REVIEW: Pam & Tommy Should Have More Lily James & Less of Everyone Else
Hulu’s new series Pam & Tommy focuses on the infamous real-life couple, Pamela Anderson (Lily James) and Tommy Lee (Sebastian Stan) and the even more infamous sex tape that changed their lives forever in the mid 1990s. The series follows the pair from their first meeting, to their whirlwind wedding, to the aftermath of the release of their sex tape. The show also focuses on the men, Rand Gauthier (Seth Rogen), the construction worker who stole the tape, and Uncle Miltie (Nick Offerman), a porn director, who, without the couple’s permission, released the tape onto the worldwide web.
Directed by Craig Gillespie and written by Robert D. Siegel, the show’s creator, Siegel, claims that they were trying to change the narrative behind the Anderson/Lee sex tape, but they did anything but in this series. The show focused too much on the “sexual themes” surrounding the pair’s rocky relationship rather then how the tape affected the lives of Lee and Anderson. When it wasn’t focusing on the sexual themes surrounding their relationship, it instead ruined potentially great moments by instead tipping the scales of reality and focusing on Rogen’s Rand jerking off multiple times or Stan’s Lee having a drug fueled conversation with his penis. None of these scenes made any sense nor did they help change the narrative at all. If anything they distracted from the overall story and left people with what they believe to already know.
The only shining moment in this new series is Lily James as Pamela Anderson. When the story focuses solely on Anderson, the struggles she faced trying to prove she is not just a “sex symbol”, and her feelings about her body being readily available for the public to view without her consent, the show truly begins to delve into the real problem and becomes an interesting and complex tale. It’s in these moments when James fully becomes Anderson. Yes, they are blips where you realize that is it James under all the makeup and prosthetics, but most of the time you feel like you are watching Anderson. However, these moments are few and far between because the second you get a great scene the writers deviate back to their over the top raunchy ways. You spend the entire series feeling like the show is taking two steps forward just to take seventeen steps back two minutes later.
Stan, Rogen, and Offerman are good as Lee, Rand, and Uncle Miltie, but they do not hold a candle to James. There were times where I couldn’t get past the idea that I was watching Rogen or Stan on screen. I didn’t feel like either of them brought the character to life enough that I forgot about who was playing them. I will say Offerman did not have this problem. At no point did I think that it was Offerman playing Uncle Miltie. He pulled off scum perfectly.
I went into this show with the expectation of liking it, especially with the talent involved. However, I had to force myself to finish this series. The whole series basically feels like a parody of itself and never focuses on the terrible events caused by the release of the tape. I recommend passing on this series and checking something else. If you are a diehard Stan, James, or Rogen fan, then you are going to watch no matter what. But, for everyone else, go watch another piece of work by the three stars.