Adventures in Psychonautics: The Genius & Duality of Paul Reubens

How much do we REALLY know about our childhood heroes? The people who are a staple in our lives, who we've never met but feel an instant kinship with? For me, one of those people was Pee-Wee Herman, aka Paul Reubens (Reubenfeld). Pee-Wee's Saturday morning TV show was primetime viewing at my house, where we'd usually record the episodes on VHS to watch later. We have approximately FOUR of these tapes lying around somewhere (around 8 hours apiece). We even had a talking Pee-Wee doll.

My mom was amazed/amused at his bathroom humor and the sly jokes that were hidden in the subtext; my siblings and I were entranced by the flashy kiddie aspect: the Magic Screen, Jambi, the singing flowers, Conky, Chairy and all the rest. As a grown-up I now "get" all those dirty jokes and understand the true genius required to make material that's a hit with (stoned) adults & children alike. That duality was one of Pee-Wee's superpowers: the rare ability to be evasive yet direct while making art that's both commercially viable & true to his wild avant-garde performer instincts. To toe the line between "endearing" & "offensive" with humor that's as brash & immature as it is refined & subtle.

...until a hot summer night in July 1991, that is. 'Subtle' had officially left the building by then.

Typical Pee-Wee fare.

That's the date Paul Reubens was arrested at a Sarasota adult movie theater for indecent exposure. His mugshot shocked & horrified fans like me, who only knew him as the cleancut bowtie wearing goof Pee-Wee up to that point. (He looked more like Pee-Wee in his 2002 mugshot for an even more serious crime. More on that in a minute).

While it was Paul who was arrested, Pee-Wee paid the price, his TV show being pulled from syndication, his dolls pulled from Toys-R-Us shelves & his reputation slandered on late night comedy shows, in newspapers and everywhere... which made me even MORE glad we had the foresight to tape all those episodes. Pee-Wee made one final appearance on the MTV Music Awards before retreating from the public eye altogether for a long time, finally resurfacing to make another Pee-Wee movie in 2016.

The mugshot heard 'round the world.

Paul Reubens died in July 2023 of a cancer he'd kept secret for at least ~~3 years~~ six years, even from his closest confidants. Actually he had TWO deadly cancers when he passed: metastatic lung cancer & acute myelogenous leukemia. When his Instagram page announced that he'd died, I was shocked. "We didn't even know he was sick!" was the common refrain to his tragic passing at age 70. But he must've been incredibly sick at times between the two cancers and their respective treatments, which can be as brutal as cancer itself.

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Lost in all the laughs, controversy & mystery of his life was the fact that Paul Reubens was a closeted gay man. He reveals this in an HBO Max documentary entitled Pee-Wee Herman As Himself that I still haven't seen* because it hasn't been bootlegged anywhere and I refuse to pay $15+ per month for any damn channel. I digress. But I HAVE seen the Vice version which alluded to his homosexuality very heavily (much like Reubens often did himself). It was a respectful send-off for a very private and mysterious guy.

Live from the Closet...

"Coming out" posthumously in Pee-Wee Herman As Himself

I remember when he was still alive and websites like Queerty chided him for his failure to make his sexuality the focal part of his life and career by "coming out". Like it or not, that's what happens when a gay star reveals their sexual orientation--everything becomes about how "brave" they are & who they're dating/fucking--their art & even their humanity is no longer the focal point. And Paul Reubens was from a time when being gay was even LESS accepted than it is now so it's understandable why he didn't want this black mark on his career.

But he never HID it either--the 2016 movie had a whole gay plot & was overflowing with not-so-sly gay jokes/references, as was his Broadway show in 2010.

From Reubens' Broadway show.

From Pee-Wee's big gay movie (2016).

Go further back to his '80s TV show and you'll find an equal amount of gay references. His Christmas special featuring Grace Jones, Charo, Joan Rivers, KD Lang, Little Richard, Cher & other gay icons is one example of how the beloved manchild showcased his gay pride years before doing so was considered acceptable for actors, let alone children's performers. His show also featured "Ricardo," the hunky Latino man in short-shorts who Pee-Wee would often make sly passes at. This was at the height of Reaganism and AIDS, mind you. The country was extremely conservative & gays were in the crosshairs, yet Reubens still had the guts to do all this on a Saturday morning TV show.

