Sleeping with the Devil (1997) -- Warning, Spoiler Alert (but Totally Worth It)

Tatonka Rating: 4.0
Director: William A. Graham
Writer: Suzanne Finstad (book), Ellen Weston (teleplay)
Key Tampon Commercial-Inspired Theme Song: “To Survive,” Music by Chris Boardman, Lyrics by Michelle Myers
Suggested Tagline: “Honk if You’re Afraid of Dick.”
Actual Tagline: [Insert a Convoluted Series of Domestic Violence Clichés Here]



Sleeping with the Devil originally aired in April of 1997 as a CBS Movie of the Week but has since nestled its way deep into Lifetime’s misandry-based repertoire. Starring Shannen Doherty (pretending to be an aspiring medical student and a good person) and Tim Matheson (and his acid-washed-enveloped prosthetic ass), the movie lays out a cut-and-dried case for how when we, as women, abandon our principles by becoming Homecoming Queen or quitting medical school to become world-renowned fitness models just to please our future husbands we will be raped and nearly killed by a hired hitman. However, it simultaneously mixes messages by showing us how we will ultimately realize we need men (especially doctors who can give us new legs when we become paralyzed) to help us achieve all our wildest dreams after we’ve made a half-hearted go at trying to make something of ourselves on our own.

Sleeping with the Devil starts with a bang (literally), as Rebecca Dubrovich (Doherty) is seen slow-motion waving and riding the Homecoming float wearing her crown and sash in a wholesome small town parade. The events dramatically unfold as we see exaggerated, blurry camera work that spells out the juxtaposition between an unnamed middle-aged man – one of many largely useless ancillary male characters in this filmic receptacle for out-of-work actors – in the crowd looking lasciviously at her, and her parents smiling proudly. Of course, as Rebecca leaves the float and heads towards the crowd, the unnamed man follows her, and she decides to walk briefly through a poorly-lit back alley, allowing him to have his way with her as the scene fades and we flash to four years later. We thankfully never have to see her coming to terms with the rape, but we do walk away with a lucid explanation for the emotional damage that tritely leads to all her ridiculously bad decisions regarding men throughout the rest of the film.

We are fed some important plot information as we learn that Rebecca has overcome some of her trauma by getting really into triathlons by day and also deciding to go above and beyond being a nurse and go to medical school by night. Though we never see her actually taking any classes or doing anything at the hospital besides gossiping with her co-workers and rejecting them when they attempt to make sexual advances towards her, throwing up in the bathroom or complaining about how much work she has to do, the frantic royalty free music tells us she is very busy and also somewhat lonely.

… Enter the deliciously elderly Dick Strang (Matheson), who pops a wheelie on his red penis of a motorcycle to impress Rebecca while she is running one day and unfairly forces her to have to show an actual emotion (anger). Millionaire Dick Strang holds several important positions, including getting sued, yelling at people on toaster-sized phones, flying to undisclosed locations and misogyny. Only one of these jobs seems to be full time (the misogyny), so he ends up eventually having a lot of time for vacations and convincing impressionable, damaged young women that he is totally awesome.



Dick stalks Rebecca silently until he completes his first and only napkin masterpiece – a childlike drawing of her running and him riding his motorcycle – which he passes to her while she’s eating alone at a restaurant. The ice is broken as she realizes that he must have been an art major, so he has to be pretty damn sensitive, and they begin their unlikely, initially sexless courtship.

If awkward romantic moments were dollars, Doherty and Matheson would have probably been paid more to be in this movie. As their relationship deepens (and she reveals that she was basically having promiscuous sex and doing hard drugs to overcome her abuse – while apparently also managing to become an R.N. – during the four years we missed), we discover that though she can have robotic sex in red silk nightgowns with Dick, she is still pretty sexually dysfunctional as she announces, “I don’t even let my mom see me naked.” That’s quite a bold statement, considering well-adjusted women call their mothers on a regular basis to come over and inspect their business. Once they break the sex barrier, Dick starts to lure her deep into the seedy, graffiti-patterned-high-cut-briefs-riddled world of fitness modeling and she struggles to stay awake as she attends random fundraisers and dinners and becomes the uneven-eyed face of his growing business empire.

Just before their relationship goes sour (shortly before Rebecca discovers she is pregnant with Dick’s child), she finds out he’s actually married when his wife shows up on their doorstep ranting, stating his full name approximately ten times interspersed with some G-rated expletives, which she apparently learned from her husband who regularly uses forceful words like “crummy” and “crap” to make particularly strong points. She also says, “There’s never been anyone but Dick in my whole life,” which is pretty easy to mishear as “There’s never been anything but Dick in my whole life,” particularly when his name is repeated by at least one character in the movie every 30 seconds to help us make the connection between the fact that his name is Dick and he also IS a total dick. The lesson we learn when Rebecca leaves him for one night to stay with her parents and Dick shows up the next day having magically started and completed his divorce proceedings overnight is that if you’re trying to convince your girlfriend that you’re really divorced, make sure it’s announced on the front page of your local paper the day it happens.

