Fan or Foe, People Can't Resist Pawing Through R. Kelly's 'Closet'

"What's amazing about R. Kelly is that it really doesn't matter what he's going through personally," says Jones. "His talent, somehow, oozes its way to the hearts of women."

After all, this is the man who once sang: "My mind's telling me no. But my body; my bod-eee is telling me ye-heh-ess." With R&B hits such as "Bump N' Grind," "Your Body's Callin' " and "You Remind Me of Something" -- his Jeep -- this man's repertoire is guaranteed to lower the defenses of some women.

Not Serena Kim, features editor for Vibe magazine. "I feel like he's a pervert," she says. "And you know, it's weird that he has so much power" -- despite his laundry list of publicized sex transgressions, including his marriage, later annulled, to a 15-year-old Aaliyah. (Kelly produced her debut album, "Age Ain't Nothing but a Number.")

Maybe it is a lack of "self-love" among women or a desire to protect him from a Nancy Grace-style evisceration. Or, says Kim: "Sometimes it's refreshing to have this truly eccentric pop star who brings this unique persona to the table. . . . He's like a brilliant puzzle. Should I be concerned with what this artist does in his private time? If he does his job well, then what does that have to do with me?"

At BET's online chat board for "Trapped in the Closet," the love-loathe confusion reveals itself in a debate over morality. Rather than discuss the merits of the cheating protagonist finding a condom wrapper (not his!) in his own marital bed, the chat quickly turns into a fight over Kelly's alleged guilt in the child-porn case, and whether people have the right to judge. Someone identified as "plynatwrk" clearly thinks so: "i hope they break you off something proper in jail punk."

But a fan named "shauntae" rushes to Kelly's defense: "although the stuff came up about u, i still didn't care . . . u r my guiding light through everything. if my mind is gone, all i do is put on 1 of ur cds and everything will be alright 4 me. that's just how good u r. keep doing what u do and keep me having something 2 slow grind to."

Beginning in June, motorists have choked WPGC-FM's morning request lines with pleas for Chapters 3 and 4. "I mean, who doesn't like a little drama?" asks host Donnie Simpson. "Even if you don't admit it. This is Jerry Springer on steroids."

Then he tempers his exuberance: On a normal day he tells his wife, Pam, not to waste his time with gossipy, daytime-talk-show nonsense. But drop a record with all that drama, and have Kelly voice six different characters, and Simpson, who was a BET "Video Soul" host back when Billy Ocean was topping the charts, will indulge: "Lyrically, the phrasing, the way he makes the words work" -- like the woo-ooh-woo-ooh-woo-ooh-woo of a police siren -- is "absolutely incredible." Just the other day, Simpson name-drops, he was in the studio with Janet Jackson and Jimmy Jam, and "we all sat there and had a great laugh about it. Who thinks of something like this?"

In this case, the Pied Piper. Roberta Magrini, Kelly's publicist at Jive Records, says the singer kept company executives in the dark about his "unusual" vision. "Trapped in the Closet" has no hook, chorus or precedent in modern R&B. "The music business is pretty cookie-cutter, but he went off, completely, on another level," says Magrini. "Just straight-up storytelling from A to Z."

After Chapter 5 faded to black in BET's half-hour special, Kelly was shown loafing on a barstool, puffing a cigar in his white do-rag, triumphant. He has produced hits for Michael and Janet Jackson, sang a duet with Celine Dion and was allegedly pepper-sprayed off last year's tour with Jay-Z.

Now "somebody deserves an Oscar," Kelly tells the camera, before getting on his feet and swaggering to the exit. He walks past pool tables and clapping bar patrons, and we hear a sample from Chapters 6-10, which have yet to be released. The saga apparently continues, for the lovers and the haters.