Tabloids (wrongly) linked Reubens romantically to another kooky never-married actress, Carol Kane.

Yet that still wasn't enough for the Alphabet Gang, who demands that all public figures no matter their age or background sacrifice themselves at the altar of LGBTQUIABBQ politics by saying the words "I am gay," preferably into a microphone like Ellen did on her sitcom. As a non-celebrity who never formally "came out of the closet" myself, I can totally understand why someone like Reubens would be reluctant to make it "a thing" by saying the quiet part out loud. Not only because it was his style as an artist but because of all the other, uhh, stains on his public image.

Lengthy Legal History

Pee-Wee's cursed commercial.

After his 1991 legal debacle, Reubens was made to film an anti-drug PSA as part of his community service. Ironic since the man himself was a drug user as he admitted in the HBO documentary ("I'm a weed head," "We used huge amounts of drugs on the Warner Bros. lot"). He was arrested in '83 for weed possession and hid the fact that he was a heavy cigarette smoker from kids when playing Pee-Wee. Maybe I should criticize him for his lack of drug advocacy & failure to make drugs the focal point of his career? Nah, I'll leave that kinda thing to the mad homos at Queerty. 🙃

Paul Reubens had quite a lengthy history of run-ins with the law. In 1971 he was arrested for "loitering and prowling" near another adult movie theater in Sarasota. By the time of his '91 arrest for indecent exposure, he'd been arrested 3 times total in the same county.

Vice documentary discussing his 2002 arrest.

And then there was the OTHER arrest in 2002. The one in which he was accused of possessing child pornography. The thing so many others in Hollywood are currently being (credibly) accused of. As a result of this charge, he was forced to register his address as a sex offender home for 3 years & stay away from unaccompanied contact with minors. But he claimed until his dying day (literally) it was not true and indeed, the story behind it is confusing and contradictory. Among his collection of thousands of "kitschy" sexual images was a (supposed) picture of someone under 18 in a suggestive pose... hardly indicative of an attraction towards children. He ended up denying the CSAM allegations but admitting to possessing "obscene" material, which is an entirely subjective call.

Of the incident, he had this to say:

"One thing I want to make very, very clear, I don't want anyone for one second to think that I am titillated by images of children. It's not me. You can say lots of things about me. And you might. The public may think I'm weird. 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."

Some of the images in question.

But it's what triggered the raid on his home that made me raise an eyebrow. While Wikipedia doesn't mention it, articles from that time claim he was accused of hiring a 14-year old (Entertainment Weekly claims he was 17 and shares another awkward article including an interview with Reubens that paints him in a bad light) to pose for sexual pictures along with fellow actor & friend Jeffrey Jones. When the boy went to cops to snitch, he told them Reubens' home was full of "child porn". But the Vice doc says the boy LIED about both his age & the CSAM, while still other sources say Reubens wasn't involved in the photography incident at all and the kid just saw his house at another time while hanging with Jones. Where's the truth?

The allegations about child porn were mostly disproved--Reubens collected vintage porn and often bought magazines "in bulk" according to a magazine dealer, who testified that he couldn't have possibly known what was on every page of these old mags, many of which were still in sealed boxes at the time of the raid. (Among the collection were many homoerotic images--surprise, surprise). It's pretty rare to register as a sex offender if you're innocent. Then again, the threat of even more jail time is often used to force defendants into "plea bargains" so who knows. And what about the interactions with the underage boy? And what exactly was found on all those computers & back-up discs?

Thee image in question.

Nobody knows, but for some reason this incident didn't make huge waves in the news back then and certainly not as big as the 1991 arrest. Undoubtedly because Reubens wasn't as "big" anymore, yet a child porn charge against ANY famous person is a big deal & would be frontpage news today. As it should. And if they were involved in childrens' programming to boot? It'd be like Mr. Rogers or Barney violating children. The fact that he would be dragged so hard for doing what you expect one to do in a porn theater while the CSAM/photography charges basically drew a collective "meh" from the press speaks to how common child sexual abuse is & was in showbiz. And at that time they were NOT ready to talk about it.

