The Dark Questions That Lou Pearlman’s Netflix Documentary Dirty Pop Doesn’t Answer
Pearlman has never been prosecuted for any sex crimes, and in a 2014 case Prison Interview with Billboard magazine, he denied that he had committed any crime. “The accusations that were made in that article, none of them were proven,” he said.
In 2015, the Backstreet Boys—Carter included—shared their conflicted feelings about the man who created their band, but also stole from it. “We are so grateful [for] what he did for us, and grateful, to some extent, and to a large extent, for giving us the opportunity,” Carter said in a group interview with Seven looks“These are hard things to go through, when someone you admire, like a family member or a mentor, does something so crazy, just something you never thought they would do. Then you hear these stories. Ultimately, it’s just a sad story, not just for us or him, but for the people he hurt. So there’s a lot of internal conflict about how we feel.”
In 2020, Nick Carter’s younger brother Aaron, who also Signed with Pearlman as a child, was asked directly if Pearlman ever misbehaved with him. “Lou never did anything strange,” Carter speak a YouTube interviewer, before revealing that he was a survivor of sexual assault—just not by his manager. “I’ve known Lou since I was a kid, man. Nothing. He’s a big daddy bear, he’s like Santa Claus.” As for the financial crimes, Carter says matter-of-factly, “I don’t blame him. Why not? He spent all his money and time, invested everything into that group and gave them the careers they still have to this day. I’m not going to be the one to say, [in whiny, complaint voice] ‘Oh yeah, Lou Pearlman…’ No.”
Dirty pop superficially addressed some of the complaints of sexual misconduct. Kirkpatrick recalled Pearlman urging him and other ‘NSync band members to get in shape, grabbing their arms and asking to peek at their abs. Tammie Hilton, a nurse whom Pearlman befriended, recalled how surprised she was when Pearlman introduced her as his girlfriend at a social gathering. “I thought he was trying to force a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship,” she said, recalling a time when they kissed and “there was absolutely no spark.” When asked why she thought Pearlman introduced her as his girlfriend, Hilton replied, “He knew that people thought he was some kind of child molester or pedophile or something. I never saw that.” After a few minutes of discussion in Dirty popIn the second episode, the conversation continues. There’s little talk of the emotional wreckage Pearlman may have left behind.
Perhaps because the late manager’s most outspoken accuser, Rich Cronin, lead singer and songwriter for LFO, died of a stroke in 2010 while battling leukemia. A year before his death, Cronin forwarded his statements ARRIVE Who is Howard Stern? Asked if the manager had touched him inappropriately, Cronin said, “He did eventually.… There were a lot of guys who did. And if they did, he would take care of them. He would buy them cars.” He added, “I had to go through a lot of therapy. I was crazy.… I mean, that guy was terrible. Besides all this money stuff, he was a real creep.”