As their relationship continues its downward spiral, Tim Matheson’s wardrobe increases in intensity. Not only does he wear jeans that turn him into a human Double-Stuf Oreo™ and couple these with marvelously bland sport coats, but he also rocks the V-Neck sweaters from your high school boyfriend’s closet in 1991 and work-out gear that makes him look like a geriatric Danny Zucco … or like he just stepped off the stage after a Sha-Na-Na reunion special.



After an hour and fifteen minutes of loud arguing, open-fisted slapping, miscarriages and Witness Protection Program-style hiding out, Rebecca finally thinks she has some peace. Flying high on the wings of an anti-climactic court case, the result of which is her winning back her furniture, underwear and family photo albums from Dick, she decides there is no better way to celebrate than going down to the local donut shop in her convertible and eating an apple fritter in the parking lot. Big mistake, as she is shot in the spine by a Dick-hired man, and to add insult to injury, before she even gets one bite of the fritter. Her final act of strength is to reach up from the passenger side floor and dramatically honk the horn to call attention to her distress.

After a brief coma and receiving the startling news that she is now a paraplegic as well as some hot one-on-one innuendo-exchanging with her Latino physical therapist, Rebecca gets kicked out for being uninsured and starts to pursue a personal injury lawsuit against the now very estranged (in Europe) Dick. While researching her medical condition, she comes across a miraculously single doctor named Jerrold Petrofsky, “Jerry,” who is developing a machine that electrically stimulates muscles in the legs and has the potential to help her walk a marathon again (or kick the next man that wrongs her squarely in the nuts). Once she determines she is completely not sexually attracted to Jerry (because that’s what leads to trouble for women in relationships), she stalks him and successfully is able to trick him into allowing her to become his lab assistant.

One of Dick’s spies hunts down Rebecca while she is swimming at the research facility, and the good doctor saves her life by being there to hold her the only time during the movie Doherty is able to get really upset about anything. She introduces him to her parents to consummate the reality of the relationship. Just a tip, as taught to us by Doherty via Dubrovich, if you are a paraplegic and your parents suggestively ask you if your new husband-to-be is “good,” the best response is “He’s a good man.” The optional subtext is, “… and I can’t feel it when he’s in my vagina, but I suspect he’s there.”

Rebecca’s new deep love prompts her to proceed full force to get Dick off the streets. During a meeting with his sister (who has gone against her brother), they define another essential Lifetime movie principle. Dick’s sister states, “It won’t be safe until Dick is behind bars.” The translation of that statement is, of course, “NO woman will be safe until EVERYONE with a dick is behind bars.” Despite the defense’s attempts to prove Rebecca is incompetent with riveting, provable facts such as, “We have witnesses that will say she is a tramp,” she prevails and is awarded millions, though she believes she will never see any money because Dick is on the loose.

An inspirational movie theme song is only as powerful as its most over-used and vaguest cliché. “Standing alone on the edge of forever” and “Gotta be real strong/Keep hanging on/Do what you gotta do to survive” are stand-out lyrics in Sleeping with the Devil’s signature gem. The theme song (unheard until the final seven minutes of the film) has a chord progression that lilts eerily towards a full-on Rick Roll. A more pressing concern, however, is that after hearing just a few notes from the introductory piano that is as gentle as a warm spring day, or a vinegar-based douche, you will overdose on estrogen and immediately get your period. It also draws the important connection between walking the Honolulu Marathon with a walker less than a year after being told you will never walk again and marrying a research doctor as equally grand accomplishments for a woman.

The just desserts come at the end of the movie, when we discover that Dick Strang has been successfully and profitably running a fake passport ring using multiple identities. Proving he has the worst case of multiple personality disorder since the Yorke/Sargent debacle on Bewitched, he eludes the police for years despite never using any other first name besides “Dick” in any of his pseudonyms. He manages to get through customs freely despite having regular lawsuits filed against him during which his financial assets are scrutinized, but does not get busted for good until he fittingly becomes “Dick O’Toole” after growing a beard.

At the end of the film, an obligatory hotline for abused and battered women lingers on the screen as the inspirational theme song plays in the background and a friendly voice invites you to speak out against domestic violence. What it should say is, “If you were wronged by Tim Matheson in 1997, please call this number.”

Reviewed by Julia Rogers