The Death Of Pee-Wee Herman Actor Paul Reubens
Pee Wee Herman was an eternally youthful figure, and Paul Reubens always knew he couldn’t play the character forever. Here’s what he thought of a potential successor.
As has recently been announced by the actor’s estate and several major news outlets.
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Paul Reubens has passed away at the age of 70. The legendary comedian and children’s entertainer was best known for creating and acting as the youthful. Pee-wee Herman,a character he played for the near entirety of his career.
Once upon a time, an actor’s death would mean the end of that character appearing on screen again—however, with some recent technological evolutions,
that’s not necessarily the case 2016’s.“Rogue One: A Star Wars Story” arguably served as the first popular proof-of-concept of this ethically dubious practice, with the late Peter Cushing’s likeness being recreated through CGI for a supporting role.
Reubens actually addressed this possibility somewhat in a quasi-serious interview with.
OutClique magazine in 2020 (roughly three years after his cancer diagnosis). When asked who could take up the role in his stead, he stated.
“No one else will ever play Pee-wee. That would happen over my dead b . . . oh, I see your point.
Actually, it’s 2020 now. The technology exists for me to be computer generated and look completely real. However, if I didn’t have the budget, I’ve always liked the work of Christopher Walken.”
The two projects Paul Reubens had seemingly been most fixated on were two feature films, both of which were Pee-wee Herman stories. The first was “Pee-wee’s Big Holiday,” which was ultimately produced by Reubens and Judd Apatow and distributed on Netflix in 2016. It was
a positively received family adventure in the same vein as 1985’s “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure.”
“You’re gonna leave Fairville and you’re gonna take a holiday.”
The second was an apparently darker film called “The Pee-wee Herman Story,” which would have dealt with more adult scenarios involving the titular character’s rise to fame and fall from grace.
Perhaps this would have taken inspiration from Reubens’ real-life legal struggles which ultimately saw the actor retreat from the public eye for several years.
There had also long in development been a film based on his “Playhouse” series,
titled “Pee-wee’s Playhouse: The Movie,” which Reubens had pitched to Paramount Pictures sometime before 2007. The film would have seemingly been somewhat separate from the “big” adventures and
the darker “Pee-wee Herman Story,” instead focusing on the unique world and characters of the “Pee-wee’s Playhouse” series, which originally aired from 1986 to 1990. It seems unlikely that any of these hypothetical films would move forward without Reubens involved.
However, it wouldn’t be the first time a “Pee-wee” performance was aided by CGI.
In a 2020 interview with Conan O’Brien, Paul Reubens revealed that his appearance in the 2016 film “Pee-wee’s Big Holiday” had been altered with the use of anti-aging.
CGI technology, similar to what was used on the Martin Scorcese crime
drama “The Irishman.” It wasn’t done in service of Reubens’ ego, however,
but to maintain the childlike essence of the Pee-wee Herman character. He told Conan.“Pee-wee was sort of based on youth and youthfulness.”
Apparently, the process wasn’t cheap, with Reubens claiming that it would have
been significantly less expensive for him to get plastic surgery.
“What does that cost?”
“You couldn’t afford it, really, seriously.”
He emphasized that he wasn’t joking about the price, either.
“Interestingly enough, and I found this out in hindsight, it costs so much money to do
it that it would’ve been a fraction of the cost for me to have had plastic surgery.”
His youthful appearance wasn’t all algorithms and polygons, though. Reubens also credited the talented lighting designers and make-up team, who used their craft in tandem with the technology to bring the character of Pee-wee Herman back as we all remember him.“Pee-wee’s Big Holiday” is currently streaming on Netflix.
Actor and comedian Paul Reubens, best known for his character Pee-wee Herman, has diedat the age of 70.
He passed away on July 30, 2023.
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Pee-wee Herman star Paul Reubens dies at age 70 after cancer fight
An official statement posted on his social media accounts read, in part.”Paul bravely and privately fought cancer for years with his trademark tenacity and wit.
A gifted and prolific talent, he will forever live in the comedy pantheon and in our hearts as a treasured friend and man of remarkable character and generosity of spirit.” And a post signed by Reubens read.”Please accept my apology for not going public with what I’ve been facing the last six years.
I have always felt a huge amount of love and respect from my friends, fans and supporters.I have loved you all so much and enjoyed making art for you.
“Reubens was immersed in over-the-top entertainment from a young age, having grown up in Sarasota,Florida, the winter home of circus performers like The Flying Wallendas.He grew up idolizing then-child star Ron Howard, and after studying theater at Boston University and the California Institute of the Arts and performing at comedy clubs, he landed a gig with the Los Angeles troupe The Groundlings in the 1970s.
This paved the way for the showcase that would catapult him to fame, “The Pee-wee Herman Show.”If I could fly, I’d be the luckiest boy in the world!” The stage show ran for five months, with one taped performance airing as an HBO special
in 1981. It was a hit and paved the way for the 1985 movie “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure” and the hit show “Pee-wee’s Playhouse.”
Reubens’ work was unique, as was his approach.
During a 2016 Q&A session at USC’s Ray Stark Family Theatre, Wayne White — one of the artists who worked on “Pee-wee’s Playhouse” — said that Reubens took a chance on him and gave him room to let his creative juices really flow.
White said, “We were doing our jobs for the first time.Who would have hired us in Hollywood?
Nobody.Paul was cool enough, he was an artist himself, and he hired all these unknowns.That was the power of the ‘Playhouse’ — it was an art project that happened to get on. In 1991, Reubens’ ascent was cut short when he went to an adult movie theater in Sarasota and was allegedly caught masturbating.
A police detective performing a surprise inspection of the theater arrested him in the lobby.Reubens pleaded no contest to the charges.He maintained his innocence, later telling Stone Phillips on “Dateline NBC,”
“It didn’t seem like a crime to me […] I certainly didn’t think to myself, ‘What happens if I get arrested for going in here?'”
Though “Pee-wee’s Playhouse” had already been canceled at the time, CBS put a stop to reruns of the show following the arrest.
In 2002, Reubens was charged with possessing child pornography, though his publicist called the claims “completely without merit.”
A representative of the actor at the time said the purported images were actually from, quote, “[an] extensive historical art photography collection,” including vintage erotica.
As the Village Voice reported at the time, after an investigation, the district attorney,
quote, “concluded that there was no case.”
In 2004, the child porn charges were dropped, but the actor pled guilty to a lesser charge of obscenity from the Los Angeles city attorney and was put on three years’ probation. Per the terms of his probation, he was not allowed in the presence of minors without
a guardian present.
Reubens seemed to accept the controversy that became part of his career.
He told Stone Phillips in 2004,
“They may think I’m crazy or anything that anyone wants to think about me.
That’s all fine.
As long as one of the things you’re not thinking about me is that I’m a pedophile.
Because that’s not true. According to Variety, Reubens had two Pee-wee Herman projects in the works at the time of
his death: “The Pee-wee Herman Story” and “Pee-wee’s Playhouse: The Movie.”
His final released film was Netflix’s 2016 “Pee-wee’s Big Holiday.”