Pee-wee Herman Part 1 with Jamie Loftus

You gotta get weirder to survive. Welcome. to your wrong about. Today we are talking about Pee Wee Herman, the man, the clown, the legend. And we're also talking about Paul Rubens, the real man behind the character, and... what it means to be a person who lives as a character and then has to figure out how to be real. And we are talking about the story with podcast legend herself, Jamie Loftus.

the host of 16th Minute of the Bechdel cast of My Year in Mensa, so many other shows that you know and love, and if you don't love them yet, you will very soon. Jamie has also appeared on this very show and some of my favorite episodes talking about everything from ghost hunting with Ed and Lorraine Warren to the Amityville Horror to Beanie Babies to Bonnie and Clyde.

And I love getting deep into this topic with her. So deep that this is going to be a two-parter episode. So thank you for joining us for part one. And we cannot wait to see you again in part two. Jamie Loftus is also the author of Raw Dog, The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs, and it's out now in paperback. So please check it out. It will go perfectly with your summer travels. And it packs up real nice. Thank you so much for listening and for being here and for getting through with us.

We are late with our June bonus episode for those of us who listen over on Patreon and Apple Plus subscriptions. because I am off stalking Bigfoot and other cryptids, not in the woods, but in a book, which is almost as fun. So we're going to have two bonus episodes for you in July, and I can't wait to share them with you. For many of us, it's summer, it's hot, keep hydrating, keep getting through it. We are so happy you're here. Here's your episode.

Welcome to You're Wrong About, the show where we talk about maligned women with maligned women. And with me today is the queen of... Clownery and brilliance and traveling America for a hot dog and every good thing in life, Jamie Loftus. Hi. How's that for an intro? I loved that. That felt great. I want to be queen clown. You are a queen clown. Exactly. That's the idea. That's the whole goal. Sometimes I get sidetracked, but that is the end goal. And sometimes we got to send you in.

Sometimes I have to read a book and sometimes even two or three. But clowns can read books. That's actually maybe my... Clowns don't just have to get topless on stage. They can and they should. But they can read books too. And a lot of us do. But they got to sit in the trailer. They do. They have to sit in it. That's a part of it. Do you find it worrying that in podcasts...

I think we're both great and smart and we make wonderful observations about the world and I truly believe that we say great things that people didn't think of. But also... It's so strange to do a show where people are like, it's so deeply researched. It's just amazing. And you're like, well... I read one to three books. I mean, that is like it did take some time for me. But is that amazing? It shouldn't be, should it? I do think it's interesting that there's I mean, it's part of why one of my.

shows is slowing down a little bit because I would like to actually earn that. compliment. Yeah, it feels much better when you're like, fuck yeah, I did ruin my life for this topic. Thank you. Right. I mean, yeah. And I have been able to do that for certain topics, but especially it's just tricky when you're I feel like the bar.

deep research is really not good. There's times I've been complimented for my research that I'm like, well, I did research, but I only had... four days to put everything together so I feel certain that there are things I've missed people dedicate their whole careers to stuff like this and it's just research is just is so undervalued which is why I think people call it deep dives now instead of yeah

else because i think deep dives which i have done and i know we've both we've both done deep dive style research and like actual like months long research and deep dive is like newspapers.com and a lot of googling yeah which is what this episode is brought to you by today yeah and there's like I think different levels of it and if you do them ethically then like they all are good yeah but there is like a limit to how much

You can learn just in a certain amount of time of thinking about something. And I feel like I love the topics that we can like descend into quickly and like learn a lot about and briefly kind of have this fling with. And then there are the ones where. it really sort of lodges in your soul. I love experiencing all those different levels, but I also feel sometimes

I guess I've just been thinking about this politically when you've like really put like a good four days in and people are like, wow, incredible. And you're like, no, this should be like a nice medium. You're like, wow, that's really nice. But it's not like it's like someone's life's work or something.

that that's that's the thing is like and why there has been an understandable like emphasis on citing sources on deep dive style work because you didn't do like it's it's you even if you're ethically presenting it because you're sort of joining a conversation with all these other people at a cocktail party and you're like hi

What a fun party. Which is fine. I mean, it's like I've had research cited by content that is made faster. But as long as it's cited, you know, it's like I'm not opposed to it getting out there. It's like you don't have to be precious about it. It's just it's weird. I do think it.

like connected to this like content churn i guess the sheer amount of misinformation i think we're like i don't know it's i don't know why i'm starting this off with my my little anxieties except that i don't know it's just it's a safe space this conversation But I feel like I also get great inflated by how much misinformation and just people profiting by lying are out there where people are like, it's so nice when you don't lie to me on purpose. And I'm like.

Yeah, but like you shouldn't thank me for that. I know like that's the least we can do. Yeah. Although I said that I did my four days for this, but also this is. I've been preparing my whole life. This is a long term love. Because I think I pitched this episode to you years ago. Oh, yeah. But there was not really enough information to actually properly put it together until quite recently.

Yeah, and this is one of those things where your time living with an interest also goes into what you learn when the facts come out, where you have something to fit them into. Yeah, I have a solid foundation of information. And then because of... the recent Matt Wolf documentary, Pee Wee as himself, there's so much more information available that a lot of people, I think a lot of fans thought would never be available. So there's so much to talk about.

That's fantastic because I hadn't watched it. I guess no people were recommending it, but people recommend lots of things. It's terrific, yeah. All this new information is so exciting to me. And I also feel like, I don't know, this topic is maybe causing me to be a little bit reflective on the journey of the show. Because when I started making it with Michael Hobbs in 2018, I had this feeling of like... And I look back and I'm like, Sarah, you were 30 years old. Why did you think that?

But being like, wow, it's so great that we have this technology and information travels faster now. And when there's a crazy rumor now, it'll be easier to debunk it because we can spread the truth around to counteract misinformation because people aren't getting all their facts from. you know, hard copy and tabloids and the age of information is here. Hurrah. And like, I don't think that's true at all. I don't know what's true exactly, but I think.

