing]
♪ Great, isn't it? ♪
♪ Swell, isn't it? ♪
♪ Fun, isn't it? ♪
♪ Nowadays ♪
♪ There's men, everywhere ♪
♪ Jazz, everywhere ♪
♪ Booze, everywhere ♪
♪ Life, everywhere ♪
♪ Joy, everywhere ♪
♪ Nowadays ♪
♪ You can like the life you're living ♪
♪ You can live the life you like ♪
♪ You can even marry... ♪
I wanna embrace the past,
embrace the truth.
My life is not a woe-is-me story.
♪ And that's good, isn't it? ♪
♪ Grand, isn't it? ♪
♪ Great, isn't it? ♪
♪ Swell? ♪
[crowd cheering]
[show music crescendos]
[music fades]
I'm not a victim.
I put myself in crazy situations
and survived them.
[dramatic music playing]
[Pamela] As much pain as we can endure in our lives
is kind of like the catalyst to all the great stuff,
like poetry, music, art.
I'm grateful for all the experiences I had,
and I don't blame anybody for anything.
I'm glad it happened.
[crowd cheering emphatically]
It does feel like, uh, I've just been through a hurricane.
Feels kind of good. [giggling]
I'm sure I'm not finished.
But I have no idea what I'm gonna do next.
My kids are grown.
Um...
I'm basically alone.
And...
But I kind of like this moment right now
where I have no clue what's gonna happen,
and I know I, supposedly, at this part of my life,
I should be settled in somewhere, but...
I don't know.
Maybe I'll know next week.
[chuckling]
[groovy music playing]
- [Pamela] Hi. - [man] Hi.
[objects clattering]
I figured I'd just do, like, no makeup, no whatever.
Who cares?
Pretty soon I'll be naked with just a pillow in front of me.
- [all laughing] - Bare, Pamela!
Pamela, bare!
Raw, bare!
What if I just do all the interviews naked?
There's no mystery here.
Oh, I figured out something.
Over... If I wear these over my sunglasses, they work.
And I was like...
Like this, and I was like...
[man laughing]
It totally works!
Hi, babes.
[Dylan] Good morning.
It works when you put your glasses over your sunglasses. Can you believe that?
[Dylan] You know you can get prescription sunglasses, right?
What?
You can get prescription sunglasses?
Hey... Hey, you know it's 7:30 in the morning here?
[Pamela] Get up!
The best way to get married is to tell someone,
"I am never gonna marry you."
Within six months you're married, for sure.
That's what you do, okay?
You have to mean it. You have to mean it.
Like, you'll never marry that person, never.
Hi, Mom!
[Carol] Oh hi, sweetheart.
[Pamela] What, are you upside down again? Oh, no. Here we go again.
I'm upside down. Oh Mom, don't do it. Please don't do this. Don't do this.
Does every old person do this?
Ugh. I never want a husband again, ever.
That sucks too. [laughing]
[gentle music playing]
[music fades]