Rev. Dr. A. Stephen Pieters, the AIDS activist and longtime HIV survivor known informally and widely as Steve Pieters following his groundbreaking 1985 interview by televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker, died July 8 in Los Angeles after a two-week hospitalization with an infection. He was 70.
His death was announced by spokesperson Harlan Boll.
The historic Bakker-Pieters interview, one of the earliest sympathetic presentations of a gay man with AIDS made all the more remarkable by Bakker’s then-elevated status in the evangelical community, was depicted in the 2021 feature film The Eyes of Tammy Faye starring Jessica Chastain as Bakker and featuring Randy Havens of Stranger Things as Pieters.
In a statement, Chastain, who won an Oscar for her performance, said, “Steve Pieters was an inspiration and advocate for those living with HIV/AIDS for over 35 years. He was a constant reminder that God is Love. Rest in Peace sweet angel Steve. You made...
His death was announced by spokesperson Harlan Boll.
The historic Bakker-Pieters interview, one of the earliest sympathetic presentations of a gay man with AIDS made all the more remarkable by Bakker’s then-elevated status in the evangelical community, was depicted in the 2021 feature film The Eyes of Tammy Faye starring Jessica Chastain as Bakker and featuring Randy Havens of Stranger Things as Pieters.
In a statement, Chastain, who won an Oscar for her performance, said, “Steve Pieters was an inspiration and advocate for those living with HIV/AIDS for over 35 years. He was a constant reminder that God is Love. Rest in Peace sweet angel Steve. You made...
- 7/10/2023
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Rev. Stephen Pieters, the influential HIV/AIDS activist and survivor whose televised interview with Tammy Faye Bakker in 1985 transformed him into a national spokesperson in the battle against the disease, has died. He was 70.
Pieters died Saturday in Los Angeles after being hospitalized two weeks earlier with an infection, publicist Harlan Boll announced.
Pieters had been diagnosed with AIDS-related complex in 1982 and Kaposi sarcoma and Stage 4 lymphoma in 1984 when he appeared via satellite on the Bakker-hosted Tammy’s House Party, seen by millions of evangelical Christians throughout the southeastern U.S. on the Ptl Network.
“She wanted to be the first televangelist to interview a gay man with AIDS,” Pieters told People magazine two years ago. “It was a very scary time, and there was still a lot of fear about AIDS and about being around a person with AIDS. And I thought the opportunity to reach an audience that...
Pieters died Saturday in Los Angeles after being hospitalized two weeks earlier with an infection, publicist Harlan Boll announced.
Pieters had been diagnosed with AIDS-related complex in 1982 and Kaposi sarcoma and Stage 4 lymphoma in 1984 when he appeared via satellite on the Bakker-hosted Tammy’s House Party, seen by millions of evangelical Christians throughout the southeastern U.S. on the Ptl Network.
“She wanted to be the first televangelist to interview a gay man with AIDS,” Pieters told People magazine two years ago. “It was a very scary time, and there was still a lot of fear about AIDS and about being around a person with AIDS. And I thought the opportunity to reach an audience that...
- 7/10/2023
- by Mike Barnes
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Welcome to this week’s “Just for Variety.”
Dylan O’Brien, who shot to fame playing Stiles Stilinski on MTV’s “Teen Wolf,” is opening up about not joining Paramount Plus’ upcoming film revival of the hit television series.
“It was a difficult decision. A lot went into it,” O’Brien told me earlier today while promoting his new movie “The Outfit” (more on that later). “The show couldn’t be more dear to me. It was the first thing I ever did I and so many people there are extremely dear to me. It was something I was trying to make work but it all happened very fast. We didn’t really know that it was happening and they kind of just threw it at us a little bit, which is fine because we all love the show. We were trying to figure it out.”
However, he says, “Ultimately, I...
Dylan O’Brien, who shot to fame playing Stiles Stilinski on MTV’s “Teen Wolf,” is opening up about not joining Paramount Plus’ upcoming film revival of the hit television series.
“It was a difficult decision. A lot went into it,” O’Brien told me earlier today while promoting his new movie “The Outfit” (more on that later). “The show couldn’t be more dear to me. It was the first thing I ever did I and so many people there are extremely dear to me. It was something I was trying to make work but it all happened very fast. We didn’t really know that it was happening and they kind of just threw it at us a little bit, which is fine because we all love the show. We were trying to figure it out.”
However, he says, “Ultimately, I...
