Secrets behind celeb tell-alls -- confession, spin control or cash?

What's with all the bussing and blabbing?

Barbara Walters.

Rep. Vito J. Fossella (R-N.Y.).

Even former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson is making graphic revelations in the documentary "Tyson," which was screened last week at the Cannes Film Festival.

What possesses celebrities to kiss and tell? Or drug and tell? Or beat people up and tell?

Is it emotional catharsis or economic cathar$i$?

Haven't these folks heard the term TMI (Too Much Information )?

In her memoir, "Audition," broadcast legend Barbara Walters' juiciest and most highly publicized confession is to having "a long and rocky" affair in the 1970s with former Sen. Edward W. Brooke (R-Mass.).

"Why, therefore, did I have a clandestine affair with a married man? A black married man?" writes Walters in her book. "Ed Brooke was simply the most attractive, sexiest, funniest, charming and impossible man. ... I was excited, fascinated, intrigued and infatuated."

Their tryst grew serious and lasted more than two years. He even asked his wife for a divorce. However, in the end, he and Walters didn't want their affair to torpedo their careers. She was on the "Today" show at the time.

"We decided very wisely, but very sadly, that we had to stop seeing each other," she writes. "That was that. We stopped."

Walters, 78, also writes that she included the story of that relationship in her memoir because it was "a very important one" in her life.

"I also wrote about it because I was trying to show how different things were over 30 years ago," Walters told the Boston Herald last week. "That the idea of an African-American and a white woman would have been enough to destroy my career and that's why it had to be kept secret."

Many before her have kissed and told, too. Monica Lewinsky told her tale to Andrew Morton in "Monica's Story." Judith Campbell Exner told her own story in "Mafia Moll: The Judith Exner Story, The Life of the Mistress of John F. Kennedy."

In his book "Exposing Myself," Geraldo Rivera revealed his affairs with hundreds and hundreds of women, including Bette Midler, Liza Minnelli, Judy Collins, Chris Evert and Margaret Trudeau. Former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, still dealing with the fallout from his high-priced-call-girl scandal, reportedly is shopping around a book.

Mark Lepore, an assistant professor in the counseling-psychology program at Pittsburgh's Chatham University, believes the reasons people choose to reveal past personal indiscretions and embarrassing transgressions include to set the record straight for posterity, to gain attention/publicity, for revenge and just for fun.

"Some people might see it as just an opportunity to communicate openly," Lepore said. "There is the opportunity for other people to learn from the choices they made, good and bad."

In the documentary "Tyson," the former boxing great admits to making many mistakes in his life. He details his troubled youth as an overweight kid who was picked on as well as his many sexploits -- including his need to dominate women and about suffering from a painful case of gonorrhea during a major fight, the Associated Press reported. However, he still maintains he's innocent of the 1991 rape charge that landed him in prison for three years. He even discusses that crazy Evander Holyfield ear-biting incident in 1997.

The telling of secrets can give them life and make them more real as well as help book sales. (Walters' book sold more than 250,000 copies its first week.)

While some choose to kiss and tell, others, like family-values politician Fossella, have kissing and telling thrust upon them. The congressman made headlines in the aftermath of a drunken-driving arrest in Virginia on May 1. He told officers he was going to visit his sick daughter, although his wife and three children live in New York.

A week after his arrest, Fossella admitted to having an extramarital affair with Laura Fay, a retired U.S. Air Force lieutenant colonel, and fathering a 3-year-old daughter -- the one he told police he was rushing to see -- with the woman, who lives in Virginia. Fay picked him up from the police station the morning after his arrest.

"My personal failings and imperfections have caused enormous pain to the people I love, and I am truly sorry," he said in a statement earlier this month.

At the time of his arrest, Fossella's affair wasn't public knowledge, but coming clean to control the spin is a tactic politicians often employ.

"Maybe they've begun to hear some rumors and stories, and instead of letting the rumors come out, they decide they're going to give their own side of the story," Lepore said.

People listen to and discuss these stories because they enjoy hearing the secrets of the rich and famous.

"It's almost like a real-life soap opera, and they can feel better about their lives by watching and reading about the mistakes of others," Lepore said.

(L.A. Johnson can be reached at ljohnson(at)post-gazette.com.)

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)