I think that this is a topic where basically to my understanding, like the big story always implicitly around Pee Wee Herman is that Paul Rubens's career was like absolutely ruined for reasons that were consistently misreported.

around the time that they happen and for years after and sort of like misrumored. And in that way, I do group him with like all the... beloved maligned women and the stained glass of the show you know he's as close to tanya harding as most men will ever get it would seem to me i completely agree and There's, well, I, were you, were you a peewee kid? Not at all. That's the thing. Interesting. I was a huge.

I have Cherry and Pee Wee in my arms right now. I was restricted mostly to educational TV. So that holds you back a bit. Pee Wee was educational. Not that people saw it at the time. But no, I was I was a Pee Wee kid. I wasn't. live when it aired but we had the they released the entire collection in vhs uh when i went at some point when i was a kid and someone gave it to my dad for christmas because my dad was a huge peewee fan i am in my arms right now.

his original cherry puppet and peewee herman ventriloquist doll that were bequeathed to me by him a few years ago when uh paul rubens passed away where he was like oh yeah i have He sounds like shit because there was floods at my house. But let's see if he can do anything. He's a dolphin now. If you slow it down. If you slow it down. Let's see. That is the most beautiful thing I've ever heard.

Yeah, there he is. There's Paul Rubens. It's like he's in the room with us. Well, it's like you're talking to Paul Rubens and David Link simultaneously, actually. It's like he's right there. I was actually, I was walking around Hollywood forever recently, like the reformed hot topic kid I am, and stopped by both David Lynch and Paul Rubens. They're both there.

But yeah, I was a huge, huge peewee kid, and we did not tolerate peewee slander in our home. That's wonderful, because I feel like you were standing pretty alone at that time. Yes, but although not as alone as... I thought, I will say, upon sort of going back into the archives and seeing what the fan movements were at the time. But yeah, we did not tolerate peewee slander to the point where I wasn't even aware at any point.

of his, of the second arrest in Los Angeles in the 2000s. One, I don't know the chronology at all, but what I do know is that at one point when I was probably like 11 watching some, just like a movie that I think happened to have Paul Reuben. Rubens in it my dad who was probably several beers deep at this point I almost said deer's beep it's different like walked in and like saw Paul Rubens and I think was like triggered by him and it was like

He got arrested for blah, blah, blah. And we'll get into what it was. But it wasn't what really happened that he was saying, but it was with the implication of something much more sinister. I see. Which I'm sure was pretty typical. I feel like that was a core memory for me and so many kids. And it feels in retrospect like a very interesting and troubling thing to unpack. But yeah, I was really, really excited to see the recent documentary.

Just so I am not recapping a recently released documentary, I've been doing research on this for a bit. And can sort of take you through at least what's available about Paul Rubin's life and career and sort of do a side by side on. Now that we have all this great interview footage with him shortly before he passed versus how it was characterized at the time. And we can really get into it. But before. we get into it I have a clip I'd like to send to you because I was like wow this is where

Me and Sarah's passions truly combine in a powerful way. This was because so much of what... the appeal of peewee's playhouse was in the late 80s into the 90s was that adults enjoyed watching it too it was really creative all this stuff they aired two episodes at night once, and I believe 1987. And you will never believe who introduced these two nighttime airings of Pee Wee. Check out this clip. I was so excited. I hope it's Carrie Orbach.

Even better. Okay. Let's see. Oh, it's in the chat. Okay. Yes. Siskel and Ebert. Siskel and Ebert. Oh my God. My boys, my baby boys. Your boys know my boy. It's really thrilling. Okay. Three, two, one, go. Oh, boy. Oh, I love the his. I'm Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune. And I'm Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times. And no, this is not our movie review program.

We are introducing a program called The Special Evening of Pee-wee's Playhouse. And you might ask, what are a couple of adult film critics doing introducing Pee-wee Herman, the hero of a children's TV show on Saturday mornings? And the answer to that is... What are a couple of adults like me and Gene doing watching that show? Every Saturday morning, I watch Kiwi. Roger, come on. I think it's time that the people who don't watch TV on Saturday mornings also get their chance.

i watch it with my children and they like it and what i found in watching this edition that we're going to see tonight which is taken from the morning shows is one it's a safe show meaning you'll learn things like to eat out of the four food groups

which i like to know and also i you know probably late for me to learn that yeah you eat out of about eight groups now twice out of four but also i think that you also learn how to make fruit things but beyond uh you already knew that juicy things no i didn't know i know that

What I also want to tell people is that it's a lot of fun. I mean, the decor of the show, if you haven't seen that, is great. And when they go out in outer space at the end of the show, wait for that. And it's nice to see that somebody on television has wit.

and is a little anarchic and is breaking the rules and is having fun while he does it yay i love this i do too because famously you know like when they saw blue velvet they're both like oh don't know I'm not sure but like it's so rare for them to both commit to something this is amazing I was really I mean I one of the things that we'll get into is it was really fun revisiting peak

peewee and the reception of how beloved he was because he was like I knew he was famous but it is truly stunning the degree to which he was famous, and almost universally beloved. The only people who didn't like pee were people who didn't like annoying voices. And the episode they're about to introduce... because I did a full series rewatch when Paul Rubens passed away two years ago. My favorite episode they're introducing, it's called Playhouse in Outer Space, where they...

encounter an insecure alien that was an inspiration for one of my AIM screen names, Zizi Baluba. And the whole joke is that Pee Wee's Playhouse has the secret word and the secret word that week was Zizi Baluba. And they're like, this word's surely never going to come up. And then they made an alien named. So, OK, that's the thrilling opening. That is thrilling. Can I tell you something embarrassing? Yeah, of course. OK, when I was a kid.

I watched any movie that Comedy Central played, which really ran the gamut, as you probably remember from around this time. But one of the movies that Comedy Central would just put on, you know, when they felt like it was Pee Wee's Big Adventure. Yes. And I...