- 3/9/2022
- by Marc Malkin
- Variety Film + TV
Monday’s Oscar Nominees Luncheon tried hard to be a normal event. But in this odd, stop-and-start, elongated awards season, it should come as no surprise that it didn’t quite pull it off.
The annual event, an Academy Award tradition since the early 1980s, was celebratory and collegial, as this luncheon always is. But it also had a tentative air to it, as if nobody was quite secure with the idea of gathering, largely unmasked, in a tightly-packed room at the Fairmont Century Plaza – and the fact that the usual “class photo” was not taken in one big group but in about 10 separate photos of smaller groups of nominees made things even odder.
“This. Is. The. Year,” said Oscar show producer Will Packer in his speech welcoming 169 nominees to the event. “If there was ever a time to revel in a celebration, this is the year.”
But between Covid...
The annual event, an Academy Award tradition since the early 1980s, was celebratory and collegial, as this luncheon always is. But it also had a tentative air to it, as if nobody was quite secure with the idea of gathering, largely unmasked, in a tightly-packed room at the Fairmont Century Plaza – and the fact that the usual “class photo” was not taken in one big group but in about 10 separate photos of smaller groups of nominees made things even odder.
“This. Is. The. Year,” said Oscar show producer Will Packer in his speech welcoming 169 nominees to the event. “If there was ever a time to revel in a celebration, this is the year.”
But between Covid...
- 3/8/2022
- by Steve Pond
- The Wrap
The Eyes of Tammy Faye star Jessica Chastain joined makeup department head Linda Dowds and prosthetics designer Justin Raleigh for a virtual panel at Deadline’s Contenders Film: The Nominees event.
Chastain stars as Tammy Faye Bakker in the biographical drama directed by Michael Showalter. The Searchlight Pictures film tracks the rise and fall of Tammy Faye’s televangelist career as she and her husband Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield) go from creating the Ptl network to Jim being arrested for felony charges of accounting fraud.
In one of the scenes from the film, Tammy Faye interviews Steve Pieters, an openly gay minister with AIDS, during a time where religious figures were against the LGBTQ+ community.
“Tammy Faye is about unconditional love and loving without judgment,” Chastain said. “I grew up in the ’80s and I remember how much homophobia and fear that there was. And for Tammy to bring someone...
Chastain stars as Tammy Faye Bakker in the biographical drama directed by Michael Showalter. The Searchlight Pictures film tracks the rise and fall of Tammy Faye’s televangelist career as she and her husband Jim Bakker (Andrew Garfield) go from creating the Ptl network to Jim being arrested for felony charges of accounting fraud.
In one of the scenes from the film, Tammy Faye interviews Steve Pieters, an openly gay minister with AIDS, during a time where religious figures were against the LGBTQ+ community.
“Tammy Faye is about unconditional love and loving without judgment,” Chastain said. “I grew up in the ’80s and I remember how much homophobia and fear that there was. And for Tammy to bring someone...
- 3/5/2022
- by Ryan Fleming
- Deadline Film + TV
Welcome to this week’s “Just for Variety.”
Reggaeton star Adassa, who made her acting debut starring as Dolores in “Encanto,” says she’s “not surprised” that Disney didn’t submit the song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” for Oscar consideration because “Dos Oruguitas,” which is up for best song, is the “heart and soul of the film.” She adds, “Did we know ‘Bruno’ was going to become what it is? No!” Even though it isn’t nominated, Adassa is hoping she will get to perform it at the Oscars: “Hand me the mic. I’m ready for the stage!”
Adassa auditioned for Dolores with a performance of Céline Dion’s “All by Myself.” But then she got Covid. “I was almost dying,” she recalls. “I told doctors I wanted to go home and die with my kids [she and husband Gabriel Candiani have seven children]. So I came home and wrote...
Reggaeton star Adassa, who made her acting debut starring as Dolores in “Encanto,” says she’s “not surprised” that Disney didn’t submit the song “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” for Oscar consideration because “Dos Oruguitas,” which is up for best song, is the “heart and soul of the film.” She adds, “Did we know ‘Bruno’ was going to become what it is? No!” Even though it isn’t nominated, Adassa is hoping she will get to perform it at the Oscars: “Hand me the mic. I’m ready for the stage!”
Adassa auditioned for Dolores with a performance of Céline Dion’s “All by Myself.” But then she got Covid. “I was almost dying,” she recalls. “I told doctors I wanted to go home and die with my kids [she and husband Gabriel Candiani have seven children]. So I came home and wrote...
