The world knew and loved Pee-wee Herman for more than four decades, but how much did anyone know the man behind the child-like character in the gray suit and red bow tie? Just before he died in 2023, Paul Reubens allowed director Matt Wolf to sit him down for more than 40 hours of sometimes joyful, sometimes somber and sometimes contentious recollections. The first part takes us from his childhood up to the surprising box-office success of 1985’s Pee-wee’s Big Adventure.
Opening Shot: The actor, out of Pee-wee uniform but tended to by hair and makeup, sits close-up in center of the frame, announcing himself: “Hi. It’s Paul Reubens. I’m on the set of the untitled Paul Reubens documentary, here, today, October (gibberish).”
The Gist: An onscreen graphic notes that Reubens died in July 2023, in a surprise to the filmmakers who had no idea the actor had been living with cancer for the previous six years.
Something you might’ve suspected: Reubens grew up loving children’s TV shows such as Howdy Doody, Captain Kangaroo, and The Mickey Mouse Club. He also loved how the Little Rascals were “completely unsupervised,” and described himself as “a combination of Alfalfa and Spanky.” Young Paul also loved I Love Lucy and compared himself to a more successful child actor of his day, Kevin Corcoran.
Something you might never have guessed: His father was a daredevil pilot who helped teach the first Israeli Air Force? That same dad built a stage in the basement where Paul got his younger sister, Abby, and other kids to put on plays.
But it was the family’s fateful decision to move from upstate New York to Sarasota, Fla., that really influenced Paul. Growing up next to the winter home of Ringling Bros. meant all sorts of circus performers and animals were his neighbors, and the Ringling family established a professional theater company where Paul was the “resident juvenile.” After high school, Paul went Hollywood-adjacent, enrolling in CalArts where his 1971 acting cohort included Katey Sagal and David Hasselhoff. In college Paul performed in drag and fell in love with a guy named Guy. But he broke off the relationship, fearing he was losing his ambition and his sense of self, and determined to go solo the rest of his life.“I was as out as you could be, and then I went back into the closet.”
Early success on The Gong Show helped lead him to The Groundlings, the famed LA improv/sketch troupe where his friends and collaborators included future Playhouse players John Paragon (Jambi), Phil Hartman (Captain Carl) and Lynne Stewart (Miss Yvonne). Cassandra Peterson also was around then, before she created her own famous alter-ego, Elvira. As for Paul, he almost struck gold with a different character, an American Indian Lounge Singer, but he’s grateful he didn’t, realizing in retrospect “it was full-on racist.”
Instead, in 1978, Paul became Pee-wee during a theme night at The Groundlings where he portrayed a wannabe stand-up comedian who would never make it. The audience immediately embraced his infantile prop comic character, and when Paul decided to audition for and win an episode of The Dating Game by remaining in character as Pee-wee, that was it. “I walked out on the street and I felt changed.” He decided to turn his life over to Pee-wee, playing him in 1980’s Cheech and Chong’s Next Movie, and even auditioned for Saturday Night Live, only to lose out on a cast role to Gilbert Gottfried.
Failing to land SNL prompted him to focus all of his attention on Pee-wee, and developed a live show that played at midnight at The Groundlings, only to become so popular so quickly it moved to bigger venues such as The Roxy, which led to an HBO special, which led to semi-regular appearances on Late Night with David Letterman, which led to a 22-city tour, which proved to movie studios that he could sell enough tickets to star in his own movie.
We learn some fascinating nuggets about what the first Pee-wee movie almost was, how it became what it did, and how vital Tim Burton was to it all coming together, and how vital MTV was to making the movie buzzworthy.
What Documentaries Will It Remind You Of?: HBO has produced and released some great two-part documentaries recently on late great comedians such as George Carlin and Garry Shandling, but this two-parter feels much closer in spirit to the Apple TV+ profile of Steve Martin, both in terms of how the filmmaker views the comedian’s life’s work, as well as how the comedian had a chance to participate in his own videography.
Our Take: Before now, Reubens chose to never be photographed or interviewed publicly as himself. Well, we do see one instance on a late-night talk-show from the very early years of CNN where he drops character momentarily, but he realized then and there that he couldn’t have it both ways. Or didn’t want to, anyhow.
“There’s only so much you can hide behind an alter-ego,” he says at one point, and he didn’t want his sexuality or his drug use to come out and contradict the playful innocence of his increasingly famous character.
Which makes for some funny yet slightly tense moments early in the first part of the documentary, as he wrestles with the idea that he is not, cannot, and perhaps should not be in control of the project. He’s told he doesn’t have “perspective” on his own story. And yet, he wants to argue the point. And more importantly: “I don’t want this to be like a legacy movie. It’s not that. I don’t think you do, either. But I think I want it less than you do.”
Why? To remain an enigma? A character more than a real person? Heck, he wasn’t even Paul Reubens, but rather, born and raised Paul Rubenfeld.
Sex and Skin: Photos of college-aged Reubens reveal his youthful sultry side, but no nudity or sex here.
Parting Shot: We see Pee-wee escorted through a throng of fans outside of a venue, as modern-day Paul recalls: “By the time I realized that you trade in anonymity and privacy for success, the ink had dried on my pact with the devil”
Sleeper Star: Of the other voices and faces we hear from, two stand out. One is his first manager, Rich Abramson, who says of Pee-wee’s first live tour: “I was close friends fringed Martin Landau. after the show he came up to me and said I’ve never seen anybody hold an audience like that. It reminded me of Adolf Hitler. Which was, you know, pretty good praise from somebody who’s been around Hollywood forever.” What a quote!
The other memorable moment late in part one comes from archival footage of David Letterman, interviewing Paul as Pee-wee right after his first movie debuted, when Letterman asks: “Have you thought about this now that the film’s a success, that means for the rest of your life, you’ll have to dress like that?”
Our Call: STREAM IT. As only Reubens knew at the time of filming: “To be able to get your message in at the last minute, or at some point, is incredible.” And despite the fact that he resisted showing us his real self for fear that “it just took a little bit of the magic out of” Pee-wee, it’s safe to say now that it all feels more magical knowing the full story.
Sean L. McCarthy works the comedy beat. He also podcasts half-hour episodes with comedians revealing origin stories: The Comic’s Comic Presents Last Things First.