I have very specific reasons for turning off of movies. And I really didn't like the opening scene where we have the breakfast machine, which is really cool. But then he doesn't eat his breakfast. Why doesn't he eat his breakfast? It's a waste of food. I really didn't like that. And then I found it a bit chaotic. And I was also, there are kids who like drop dead Fred and there are kids who don't. And I don't, I'm not a drop dead Fred kid. And I feel like this plays in dead.

this. This is Pee-wee's Big Adventure is one of my favorite movies. I watched it as an adult and I like it now but I'm just as a child I just have to confess that's the kind of child I was. Look I you're You're wrong, but that's okay. I will say there's superior breakfast machines. Caitlin and I talk about this a lot on the Bechtelcast whenever there's a breakfast machine because superior breakfast machines include the Wallace and Gromit breakfast machine. Those guys never make.

a meal well that one gets you out of bed as well which is really nice um yeah and and peewee's big adventure as i'll get into is was before the tv show fascinating but

Paul Rubens, a.k.a. Pee Wee Herman, a.k.a. originally Paul Rubenfeld. was born in upstate New York in 1952. And right away, we have to get into something extremely complicated. Perfect. He grew up in a Jewish family. They moved to Sarasota, Florida. That's primarily where he grew up. His father was one of the founding pilots of the Israeli Air Force. What? It sucks almost right away.

As history so frequently does. And the biographies of comedians, famously. So for what it's worth, I had a complicated relationship with this father for different reasons, but... This was a big part of his family history. He was one of the five founding pilots of the Israeli Air Force in the 1948.

So he was participating in the Nakba. And there is kind of a stunning amount written about Pee-wee's father, most of it very... pro-Zionist, but he was an American who volunteered to fly in the Israeli Air Force and basically turned things in favor of Israel in 1948. Kind of hard to do something worse than that. So that I won't get into in depth because Paul never really addresses it in depth. The only thing I was able to find, I didn't.

watch it. I would say don't. I had no desire to watch it, but there's a 2014 documentary about this group of pilots that is very pro-Israel made by Steven Spielberg's little sister called Above and Beyond. in which paul and his mother i think speak about this you got to get some some jobs for little sisters i suppose i mean zion is propaganda for the little sister i just don't know um

So that is inextricably a part of his family history. Yeah. Well, and I hate to assume things, but you do feel like a dad who's the kind of person who volunteers to kill people on purpose is maybe. going to be less fun at home i don't know yes and uh to paul and his siblings credit they go on to do almost universally positive work for the world But they move to Sarasota when Paul's very young. He has a younger sister and a younger brother.

His younger sister is now a lawyer with the ACLU in the South. She seems pretty great. Abby Rubenfeld. Godspeed, Abby. Abby rocks. But they moved to Sarasota, which is where the... Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus is headquartered. I did not know. Paul gets really into circus stuff. That's where they train elephant torturers. Yep. Sorry. And Paul gets really into the idea of being in the circus. He goes to circus camp. He's a weird little guy. He's a circus kid. He's an indoor kid.

He loves TV, as many future TV stars tend to. But while I think he's sort of regarded as this very 80s figure, so much of what he's pulling from is like... TV that he grew up with. So there's like a lot of Howdy Doody and Soupy Sales and like all of this stuff from the 50s and 60s that is pulled into his work, even though he gets famous in the 80s.

And probably maybe for that reason, partly where adults can kind of feel that culture happening. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I feel like it's all adults. not adult entertainers, entertainers who are adults and adult entertainers are pulling from like their 20 year cycle. But yeah, so he, he in. high school, gets really into theater. He's really into Andy Warhol. He's really into Paul. Morrissey and he gets really close with this photographer named Ann who everyone thinks is his girlfriend but

And he has very intense friendships with women throughout his life. But spoiler alert, he's gay. He says that constantly, too. He's like... surprise like you know uh peewee's playhouse is essentially a drag queen story hour like he's gay The greatest threat to our nation, of course. But he remains pretty firmly like a theater kid. He like does these photography projects with his best friend and in high school where he's.

trying to like telegraph hyper masculinity, but more as a performance. He's very much like a dorky theater kid at school, but then they do these photo shoots where he. looks you know very different and looks like this very like masculine late 60s hippie guy and he talks a lot about like he generally has a good relationship with his parents but his dad is this hyper masculine war criminal and paul is none of those things but he feels generally supported by his family

And Paul and Anne decide to go to Cal Arts for college. I think that would be in like 1970. And in 1970, Paul, I feel like starts to. figures shit out. He's 18. He immediately becomes like the most popular guy at CalArts, having never been the most popular guy in Sarasota. Do you have the impression that you would have been in the same friend group or an adjacent friend group in high school? I think it's strict. I mean, because of a theater and B, most of my friends were gay men.

and weird girls in high school i would hope but also he's so i also wonder if i would have been too intimidated because it seems like he always had like a big funny prankster personality and i feel like I was so introverted. I don't know. I really hope so. I know I would have wanted to be his friend, but would he have had me? I don't know.

But this I wanted to show you this clip because it made me laugh. I was looking for these old profiles of him on the news. And I found this one from I think also 1987 or no from 89 where he had reached the level of fame. where like local news bureaus were going to his hometown in Sarasota and just being like, hey, did anyone hook up with him when he was 17? And they find the weirdest there. And this is, you know, for what it's worth, he.

only technically came out in this documentary he came out posthumously right and i could get into sort of like the reasons that he made that decision but for a long time there's a lot of effort put into like who is peewee dating and he has a series of close women friends who sort of are you know down down to beard but

This clip just cracked me up because it's just random women in Sarasota in the 80s. Who knows if they're telling the truth? I feel like the economy for publishing was so good in the 90s that tabloids would have just someone on the like, who's gay beat.

Yeah, I mean, this was before that question was ever really asked publicly. That doesn't happen for a couple of years until a couple of years after this. Oh, wow. OK. This is like very sincerely like who did Paul Rubens hook up with in high school, which is like. And then there's three girls in a row that have stories about going on dates with Paul Ruppens. All right, I'm at 413. Do you want to count it down and play together? Yeah, let's do it. Three, two, one. Go.