My Armchair Analysis

It sounds to me like Paul's choice to remain in the closet led to some poor decision making, particularly in regards to the loitering arrests. Perhaps he would've been diagnosed with porn/sex addiction if it happened today. If Reubens hadn't felt like he had to choose between being openly gay & being successful, he likely wouldn't have felt the need to engage in these other bizarre and sneaky activities, or to be so private in general. It's a lot like George Michaels' arrest in that men's bathroom: he was closeted at the time and sneaking around to meet men on the down low. Repressed feelings don't magically go away-- they often show up in other, much worse ways.

However, the allegations about children do NOT fall under that category. If he was guilty of any of that, it's 100% on him & he should've sat in prison for a time. A long time. But in my biased opinion it seems like the 2002 arrest was a witch-hunt for which he was targeted due to his infamy & closetedness. When they failed to find actual CSAM, it was like "Okay, but we know your Big Gay Secret so you better cop to an obscenity charge & we'll call it even". Gays have long been accused of being pedophiles, and here was a high-profile closeted gay man with a history of sex crimes & a now-defunct children's show. Having all that vintage gay material simply wouldn't do for the LAPD, who have been involved in their own set of crimes & scandals.

Describing his character while promoting another project.

The Brilliance is IN the Subtext

A man of many faces

So much about Paul Reubens the man is and will probably remain forever unknowable. It should be said that he was a serious actor who starred in a number of other projects besides the Pee-Wee thang. He portrayed a range of VERY different characters in these gigs. The 1st that comes to mind is his character in the Johnny Depp flick Blow. This character is closest to how I imagine Paul Reubens THE PERSON to be when the lights & Pee-Wee costume are off and he's at home alone. But that's just a guess. From his spotty legal history to his sexuality/drug use to his super secretive battle with cancer, Reubens remains an enigma. And maybe it's better that way.

If he had lived openly in every way, wearing his orientation on his sleeve, perhaps we never would've gotten the subversive, high-art Pee-Wee Herman character. Shows and movies today are far too direct and beat you over the head with the message in a condescending, preachy way. Pee-Wee's TV and stage shows were so great in large part because of the subtext & what wasn't said. He fought for diversity & representation with his multicultural cast, pushed censorship limits with tons of hidden sexual innuendos, gave mainstream platforms to other serious artists like Gary Panter & spread the message of inclusivity/individuality all on a CBS kids' show.

If you really think he failed us by failing to come out publicly in grand "look at me" fashion, you've missed the entire point of Paul Reubens the artist & performer. For all the damage it did, it seems to me that his closetedness provided extra fuel to "come out" as a weirdo in every other way: as a nerd, a prankster, a trailblazing children's TV pioneer, a rulebreaker & a rebel. ("I'm a loner, Dottie. A rebel"). It's unfortunate that he felt he had to hide that aspect of himself to be successful but he wasn't--and still isn't--alone. And he really only hurt himself by doing so.

His posthumous message to his fans on social media 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."

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*Edit: I DID finally watch the (bootlegged) HBO documentary, thankyouverymuch. A great and touching movie that contains tons of precious rare footage. In it he discusses his influences, which included Howdy Doody, Little Rascals, Andy Warhol's factory & circus performers to name a few. He performed on his college campus as a drag queen (pics below). He also discusses his first relationship with a man named Guy & how they split up largely to help him hide his homosexuality & advance his career. The way he stayed in character IRL at times is reminiscent of Andy Kaufman, who has also been said to have been gay or bisexual in secret.

This film helped fill in the gaps & give us a more definitive look into the life of a reclusive genius who died too soon, leaving a void in the hearts of his fans. It's the closest thing to closure we'll be getting, at least. He passed only one week before he was set to film the "final scene" in which he was to discuss his arrest for child pornography. In true Paul Reubens fashion, he chose to do it his own way & the result is very sweet & sad.

The film highlighted the excessive need for control that Reubens had, a trait that's all too familiar to most closeted people. That fear of being exposed at any minute can lead to being a little too Type A or obsessive, but he ultimately relinquished control and revealed himself (in a good way this time) to his adoring audience. In the name of avoiding big spoilers, I'll stop here in describing the 2025 documentary because you really should see it yourself. I'll just say that stars like Paul Reubens are a rarity these days, and THAT is truly tragic. 🫶🏻