The Honeymooners

By Romesh Ratnesar

No matter what artistic accomplishments will grace this new year, America will always have Pamela and Tommy Lee. Shortly after their marriage in 1995, the bosomy former Baywatch actress and the heavily tattooed drummer of the rock band Motley Crue put together a home videotape that included episodes of explicit sex. The tape, allegedly stolen from the couple's Malibu, Calif., home soon after it was made, is now infamous, turning up at dinner parties in Hollywood and in media offices in New York City. This month, voyeurs everywhere get their chance to ogle. A Seattle-based adult-entertainment company will release in video stores a 60-minute, digitally remastered version of the domestic affairs of the Lees. Discriminating viewers may choose among several formats: standard VHS ($35.95), CD-ROM ($18.95) or the new Digital Video Disc that includes a photo gallery and multiple screens ($29.95).

The tape has been the subject of nearly two years of litigation. In 1996 the Lees filed a $10 million lawsuit against Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione to prevent the magazine from publishing still photographs gleaned from the tape. The Lees lost, and Penthouse ran the photos that June. Meanwhile, copies of the purloined video found their way into the hands of various Internet impresarios, who began posting shots of the more graphic scenes on their Websites. Last fall the Lees went to court seeking an injunction against the Seattle company, Internet Entertainment Group, which had announced its intention to air the short film on its Website. A Superior Court judge denied the request, in part because the Lees undermined their invasion of privacy claim by quite publicly discussing the contents of the tape on Howard Stern's radio show. In December the couple reached a settlement with IEG, the terms of which neither side will discuss--although IEG now heralds the video it is selling as the "Only Legal Version" of "the most controversial tape ever made."

So much for the legal wranglings. What does the tape offer? For the most part, relatively mild stuff: Pam and Tommy fishing, camping, gardening and cooing newlywed niceties to each other. O.K., there's also plenty of camera time for the pair's respective endowments and several minutes of hard-core sex in inspired locations like California's Highway 15. The IEG tape enhances these moments with slow-motion replays and a pornish sound track. At least a few viewers, including Seth Warshasky, the head of IEG, think the Lees staged the whole thing. "It's a publicity stunt," he says. "The tape looks like it was produced to be shown." Perhaps there's no such thing as overexposure.

--By Romesh Ratnesar