And what about Paul's social life? Well, back in junior high school, he was something of a ladies' man. There was Diane. now Mrs. Diane Weiss. She recalls her first and last date with Paul Rubenfeld. Oh, it was very romantic. We held hands, I'm sure of that. Sweaty palms. They're all so Florida. We held hands. There was Susan McGarry, now an Episcopal priest. Now, not to say I can spot a lesbian at 20 paces, but this story is great because it's not giving straight teenager.

Oh yeah, Paul loves Gina, Gina loves Paul, you know, that kind of stuff. Notes back and forth between the classes. Their puppy love gradually led to a party and the first kiss, Paul's first kiss. Pee Wee's first kiss had my arm around his neck and He says I'm gonna kiss you and I guess oh my god, you know, this is this is great, you know, so

You know, the girls are always more mature at that time anyway. So he puts his arm around me and I closed my eyes. When I opened my eyes, he had put cellophane across his lips. And I said, Paul, I said, don't don't fool around. I said, no, do you want to kiss me or not? See what I mean? I mean, he was he was funny then. Now that's what I call.

A straight young man. That's what I call romance. Just I'm sure that he hated that, but it just cracked me up because we were just like, what the fuck are we? But that's like the level of famous he became where that was a viable story. Right.

And they kind of didn't find anything, but they're like, look, we got it. We have, we have to do our 10 minutes on Pee Wee Herman. Let's just put it in there. It's, and it's fascinating. I mean, like, obviously like he's like such a product of his time in all these different ways, but the amount. of privacy he managed to maintain for a very long time, like would just be completely impossible now. Because when he and Anne get to CalArts during college, Paul is...

very openly gay. He is very openly performing in drag. He's doing experimental theater. Part of what makes this Matt Wolfe documentary so great is that Paul was like a huge... collector and a huge documenter of his life. So there was thousands and thousands of photos and video footage of him at every stage of his life. That's very Andy Warhol, I feel like. Yes. And he I mean, he was. obsessed with Andy Warhol as another very straight thing to do. Yes. Famously. But it was part of his like.

endgame that he wanted to move to New York eventually and join the factory, right? It's this very early 70s queer teenage dream. And be taken advantage of by a scary old artist, but we all have to do it, you know, once. Maybe ideally not more than once, but, you know, sometimes it happens. That doesn't end up. I think he meets Andy Warhol, but like he never he there's a lot of large, somewhat, quote unquote, conventional aspirations for your time, including getting on SNL.

end up happening for him that end up I think being good in the long run for him and not joining the factory is one of those things but at the time he's like I you know there there are these photos of him in drag in college and just so gorgeous like so beautiful and you know he talked a lot about how like he you know was extremely popular and you know sort of held court every night with these parties and drag there's all these experimental

films of him as a teenager there's like him as jesus on the cross talking right to camera like it's so charming and yeah he was an art kid right so he gets really into the CalArts scene. He joins this acting ensemble in California with David Hasselhoff and Katie Segal. It's like... so bizarre but they all knew each other i would like a one-act play about them like hanging out after class one day yeah

He makes this short in 1973 where he plays a mermaid, modeled after Cher. It's just all of this really great stuff. His student thesis is this short that he made, half in drag, half not. and it's like a very study of gender presentation like he he was very very out and very like uh you know exploring in in the way that you do when you go to an arts college yeah And in a way that maybe shows like why there's this, you know, fear.

alleged fear of drag and drag queens because it feels like okay first of all you're insane but b if you're saying that then i think you're revealing what secretly may be in your subconscious you understand which is that playing with gender and teaching it or representing it as an object of play and exploration rather than oppression is like going against a very oppressive worldview where if you teach kids that they can

experience creativity and freedom then they won't consent to be abused as much oh no yeah i mean and at The time, and this is all, I mean, most of the information I'm sharing at the top here is from Matt Wolf's documentary because there was just very little known about Paul's early life because he intentionally didn't share it.

Which is kind of fascinating to think of as like a right that a lot of us quietly gave up, you know, or that culturally people have really given up. And yeah, like you said, the degree of privacy that he was able to maintain while suddenly becoming as famous as he did like that feels almost like there was a very tiny moment where that could happen and it was inside of it that he fell yeah and it's a double-edged sword too because it's like why what are the reasons he

He's maintaining this privacy and it's all connected to his, I think, being hyper aware that if images of him in drag. came out at the height of his fame, it could seriously affect him. And based on what happened to him outside of his control, it seems like it very much would have. There was later, I really did the newspapers.com scroll about Paul from year to year.

And later, when he is arrested for the first time in the public eye in the early 90s, it's said that he was also arrested for being at a gay porn theater when he was eight. teen years old so it's like already i think that there are these indications to him that would have been clear to anyone but that he he was very out as a young person but also was aware that this could derail

his life. That was the only mention I saw of that first arrest. But, you know, it totally tracks Florida in 1970. I believe it. Right. And just, you know, of like a theater being the target of just like a routine sweep that. sort of also exists to identify people. And then we'll get to this later, but why are there so many Sarasota police officers hanging out in gay porn theaters, quote unquote, undercover? We'll circle back.

And what's the budget for it? Three. When he's arrested in 1991, there were three undercover cops.

In a dark theater. Okay, well, so after college, he makes all of this experimental queer art in college. The plan is to move to San Francisco with some friends because it's 1970 and that's what you do. But then he goes to a party in L.A. And this is also all unpacked for the first time in the documentary. He meets the love of his life. Basically, he meets this artist named Guy Brown. And they fall in love. I met an artist. His name is Guy. It's just a great diary night. Let me.

send you a photo of them because they're so sweet together. There's also all of this like super eight footage taken by Paul. Like there's an incredible amount of material that he has that just. was hanging out at his house, which, by the way, I should confess, last year when Paul Rubin's house went on the market, I messaged the realtor, said I had $5 million, and we did tour it. That's fantastic. I hope he would be okay with that.