- 2/23/2022
- by Marc Malkin
- Variety Film + TV
Jessica Chastain transformed into flamboyant televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker in the new film “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” for which she just earned an Oscar nomination. It is the actress’s third bid at the Oscars, with previous nominations for “The Help” (2011) and “Zero Dark Thirty” (2012).
Chastain spoke with Gold Derby senior editor Denton Davidson last month about what drew her to playing Bakker, working alongside actors like Andrew Garfield and Cherry Jones and her memories of her first Oscars experience. Watch the full interview above and read the complete transcript below.
SEELinda Dowds and Stephanie Ingram interview: ‘The Eyes of Tammy Faye’ hair and makeup
Gold Derby: Jessica, you’ve been nominated for a Critics Choice Award, the accolades are piling on for this performance, and I think that’s just because you really went for it with this portrayal of an over-the-top, complicated, fascinating human being. And this...
Chastain spoke with Gold Derby senior editor Denton Davidson last month about what drew her to playing Bakker, working alongside actors like Andrew Garfield and Cherry Jones and her memories of her first Oscars experience. Watch the full interview above and read the complete transcript below.
SEELinda Dowds and Stephanie Ingram interview: ‘The Eyes of Tammy Faye’ hair and makeup
Gold Derby: Jessica, you’ve been nominated for a Critics Choice Award, the accolades are piling on for this performance, and I think that’s just because you really went for it with this portrayal of an over-the-top, complicated, fascinating human being. And this...
- 2/19/2022
- by Kevin Jacobsen
- Gold Derby
In 2021, the ways in which women can define themselves, their identities and their successes is more complex and diverse than ever before, but tradition — and the expectation of adherence to that tradition — continues to exert a powerful influence on how easily or confidently these individuals navigate the spaces they’re creating for themselves.
Many of the most memorable stories told on screen this year examined that topic, portraying women of all different ages as they reckon with the roles that society believes they should fill, which come with duties their culture or beliefs tells them they must fulfill, or that lead them down paths, personally or professionally, that the world pressures them to follow. And judges mercilessly when they don’t.
When these stories are of real women — technically or actually — some of those challenges are easier to dramatize, thanks to the actual challenges they faced, or the context in...
Many of the most memorable stories told on screen this year examined that topic, portraying women of all different ages as they reckon with the roles that society believes they should fill, which come with duties their culture or beliefs tells them they must fulfill, or that lead them down paths, personally or professionally, that the world pressures them to follow. And judges mercilessly when they don’t.
When these stories are of real women — technically or actually — some of those challenges are easier to dramatize, thanks to the actual challenges they faced, or the context in...
- 1/21/2022
- by Todd Gilchrist
- Variety Film + TV
In a short period since blasting out of a cannon on the big screen in Terence Malick’s Oscar nominated and Palme d’Or-winning The Tree of Life in 2011, Jessica Chastain has quickly built a resume of playing strong willed women. Alas, some are Greek tragic heroes, who reach for the stars, only to fall short; Tammy Faye Bakker being one of them. She, along with her husband Jim Bakker, built Ptl into a massive multi-million dollar earning evangelical television network, a solid amount he siphoned for personal use, ultimately serving close to five years in jail. Tammy Faye Bakker meant a lot of things to a lot of people: a soulful Christian singer, a sensitive preacher who reached across the aisle to recognize the plight of LGBT during the AIDS epidemic, as well as material for late-night talk show hosts in her ambitious fashion and make-up sense. Chastain yearned...
- 12/6/2021
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
Jessica Chastain knew she wanted to make a movie about Tammy Faye Bakker’s life when she was watching the documentary “The Eyes of Tammy Faye” and saw the late televangelist’s 1985 interview on “The Ptl Club” with Steve Pieters, a gay minister who was diagnosed with HIV.
“I was just like, whoa, we were in a time in this nation where the government isn’t acknowledging the AIDS epidemic and here is this Christian woman in a community, a very conservative televangelist [community], and she is being rebellious,” Chastain tells me on this week’s episode of the “Just for Variety” podcast. “And she’s bringing Steve Pieters on. He’s an openly gay minister. And not only is she talking to him about his experience of coming out to his family but she looks at the audience and says, ‘We as mom and dads need to love through anything,...
