TAMMY Faye up close: eyelashes the length of a newborn’s fingers, tattooed eyebrows and tawny skin that comes only from a bottle.

On her way to a TV taping, the 58-year-old wears a slinky slit skirt and silver sandals with towering Lucite heels. Her lavender twin sweater set grapples with her enormous, tanned cleavage.

“If I looked all dowdy, no one would want what I’ve got,” says the subject of “The Eyes of Tammy Faye,” a documentary opening tomorrow at the Empire.

“I’ve set a lot of Christian women free. They felt they had to look dowdy, not sexy, and they couldn’t be fashion conscious.

“There’s nothing wrong with being sexy. Christians like sex, too.”

Her look has made Tammy Faye Messner, formerly Bakker, one of the best-known – and oft-ridiculed – figures of the ’80s.

Now she’s the subject of a film – complete with RuPaul voice-over – painting her as a gay camp hero like Ivana Trump or Bette Midler.

“I think they like my style,” she says, recalling how gay men lavished her with presents and money when her current husband, retired contractor Roe Messner, was jailed for fraud in 1996.

“For Christmas, they sent me a beautiful robe with my name in gold and a leopard throw … I don’t know who they are – they’re just guys who came into my life.”

For the last few days, Tammy Faye has been on a breakneck media tour to promote the documentary.

She says she doesn’t stand to profit financially, but wants people to see her side.

The film largely blames the Rev. Jerry Falwell for the downfall of the Praise The Lord (PTL) Club, the Christian television network she founded with her ex-husband, Jim Bakker.

“Right now, history is not written correctly,” she says, while riding through Queens in a limousine.

It’s been 20 years since her then-husband met church employee Jessica Hahn in a hotel room for the tryst that undid the Bakkers’ heavenly empire.

They were the First Couple of Christian television, presiding over PTL as well as Heritage USA, a popular Christian theme park.

Tammy Faye, the oldest of eight kids from a poor Minnesota family, had discovered Jesus at age 10, false eyelashes at age 16 and Jim Bakker at age 18.

The two quickly married and set off for revival tents around the U.S.

In 1965, they started a Jesus-based, low-rent puppet show that sowed the seeds for a multibillion-dollar TV kingdom.

But in 1987, PTL began to fall apart. Falwell took the helm of the network and Heritage USA.

In 1989, Bakker went to prison, convicted of bilking $158 million from followers. Reports surfaced that Bakker had spent $265,000 in church money to quiet Hahn.

Tammy Faye went to the Betty Ford Clinic to kick anti-anxiety drugs, then found herself divorced, estranged from her singer daughter and struggling to help a drug-addicted son.

A bout with colon cancer left her 20 pounds leaner. Now, five years later and cancer-free, Tammy Faye lives quietly with Messner in Palm Springs, Calif.

She would welcome a TV comeback, but with one reservation:

“I don’t know why secular television stations are so dirty,” she huffs, scowling at the carpet in the studios of the Lifetime cable network.

Now spokeswoman for a chain of upscale swap meets, she’s an avid bargain-shopper. Her sweater set, she gloats, was $14.95, her skirt cost $7 and her shoes were $20.

“I’ve learned to stretch a dollar until it screams,” she says.

But what about that enormous sparkler on her finger?

“I always wear cubic zirconium,” she cackles. “Five carats – set in 14-karat gold. If you’re gonna wear cubics, honey, wear it!”

And her lashes? They’re L’Oreal Waterproof Lash Out.

Tammy Faye’s survival tips

Spend on jewelry and other accessories: “If your accessories look expensive, they’ll assume all your clothes are.”

Every women should have at least one wig.

Invest in clear sandals. “If you can’t find the right shoes, buy plastic see-through shoes you can wear every day.”

Wear shoulder pads: “You always look better with them.”

Use nail polish to change the color of eyeglasses, shoes and jewelry.

Tip for men: Don’t smell bad. “When my husband comes to bed at night, he always has Chanel for Men perfume on. It turns me on so much that he cares that he’s not offensive in any way.”

“Never wear too much makeup! (Laughter.) Less is more! (More laughter.) Make sure you blend it in! (Hysterical laughter.)”