I feel I just feel like he would. I just feel like when when beautiful, he like customized it. He had a catio. There was like the peewee bike outside. It made me cry. And we just had to pretend to be fabulously wealthy for 20 minutes. It was great. But I've attached here a picture of Peewee, of Paul and Guy. Ah! Wow. I know. They're so sweet. Wow. So they fall wildly in love. Mm-hmm.

And Paul changes his plans. He does not move. There's all of these ways in which this relationship changes his life in like big emotional ways and then also in logistical ways where this is his first time from what we know of like really. being fully in love. They move in together in my neighborhood in Echo Park. They're extremely in love. And because Paul doesn't move to San Francisco, he stays in LA and starts to try to make it as an actor.

Does he want to be a serious actor or like what's his goal there? At the beginning, his goal is to be a like an Andy Warhol style actor. Like he's going for queer indie darling. That's a great place to start, I feel like. I think so, too. I mean, I would happily stay there.

But I mean, plans change for other reasons. But so he's doing these bit parts. He's just getting by. His boyfriend is a painter. You know, like it's tough. Their relationship is somewhat tumultuous because they're in their 20s. But listening to him talk about he'd never spoken publicly about Guy, but he attributes these little qualities in the peewee character.

to guy like that some of the mannerisms and some of the just some of the ways that people would talk where i guess like his boyfriend would eat a cookie and be like buttery like you know the little peewee mannerisms that are pulled from this really sweet relationship. That's so beautiful. He comes out to his parents. They are supportive.

His whole family is supportive. His sister, Abby, is also I don't I mean, I don't know the timeline of her life, but she's an out lesbian has been for, I think, since around the same amount of time. So he gets support from his family. He feels support from his community. But their relationship doesn't work out. It seems like primarily because they're in their 20s. Paul describes it as he felt his identity getting too enmeshed with another person and kind of panicked.

which I can relate with that. I feel like I've been on both sides of that equation at some point in my 20s. Yeah, that's the circumnavigation of the 20s, I guess. Yeah, so he panics, the relationship ends, and... He's emotionally really fucked up from it. Guy moves to New York and Paul decides that he just wants to strictly focus on his career in. acting he is going to switch after this it's like yes the down with love phase the right the relationship

I recently just saw that movie for the first time. I only remember the outfits. They're incredible. Unbelievable. It's so underrated. They should play it in bars. I feel like they really should. Bars need to play more.

colorful movies if i see another marvel movie on at a bar if i see another black and white movie on at a bar brought by the same token get over yourself right get over yourself get over yourself i'm not here to exercise my library card but i'm down with love but after this relationship doesn't work out paul there's like a fundamental shift in who he wants to be and how he wants to be he is like

love sucks he stops pursuing the queer indie darling he's going to start pursuing conventional acting oh no and so he goes back in the closet for basically the rest of his life. Wow. A quote from

The documentary, he says, I was as out as you could be. And then I went back in the closet because I could pass. And so I went to great lengths for many, many years to keep it a secret. I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but I mean, there were plenty of examples even before the AIDS crisis of as to like.

Why he would choose to do this. There were already, you know, heavy speculation around Rock Hudson, who would have still been alive at the time around Tab Hunter. And it's sort of like the further. his career goes, the more he sort of remains committed to staying in the closet, particularly after the AIDS crisis starts. Yeah. Well, and one of the things that I feel like I remember from my childhood watching The Celluloid Closet on IFC is that there didn't really exist movies until kind of...

I guess the boys in the band where being outed to yourself as a gay character didn't cause you to like immediately die by suicide or get murdered. Right. You know, and of course, like if you're at Cal arts in the seventies and you're out and. have this whole life like you know that in a sense you can exist and like you've done it before but like I wasn't there but like it just seems like there was an incredible amount of conscious effort involved all the time yeah

And both being out of the closet and being in it. And because, you know, there's no way out of it. If nothing else that like because he decides he wants a conventional career that he views this as a necessity. And so he stays in L.A. He has other relationships throughout his life. He doesn't mention any in detail. It's really just Guy. So around this point, he pivots to comedy, right? And he starts taking classes at the Groundlings.

With future greats such as Lorraine Newman, such as Cassandra Peterson, a.k.a. Elvira, a.k.a. one of his best friends in the world, which you're like, of course, Peewee and Elvira were best friends. It just makes sense. Just being quietly gay through the whole.

ladies yes exactly and then some and then like most importantly for his like future career phil hartman and one thing i noticed as i was watching this footage in the documentary is like even if you're watching some of the most comedically talented people in the entire world watching footage of improv is always embarrassing like even done at the highest level I was like I want to cut my head off this is really hard to look at

But I mean, in short, like Pee Wee comes out of this training. Pee Wee comes out of Groundlings. It's a character he started developing through improv and then turned into sketch. That's sort of the Groundlings MO as they'll improvise and then take.

the good stuff and turn it into sketch. It's an important part of the process. Yeah. Well, and do you feel like there's an element and this is maybe actually a bigger question because I can see it being a part of improv because you like presumably need. things to lean on and to be able to call forth sometimes as opposed to just starting from scratch every time you do it. But also I feel like in sort of like...

I don't know, comedy and theater and circus arts generally and drag too. It seems like there's just like this trend that I feel like is very important as a unifying theme and is something that people really need of like. There's all these characters inside me and I never would have known it until I started talking as one one day. And now it's like they know what to say. And I can just be that person for a while. And that's just sort of a wild thing that.

that people can like do and share. And I wonder if that's if that's what this is like. Yeah. I mean, I think it's it's different for everybody. I mean, I've definitely like found. characters through i've generally found it more through sketch but everyone has their sort of like preferred way of honing a character and and yeah being able to process

Whatever it may be. I don't know. I'm not good at talking about comedy theory. I just show up. You just do it. I don't like to think about it. I just show up. It's better to do it than to talk about it. I like to think about everything. get stressed and have to lie down and take a nap and I miss the thing I was supposed to show up for. I think half of it is like, don't think too hard about it and be generous with the other people on stage. And if you do that, you will probably be fine. Right.

