What Band Tommy Lee Is In During Pam & Tommy (& What’s Next)

Warning: contains spoilers for Pam and Tommy.

In Pam and Tommy, Tommy Lee (Sebastian Stan) is in a band – but what band is it, and where did it next take Lee’s real-life music career? Pam and Tommy premiered on Hulu with a three-episode release on February 2, 2022. The show, based on the 2014 Rolling Stone article “Pam and Tommy: The Untold Story of the World’s Most Famous Sex Tape” by Amanda Chicago Lewis, follows the true story of the salacious Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee sex tape released on the internet in the mid-90s. The couple made the 54-minute tape for themselves after their Cancun wedding, until it was stolen by a contractor working on renovations in their Malibu home and sold on the web as revenge porn. The contractor, Seth Rogen’s Rand Gauthier, distributed the tape with the help of porn filmmaker Milton “Uncle Milty” Ingley (Nick Offerman). Despite the obvious criminal nature of the act, Gauthier was never held fully accountable for his actions.

The first three episodes in this limited series structure around establishing who its three main characters are. Stan is able to portray Lee in all his brazen rock star glory, two-minute-long penis conversation and all. The first two episodes show Lee with musician friends named Zakk (Sam Meader) and Ace (Zack Gold), with Pam and Tommy episode 3 showing Lee watching a disheartening Behind the Music episode about Mötley Crüe. The Pam and Tommy cast of characters take great lengths to portray the show’s real-life figures accurately. Sebastian Stan’s Tommy Lee is, by many accounts, very much like the real Lee, who is the only one of the former couple who gave approval for Hulu’s show despite Lily James’ best efforts to contact Pamela Anderson.

Tommy Lee was indeed in a band during the events depicted in Pam and Tommy. Lee is most famous for being the drummer and co-founder of Mötley Crüe, one of the biggest hard rock/hair metal bands of the ’80s. During the events of Pam and Tommy,  Mötley Crüe was going through a tumultuous time due to the rising popularity of grunge and alternative music, as evidenced by Pam and Tommy’s eclectic soundtrack. As Stan’s performance shows, Lee was going through a period of stagnation during this time as a result of hair metal’s declining popularity. In 1999, he finally left Mötley Crüe, forming the nu metal band Methods of Mayhem during Mötley Crüe’s hiatus, and in 2006, he formed the short-lived group Rock Star Supernova. Lee also had a solo career and worked with many musicians including Rob Zombie and Nine Inch Nails. Mötley Crüe later reunited and has toured intermittently over the years, with Tommy Lee rejoining them for their Crüe’s Greatest Hits in 1999, and again in 2004 to record the double-disc anthology album Red, White & Crüe, which went quadruple platinum.

Pam and Tommy is expected to show Mötley Crüe in coming episodes, with Paul Guzman playing vocalist Vince Neil, Iker Amaya playing bassist/pianist Nikki Sixx, and Chris Mann playing lead guitarist Mick Mars. Regarding Lee’s friends in the show, no musicians in either Mötley Crüe or Methods of Mayhem are named Zakk or Ace, and neither of the characters resembles the potential name influences of guitarist Zakk Wylde or KISS’s Ace Frehley. Furthermore, no sources provide last names for the characters to imply that they’re based on real people.

With occasional story changes and creative liberties taken, Pam and Tommy is largely accurate to the real-life events that happened. Tommy Lee was always a key component of Mötley Crüe, having helped form the band with Sixx in 1981 and going on to release hits like “Kickstart My Heart,” “Dr. Feelgood,” and “Shout at the Devil.” With Pam and Tommy focusing primarily on the lives of Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, it’s only natural for Lee’s music career to make its way into the show.

Pam & Tommy releases new episodes of the limited series every Wednesday on Hulu.

About The Author

Allison Wonchoba
(79 Articles Published)

Allison Wonchoba is a Features writer on Screen Rant. She holds a degree in Cinema and English, and she knows (probably) all things film and TV. Working at Hot Topic for a couple years also helped her know all things pop culture-y. Once upon a time, she also interned at a radio station in Dublin, Ireland where she got more media training – and built up her Sudoku skills on the side. She likes Pina Coladas and gettin’ caught in the rain – and she knows that’s NOT a Jimmy Buffet song.

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