The late Paul Reubens made certain he obtained the ultimate phrase when it got here to his much-debated however by no means overtly acknowledged sexuality.
The beloved actor got here out as a homosexual man within the posthumous documentary “Pee-wee as Himself,” which premiered on the Sundance Movie Pageant on Thursday.
Whereas sitting down with director Matt Wolf for the movie, Reubens mentioned why he determined to cover his sexuality after changing into well-known along with his whimsically childlike character, Pee-wee Herman.
“I hid behind an alter ego,” he mentioned within the film, which was detailed in a narrative by the New York Put up. “I spent my entire adult life hiding I was a huge weed head. I was secretive about my sexuality even to my friends [out of] self-hatred or self-preservation. I was conflicted about sexuality. But fame was way more complicated.”
Reuben’s Pee-wee persona first took off after debuting the character with the Groundlings comedy troupe in 1981. After being unexpectedly thrust into the highlight, the star selected to place his skilled ambitions forward of his private life.
“I was out of the closet, and then I went back in the closet,” Reubens mentioned, who recalled being in a relationship with a person who helped encourage Pee-wee earlier than concealing his sexuality and changing into a popular culture icon.
“I wasn’t pursuing the Paul Reubens career,” he continued. “I was pursuing the Pee-wee Herman career.”
Michael Ochs Archives by way of Getty Photographs
Reubens’ success as Pee-wee was plain. All through the Nineteen Eighties, the character turned a fixture on late night time tv, touchdown the star his Emmy-winning kids’s present, “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” and two hit movies. (A 3rd, far much less celebrated Pee-wee movie got here out in 2016, years after Reubens’ profession collapsed following his 1991 arrest for indecent publicity.)
Although he refused to be public about his sexuality throughout his profession, the actor informed Wolf he had “many, many secret relationships” amid the peak of his fame.
Regardless of refusing to come back out as homosexual throughout his lifetime, Ruebens determined to make his sexuality public within the posthumous documentary, which is crafted from 40 hours of interviews finished previous to his demise on the age of 70 in 2023 as a result of acute hypoxic respiratory failure.
The star, who was additionally preventing two types of most cancers and saved his analysis personal over the last years of his life, informed Wolf how engaged on “Pee-wee as Himself” gave him an opportunity to form his personal legacy after years of scandal, hypothesis and gossip.
“More than anything, the reason I wanted to make a documentary was for people to see who I really am, and how painful and dreadful it was to be labeled something I wasn’t,” he informed the filmmaker. “To be labeled a pariah; to have people be scared of you, or untrusting.”
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Remarking on his personal mortality within the film, Reuben mentioned, “Death is just so final. To be able to get your message in at the last minute, at some point, is incredible.”
“Pee-wee as Himself,” a two-part documentary, can be launched on HBO someday later this yr.