Yeah, I give other people a laugh. And Paul's great at that. There's all of these like examples of especially because he came up as a bit part actor that he's really great at like, quote unquote, stealing scenes with a single line, but then getting out of the way and letting the scene continue and important.

skill that the worst improvisers in the world don't have i feel like characters are sort of i can be extremely therapeutic because it's just like relentless to be yourself all day you know it's just nice to be able to be someone else for a while yeah i mean i think that it seems like paul really did not want to be framed as a like tortured closeted person but for what it's worth like he basically chooses to publicly live only as peewee and then only as paul rubens in private

of like Dolly Parton in a way I think so yeah where it's like I mean or Elvira or I mean right any of the great drag stars absolutely where yeah he doesn't speak as himself because it felt It seems like it because it felt vulnerable and uncomfortable and he didn't think it was anyone's business. And that does connect with a lot of these other closeted stars where like if you look at the you probably know more about this than I do, but I was going through a lot of.

Have you ever watched Matt Bohm on YouTube? I don't think so. He's terrific. I really love his work and he's done a lot of sort of these biographies of... Actors who were either who were like closeted throughout the 20th century. And he did a great video about Anthony Perkins and this sort of lifelong relationship he had with the Norman character of like, you know, your private self. And then.

the self you can't control and like that sort of repeated and peewee is obviously a very different flavor of that like peewee famously never killed anyone but they are They both wear a little gray jacket sometimes. Boy, do they. And have this like absurdly complicated relationship with their creators. Yeah. Yeah. I just recommend Matt Boehm's work in general, but he makes a similar argument for...

a lot of Rock Hudson's rom-com characters where there's always this level of like, I can't believe I'm getting away with this. All right, back to the act. It's maybe framing, but it feels...

you know, worth mentioning. Well, and that he's like, play that you know famously was in all these movies with doris day where they're both 40 years old and like trying to decide whether they're gonna get married and jump in the sack or not and where he's like a gay man playing a straight man playing a gay man jack tripper style so he can

like seduce this virgin and it's I don't know it is fascinating to me too how much of like super super straight media of the 20th century just sort of depicts men and women as like completely different species who are so incapable of communicating with each other that it's like insane that anyone thinks we can mate you know we're like pandas in captivity and then they're like this is the only way you have to do it and you can never communicate with the opposite side

so you have to marry and it's like huh really how did it work out for our parents like uh or their parents i guess like yeah yeah i i i was like getting into like this sort of side quest of of learning more about these actors that paul rubens was a fan of right and then i think he ends up like really successfully subverting is how like but how much there is this anecdote about how rock hudson when he was starting to play these like hyper masculine parts

In his 20s, how there was like a director or casting agent or something who is like, you know who you should look to to figure out how to best perform is Gary. cooper and spencer tracy like who were both queer and so it's just like i don't know so much of like uh this hyper straight masculinity is The performance is a copy of a performance of a copy of a performance. Yeah. And then Rock Hudson got really good at it. It's just wild. Yeah.

And by wild, I mean depressing, but also like, I don't know. Also kind of amazing how many layers deep it is just, you know, queer camp portrayals that straight men watch and are like, yeah. yeah yeah almost anything is camp if you dig deep enough um yeah but so so uh The Pee Wee character is developed in this Groundlings, original Groundlings troupe in the, I think, mid to late 70s, which is also when SNL is starting. Lorraine Newman is a founding member of SNL. Groundlings is sort of...

like starting to become known as a place where SNL actors are found. And so, of course, Paul is like... Maybe. Maybe it's going to be me. He works on the Pee Wee character more with Phil Hartman. Phil Hartman for a while is his bestie. They have a falling out.

later that I do appreciate that Paul is very up front towards the end of his life about i think the things that like a lot of performers aren't comfortable talking about myself included which is jealousy of your peers and he you know basically he he and phil hartman end up falling out because Phil Hartman left the Pee Wee production for SNL.

And Paul kind of never forgave him for that. And he talks about this, like that this was a repeated pattern early in his career, which is so common, but I don't think a lot of people talk about it. He also is like very amenable. Again, this is like, you know, he doesn't just.

But one of his popular Groundlings characters was an indigenous chief. It was a super racist character. And in the documentary, he was like, that was really racist. And I. like you know does not make any excuse for it it's just like you know it wasn't unusual for the time but it's like I'm so glad I did not pursue that because it's just embarrassing to watch

And it's just nice to have somebody not immediately be like, well, it was the time and we were all incapable of not being racist. Don't talk to me about it. Exactly. Like he's, you know, he's able to see himself with, I think, a lot of clarity, even when he's. being difficult and perhaps a little itchy. Which is what you hope to be able to do as you get older to at least sort of understand better why certain things happened. Totally.

So he creates the peewee character and it becomes popular in like late night L.A. groundlings shows. He starts doing it for. larger uh crowds keeps working on it he auditions for snl and loses it to gilbert gottfried oh boy who i know was only on for like the one cursed season or something yeah yeah one saw yeah so yeah he lost it to that he was but i think that again like he that rejection he's like all right i'm gonna double down on peewee nice

You got to get weirder to survive. Exactly. So what he does is he puts together this large production that is basically a template for what becomes Pee-Wee's Playhouse. There are it's at the Roxy Theater in L.A., which I don't think exists anymore. He he combines his friends at the Groundlings. So Phil Hartman, Lynn Stewart, who plays Miss Yvonne.