“I was just like, whoa, we were in a time in this nation where the government isn’t acknowledging the AIDS epidemic and here is this Christian woman in a community, a very conservative televangelist [community], and she is being rebellious,” Chastain tells me on this week’s episode of the “Just for Variety” podcast. “And she’s bringing Steve Pieters on. He’s an openly gay minister. And not only is she talking to him about his experience of coming out to his family but she looks at the audience and says, ‘We as mom and dads need to love through anything,...
- 9/24/2021
- by Marc Malkin
- Variety Film + TV
In new film The Eyes of Tammy Faye, the unusually accepting religious TV star is brought to life by Jessica Chastain
Thirty-six years have passed but, at a cinema in New York this week, the memories came flooding back for Steve Pieters.
The Aids activist was attending the premiere of The Eyes of Tammy Faye, a film that includes a recreation of a seminal TV interview he gave to Christian televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker in 1985.
Thirty-six years have passed but, at a cinema in New York this week, the memories came flooding back for Steve Pieters.
The Aids activist was attending the premiere of The Eyes of Tammy Faye, a film that includes a recreation of a seminal TV interview he gave to Christian televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker in 1985.
- 9/18/2021
- by David Smith in Washington
- The Guardian - Film News
In 1985, after thousands of gay men had died of AIDS in the U.S., Tammy Faye Bakker interviewed an openly gay pastor with HIV/AIDS named Steve Pieters on a national Christian television program.
“How sad that we as Christians, who are supposed to love everyone, are so afraid of an AIDS patient that we will not put our arm around them and tell them that we care,” Tammy, through teary eyes and smudged makeup, said then on The Ptl Club, the televangelist network she founded with husband Jim Bakker and which spectacularly collapsed after he was convicted of mass fraud and conspiracy.
In “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” a new biographical film starring Jessica Chastain as Tammy and Andrew Garfield as Jim Bakker that interview with Pieters is recreated verbatim as the centerpiece of the film to highlight Bakker’s complicated character of Christian evangelism, uncommon empathy, and accidental gay iconography.
“How sad that we as Christians, who are supposed to love everyone, are so afraid of an AIDS patient that we will not put our arm around them and tell them that we care,” Tammy, through teary eyes and smudged makeup, said then on The Ptl Club, the televangelist network she founded with husband Jim Bakker and which spectacularly collapsed after he was convicted of mass fraud and conspiracy.
In “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” a new biographical film starring Jessica Chastain as Tammy and Andrew Garfield as Jim Bakker that interview with Pieters is recreated verbatim as the centerpiece of the film to highlight Bakker’s complicated character of Christian evangelism, uncommon empathy, and accidental gay iconography.
- 9/15/2021
- by Michael Appler
- Variety Film + TV
Jessica Chastain is physically transformed in the official trailer for “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” the latest directorial effort from “The Big Sick” filmmaker Michael Showalter. Chastain stars in the Searchlight Pictures-backed drama opposite Andrew Garfield, Cherry Jones, Fredric Lehne, Louis Cancelmi, Sam Jaeger, Gabriel Olds, Mark Wystrach, and Vincent D’Onofrio. With its September release date, expect “Tammy Faye” to turn up at a fall festival like TIFF and possibly factor into the upcoming awards season. Searchlight is coming off a Best Picture win for “Nomadland.”
The official synopsis for “The Eyes of Tammy Faye” from Searchlight Pictures reads: “[The film] is an intimate look at the extraordinary rise, fall, and redemption of televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker. In the 1970s and ’80s, Tammy Faye and her husband, Jim Bakker (Garfield), rose from humble beginnings to create the world’s largest religious broadcasting network and theme park, and were revered for their message of love,...
The official synopsis for “The Eyes of Tammy Faye” from Searchlight Pictures reads: “[The film] is an intimate look at the extraordinary rise, fall, and redemption of televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker. In the 1970s and ’80s, Tammy Faye and her husband, Jim Bakker (Garfield), rose from humble beginnings to create the world’s largest religious broadcasting network and theme park, and were revered for their message of love,...
- 6/9/2021
- by Zack Sharf
- Indiewire
IMDb.com, Inc. takes no responsibility for the content or accuracy of the above news articles, Tweets, or blog posts. This content is published for the entertainment of our users only. The news articles, Tweets, and blog posts do not represent IMDb's opinions nor can we guarantee that the reporting therein is completely factual. Please visit the source responsible for the item in question to report any concerns you may have regarding content or accuracy.