Pee-wee’s Playhouse was the culmination of a character created back in the 70s by the multi-talented Paul Reubens. Reubens had joined the comedy group the Groundlings in the 70s. The Groundlings was the jumping-off point for several famous comedians and icons. This would include Phil Hartman, Lisa Kudrow, Cassandra Peterson, Craig T. Nelson, a who’s who list of SNL Alumni, Conan O’Brien, JJ Abrams, and well…just a lot of people.
A number of the troupe who were there when Reubens was a part of the Groundlings would wind up as part of not only Pee-wee’s Playhouse but also other Pee-wee projects. I mean…who can forget Cassandra Peterson, Aka Elvira, as the biker gang badass chick who wanted a go at Pee Wee first?
From his time creating the character at The Groundlings, Reubens had a go for Saturday Night Live which didn’t happen. After this, he...
A number of the troupe who were there when Reubens was a part of the Groundlings would wind up as part of not only Pee-wee’s Playhouse but also other Pee-wee projects. I mean…who can forget Cassandra Peterson, Aka Elvira, as the biker gang badass chick who wanted a go at Pee Wee first?
From his time creating the character at The Groundlings, Reubens had a go for Saturday Night Live which didn’t happen. After this, he...
- 1/8/2024
- by Jessica Dwyer
- JoBlo.com
There’s a scene in the Paul Reubens-starrer Pee-wee’s Big Adventure that finds its titular character setting off on a vagabond adventure. He hops aboard a train to sit side-by-side with a grizzled, toothless man known as Hobo Jack, and they sing camp songs until Pee-Wee suddenly sours on the moment. The disgust radiates from his face and he makes a rash decision to jump off the moving train and tumble into the dirt below. The scene lasts all of 53 seconds.
“It’s such a committed, incredibly short joke that takes so much effort and I think that that has embedded somewhere deep inside me,” Greta Gerwig explained from the podium inside Tcl Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on Thursday night while introducing a screening of Tim Burton’s 1985 film as part of AFI Fest. The blockbuster Barbie director turned up as part of her guest-directing duties for the Los Angeles-based festival,...
“It’s such a committed, incredibly short joke that takes so much effort and I think that that has embedded somewhere deep inside me,” Greta Gerwig explained from the podium inside Tcl Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on Thursday night while introducing a screening of Tim Burton’s 1985 film as part of AFI Fest. The blockbuster Barbie director turned up as part of her guest-directing duties for the Los Angeles-based festival,...
- 10/27/2023
- by Chris Gardner
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Earlier this week, we were devastated to hear that Paul Reubens, the actor and comedian best known for playing the character Pee-wee Herman, had passed away at the age of 70, following a six year private battle with cancer. Among the many people who took to social media to mourn the loss of Reubens was special makeup effects artist Mark Shostrom, whose long list of credits includes The Slumber Party Massacre, The Beastmaster, The Mutilator, From Beyond, Witchboard, Prince of Darkness, Poltergeist III, Phantasm II and III, the first three Nightmare on Elm Street movies, and Evil Dead II. And while paying tribute to Reubens, Shostrom revealed that an iconic effect from Evil Dead II drew inspiration from an iconic effect in Pee-wee’s Big Adventure!
Shostrom said, “Paul Reubens provided huge inspiration for my work on Evil Dead II. I had been watching Pee-wee’s Big Adventure on VHS on repeat while sculpting.
Shostrom said, “Paul Reubens provided huge inspiration for my work on Evil Dead II. I had been watching Pee-wee’s Big Adventure on VHS on repeat while sculpting.
- 8/4/2023
- by Cody Hamman
- JoBlo.com
Paul Reubens, the actor who portrayed beloved character Pee-wee Herman that amused kids and adults of multiple generations, died on Sunday night at the age of 70. The cause of death was an unspecified cancer.
“Last night, we said farewell to Paul Reubens, an iconic American actor, comedian, writer, and producer whose beloved character Pee-wee Herman delighted generations of children and adults with his positivity, whimsy, and belief in the importance of kindness,” a post on the actor’s official Facebook and Instagram accounts read.