All these characters that end up being on the playhouse, Jombie, the genie, Terry, the pterodactyl, all of these wonderful characters, right? And then he goes to, in a way that I feel like really starts connecting.

the peewee character with the 80s in general he goes to melrose ave which is near groundlings where there was really vibrant punk culture at the time he meets gary he meets this guy gary panter who then designs the peewee set he's this punk artist that designs the peewee set and works with them forever and sort of ingratiates this weird character who's based on like howdy doody into the 80s and punk culture it's very cool

This show becomes super popular. They end up producing a special of it on HBO. It was like the fifth special ever on HBO. Which I feel like was like leaning a lot on stand-up comedy at the time. They were like, we don't know. Yeah, yeah. Because it was like... cheap and then he also starts appearing again there's like a i think there's like only a few examples of him being like hi i'm paul rubens i play a character named peewee herman he quickly is just like

I'm going to show up everywhere as Pee Wee. Which I feel like was confusing to me as a kid and probably a lot of kids at the time. It was like him and Max Headroom were like the two guys who were like, is it a guy? How does this work? What's reality? I think that that's... Like it makes sense and also ends up kind of really working against him later on when it's hard to. You can't get out. Right. When it's like, when is he Paul Rubens? But.

He starts making appearances on Letterman. There's all these really funny clips from the 80s of Pee Wee and David Letterman. They're great. And what is the special like as like America's introduction to him? So the special, which I think was fairly popular at the time, but the special was based on this stage show that he'd taken across the country. And you're functionally in Pee-wee's Playhouse. It's basically what becomes the set.

And the storyline of it is that Pee Wee gets one wish from Jambi the genie and he wishes that he can fly. But then Miss Yvonne and Captain Carl. Lynn Stewart and Phil Hartman, come over to the playhouse and Pee Wee realizes that Miss Yvonne is in love with Captain Carl, but she doesn't think that he loves her back. And so Pee Wee gives up his wish and gives it to Miss Yvonne and Miss Yvonne and Captain Carl fall in love. And then John B. realizes that.

Pee-wee did the right thing and he will get his wish and the show ends with Pee-wee flying in this really goofy practical effect where Paul Rubin's head is just like in this like sock and then there's this tiny body behind it um it's very funny it's all so like practical effect i mean it what takes him a while to figure out is like

Who is this for? I don't think Paul Reubens worries about that too much. Yeah, you shouldn't if you're making it. That's what other people can, I guess. The money people are very much trying to figure out who this is for, because it starts as like a midnight show.

And it does really well as a midnight show. But I think early on, people were like, well, if some things were changed, if some of the humor was adjusted, this could be for... kind of anybody but the early one it's still there's still like enough innuendo that like you probably wouldn't show it to a young kid that's it yeah so it's kind of finding its way to where it ended up it's just it's interesting too just like

So this feels like the kind of thing that like nobody obviously would have like created in a lab and that no one would have like signed off on is like, yeah, this is going to be the next big thing unless it had become that. by itself the same way that like you know no one in like a studio exact position would have watched the rocky horror picture show and been like this movie is going to become

So culturally meaningful that for many years it will be impossible to successfully complete puberty without seeing it in the middle of the night. Yeah. I mean, it's I feel like he he very much makes Pee Wee happen.

on his own like he doesn't have agents even at the beginning like it's very like his own blood sweat and tears are making this happen and it's also a weirdly good moment for alternative comedy because like That's technically what SNL... was when it started and like Andy Kaufman is still working heavily like it's a pretty good time to be a weirdo Steve Martin is at like the peak of his success and he eventually it became this big LA thing where like Martin Scorsese saw Pee Wee in

midnight and like you know Steve Martin goes and like gives Paul a bit part and like he's able to really build a lot because weirdness wasn't completely disencouraged right or like weirdness is sort of like going a little bit mainstream maybe with like because steve martin especially feels like he could yeah yeah so i think like he very much like fits in and almost like builds on what was like permissible

at the time i don't think that a lot of people like are like you know at the beginning and for most of his early career most people aren't like this is too weird they're just sort of like what is this like it's it's really fun reading early reviews about peewee and also about gary panter because people loved the art in this show and the design and the characters and just like it seemed

Like it was going to work out great. And it did for a long time. Yeah. One thing that is included in the documentary that he only touches on. Briefly, but Paul mentions that when he takes the show to New York, his whole family saw it and they loved it and all this stuff. But his ex-boyfriend guy went to see it as well and was able to see.

the character and was able to like hear his pretty obvious influence within the character and liked it this is now we're now in the early 80s um so like he's working on this and touring this between like 81 and 84. And during this time, he learns that Guy is sick and that Guy has AIDS and sees Guy the day he dies, goes over to visit. And he just mentions like, and then I got.

see him one last time and and it was really scary and really sad and i just you know had to act normal and then he passed away a couple hours after i left and you're just like oh my god it's so sad yeah yeah and that's the the amount of loss that people survive is uh i don't know i think that is one of the reasons of why to just learn about people's lives to the extent that we have that information of just sort of, it's all worth remembering.

Yeah. And that he's still, even though he is not publicly out, he's still very active and, you know, like a part of the L.A. queer community. And so he doesn't get into it, but it. Alludes to obviously like losing a lot of friends and being kind of terrified by that. And it seems like he processed this. grief of losing guy and of losing other people and of his own anxieties by working which um

Who could relate? Yeah. Yeah. And then he has this show and this character that's taking off and it does feel kind of like it's handed to you on a silver platter like many things. But one of them is, you know, so many opportunities.

we'll never stop asking you to do stuff and if you want to you can never slow down because if you uh don't slow down then grief can't find you so yeah yeah and like you're getting at like peewee is uh safe place from having to process what's going on with paul in like his life which yeah it's like of course is is super

complicated well and maybe this is a good time to talk for a second about kind of who is peewee you know and not necessarily trying to convey his totality because that's impossible um But sort of like what, what, because this is something I've always found really interesting is the sort of like the child likeness of the character, I guess I would say, you know, but like, like, who is he?

