God of war faye1/25/2024 ![]() ![]() © 2021 20th Century Studios All Rights Reserved The Bakker Empire Andrew Garfield as “Jim Bakker” and Jessica Chastain as “Tammy Faye Bakker” in the film THE EYES OF TAMMY FAYE. Though Messner is still remembered for her eccentricities (real or imagined) and the scandals that toppled her husband’s ministry, Chastain is hoping the movie and her performance will spark a reevaluation. He loves you just the way you are.’ What a radical thing to say and to remind Christians of.” And here she’s just kind of like, ‘God loves everybody. “Especially in this world, controlled by white men. “It was shocking that this televangelist did this,” Chastain says. For one thing, the image of Tammy Faye with streaks of mascara down her face appears to be an example of the Mandela Effect, as there’s no actual footage of it to be found (although it was a regular gag on SNL where Jan Hooks would regularly skewer Messner).įor another thing, as Chastain says, Messner “was punk rock.” Although rarely remembered now, Messner was welcoming of the LGBTQ community at a time when most American Christians shuddered at the association, and reached out to HIV/AIDS patients when vanishingly few other public figures, Christian or otherwise, would. “Why hasn’t anyone made this movie?”Ĭhastain started to reevaluate her notion of Tammy Faye, and what she found was surprising. “She’s amazing,” Chastain recalls thinking at the time. That happened during the press tour for Zero Dark Thirty, when Chastain stumbled across the 2000 documentary (also called The Eyes of Tammy Faye ), which is narrated by Ru Paul. It wasn’t until later, after her career had taken off, that she had the opportunity to revisit her understanding. ![]() “The makeup running down her face and all that stuff.” “I knew the joke of Tammy Faye,” she says. So, Chastain had little connection to the Bakker industrial complex outside of the cultural schadenfreude, which was fodder for Saturday Night Live and late night TV hosts by the time she was entering middle school. “My family had some negative experiences in organized religion, which is why they chose not to raise their children in it,” she says. Chastain says her childhood was challenging, and she wasn’t raised with any real context of faith. That’s what it’s based on.”Ĭhastain grew up in Sacramento, California, raised by her mother who was just 16 years old when she was born. “Tammy Faye was someone who could reach those who felt like they had no connection to grace and to remind them that for her - and this is also what I believe too - that love is for them too. And if the public imagination of Tammy Faye’s life can be corrected, maybe it’s understanding of God can be, too. The Eyes of Tammy Faye is a big role for Chastain, but the movie is also a passion project. Hers is a story that’s widely known but poorly understood, with most Americans just remembering a few broad plot headlines of the story and, of course, the image of the late Messner herself - caked in makeup, lips quivering, rivers of mascara running down her cheeks as the organ music floats skyward to glory. ![]() The Eyes of Tammy Faye puts a spotlight on the mother of all televangelist scandals, charting the astonishing rise and sudden demise of the Jim Bakker and Tammy Faye Messner PTL empire (after her divorce from Bakker, Tammy Faye remarried a building contractor named Roe Messner). Now she’s starring in another touchpoint, one that will interest Christian audiences from a slightly different angle. That movie’s sweeping grandiosity puts it among the most important movies about the Christian faith of the last decade, and it’s anchored in Chastain’s rapturous performance. But for many, her most famous work to date was opposite Brad Pitt in Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life. She’s one her generation’s most sought-after actors, nominated for two Oscars and the winner of a Golden Globe for her work in Zero Dark Thirty. That won’t surprise anyone who has familiarity with her work. ![]() “My life is deeply based in faith,” she says. It’s an idyllic setting, which is appropriate enough, given our conversation. Jessica Chastain is sitting outside, her head wreathed by little flowers blooming on the trees behind her. ![]()
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