“Paul bravely and privately fought cancer...
“Last night, we said farewell to Paul Reubens, an iconic American actor, comedian, writer, and producer whose beloved character Pee-wee Herman delighted generations of children and adults with his positivity, whimsy, and belief in the importance of kindness,” a post on the actor’s official Facebook and Instagram accounts read.
“Paul bravely and privately fought cancer...
- 7/31/2023
- by Althea Legaspi, Ej Dickson and Kory Grow
- Rollingstone.com
At one time, Paul Reubens and Phil Hartman had a symbiotic friendship, as many in Hollywood do.
Speaking with Westword's Simon Abrams whilst promoting his 2016 movie "Pee-wee's Big Holiday," Reubens remained as dedicated to his iconic man-child character as ever, and refreshingly hailed Russ Meyer's "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" as "one of the most underrated American films ever made." Looking back on his career, the American writer-comedian reminisced on his many collaborations that seem out of left field, including that with the late, great Hartman.
A fellow member of the L.A.-based Groundlings comedy sketch troupe when Reubens joined in the 1970s, Hartman (who joined the improv team in 1975) quickly hit it off with him. When the beginnings of an obnoxious character, inept at stand-up comedy, began to germinate in Reubens' mind, it was Hartman who helped him develop the character into the bowtie-wearing nerdball Pee-wee Herman. The...
Speaking with Westword's Simon Abrams whilst promoting his 2016 movie "Pee-wee's Big Holiday," Reubens remained as dedicated to his iconic man-child character as ever, and refreshingly hailed Russ Meyer's "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" as "one of the most underrated American films ever made." Looking back on his career, the American writer-comedian reminisced on his many collaborations that seem out of left field, including that with the late, great Hartman.
A fellow member of the L.A.-based Groundlings comedy sketch troupe when Reubens joined in the 1970s, Hartman (who joined the improv team in 1975) quickly hit it off with him. When the beginnings of an obnoxious character, inept at stand-up comedy, began to germinate in Reubens' mind, it was Hartman who helped him develop the character into the bowtie-wearing nerdball Pee-wee Herman. The...
- 1/16/2023
- by Anya Stanley
- Slash Film
A lot of water, legal and otherwise, has passed under the bridge since Paul Reubens last donned the signature crisply tailored gray suit and red bow tie of his indisputably great comic creation, Pee-wee Herman, for a feature-length comedy. His previous Pee-wee feature, Big Top Pee-wee, debuted during the summer of 1988, 28 years ago, and that picture was hardly anyone’s idea of a worthy follow-up to the delirious and hilarious Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985)-- it certainly wasn’t one I held too dear. When I saw Pwba the night it opened, I was actually admonished by fellow audience members and even the management of a Medford, Oregon movie theater for my hysterics. But though I approached the Big Top three years later with much eagerness, I left it feeling that Pee-wee had somehow ended up getting twisted into a formula that traded that gray suit in for something more akin to a straitjacket.
- 4/16/2016
- by Dennis Cozzalio
- Trailers from Hell
With a title like that, I'm sure to get a lot of hate for even suggesting such a notion. But here's the thing: I loved Tim Burton. He was my absolute favorite director until around 2001. The worlds he created held my attention in a deeper way than other filmmaker's. The oddball and macabre design, along with the melancholy atmosphere, were unlike anything I had seen in movies. It was as fantastical in imagination as any blockbuster, and it felt more ethereal and personal than the "Hollywood" spectacle of a Spielberg or Zemeckis film. He introduced me to ideas of retro kitsch, spooky fringe and proudly holding onto timeless obsessions of your youth. Burton is one of those early influences in my life that made me become a passionate movie lover. I can catch "Beetlejuice" or "Pee-wee's Big Adventure" at any moment on TV and immediately get sucked back into them.
- 5/14/2012
- by Eric Larnick
- Moviefone
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