Who are you, Pee Wee Herman? Well, they were asking that on the Florida News in 1989. Who is Pee Wee? These three lesbians, I will tell you now. Well, to me... peewee is not just the blueprint for spongebob squarepants which he is oh my god he is oh my god so is it's i don't know if it's been said explicitly but like of course it is but he is a

big kid like he's a big kid i think it's interesting i i i think uh siskel saying that peewee is teaching kids good lessons is a bit of a cope um because i think that's like part of his appeal like he's not he he's not setting a bad example for kids but he's not right he's not Mr. Rogers he's not gonna tell you how to live your life exactly he's one of the kids and like I think that what was

so appealing to me as a kid was that he he was a hyper weird funny kid with all of the freedom of an adult which is also what i loved about spongebob except unlike spongebob peewee didn't have a job um but peewee like he had this like amazing playhouse where he could do whatever he wanted he he lived with his friends he was beloved by his community who are the adults in the room but they're also like weirdos it's a little bit like big bird

Maybe. I think there's so many great characters for kids that sort of fit into this where he's not Mr. Rogers because Mr. Rogers is a... character who cares for you yeah and like miss rachel is a character who cares for you like you're with peewee you're like a part of his cohort it almost it weirdly reminds me of and this is just because i got

I went really deep on this recently for no reason at all other than I visited my nephew. But it reminds me of like the hosts of Blue's Clues in a way. They're better behaved, but they're like talking to you like. I need you. I as a 27 year old man cannot figure this out in a way that like makes you feel like you're a part of it in a way that makes you feel welcome. It also reminds me of Blue's Clues in the like.

Treating you as a peer, but talking to camera, there's these participatory elements with the secret word. In Pee Wee's Playhouse, where every day the magic screen prints out the secret word. And anytime you say the secret word, you scream real loud. That's perfect. a part of it and it's like you're it just draws you in but i think everything that you like can learn and absorb from peewee is shown and not told which is like the best kind of kids

Which you can't say for Blue's Clues because it's for younger kids and they need to be told this is a graham cracker. So it's kind of limiting. But Pee Wee is not really like, I think he was just showing you how to be creative and like showing you to see fun.

everywhere there's this example of um an episode i was thinking of where also baby natasha leone is on peewee's playhouse as like a six-year-old um But in some Pee-wee's Playhouse episodes, there are these kids that come over and they're Pee-wee's friends. And they come and hang out at the Playhouse. Pee Wee also has adult friends who act like adults. Reba, the male lady, is a great example. She's sort of the one person that sees the Playhouse as being weird, but is still an active part of it.

There's Miss Yvonne, the most beautiful lady in town. There's like this whole world and community that Pee Wee is a part of, but he's treated as like one of the kids. And there's one episode where the kids.

trash the playhouse while peewee's gone and peewee comes back and he's like hey you can't do that that's my stuff that's not you know and it like feels like it's a little bit didactic in a way that the show isn't normally there's my grad school route um but then the kids leave and peewee trashes the house and so it's like you don't learn anything it's like it's yeah what you learn is just

creativity and how to have fun and the world of peewee especially the tv show is so effortlessly inclusive in a way that never calls attention to itself i've seen it compared to like a drag queen story hour and it's I don't think that that's very far off. You know, you have these like characters that are clearly pulled from like Paul's childhood, but there's something.

different about them like Lawrence Fishburne is like one of the most famous people on Phoebe's Playhouse playing Cowboy Curtis this like weird black cowboy and it's never called attention to he is just a part of this world there's people of all body types just a cowboy who's there's like some frontier there's some rangeland out there next to the playhouse cowboy curtis is such an incredible character there's um and and also like you know paul loved pop culture was like a huge

collector of pop culture stuff and tries to get as many people who he feels are like connected to things he liked or like to just pop culture in general into the show. And so the original Blackula. plays the king of cartoons. I love Blackula. Yes. So he plays the king of cartoons. Perfect. Which is just incredible. William Marshall. Just the general idea of being like it was built into the show that it seems like Paul was basically making the show for himself, which.

means that it was really accessible to parents because he was the age of parents but it had this like really wholesome care he's just a big kid yeah and he doesn't really learn anything And he, I like that he's, he's super, I'm going to just keep talking about PeeWee forever. He's like really flawed. He gets angry. He throws tantrums. He has enemies and like.

has to work through it. And it also takes a while. And it's just, I don't know. There's no one in the room being like, Hey Peewee, don't do that. Like he learned through like interacting. I just, ah. And it does feel like, I mean, I don't... we act like we need to make excuses for children's media. And we're like, well, they're learning things. And it's like, well, but they don't have to learn all the time. You know, that does seem like a lot of learning. And it kind of growing up, I feel like.

I don't know. There's so much dorky PSA stuff that I do really love and think probably works pretty well. But there's also, I think, a quality when you're... a kid or an adolescent where a lot of the media and the sort of like way adults talk to you is geared toward this idea of like just follow the rules and everything will be fine and if you don't follow the rules then

That doesn't make sense. Why wouldn't you do that? There's no reason for you to possibly not do that. And the system works. And just do what we tell you to do, and it'll be okay. And at a certain age, presumably, unless... you are too rich you're too stupid to notice you realize that the system fails everyone including you and that the sort of way that

we teach children with an air of like, just simply follow the rules and the rules will take care of you is to some extent adults lying to them, you know, and I feel like there's, especially in America. And, you know, this is as true in the 80s as it is now. There's something I'm trying not to be too pretentious and grad school about it. I'm really trying. But there is like something sort of radically fantastic.

And also a queer utopia about just like a world where like you can be a big kid and learn nothing. And like have a community and sort of exist and have this fantastic space that you were able to decorate exactly. the way that you wanted to. But also you didn't need to like change or be different or like earn it in any way. Yeah, you didn't have to grow. I mean, growth is good, but let's not grow all the time. That's just too much growing. I mean, I really do feel like it's like Spongebob soap.

from that playbook. Yeah. He's living independently. But he's a kid. And that was our episode. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you to Jamie Loftus for being our wonderful guest. And please check out her work. You will be so happy you did. Thank you to Miranda Zickler for editing and producing. And thank you to Carolyn Kendrick for editing and producing. And we will see you soon for part two.