Getting to see the Pee Wee Herman show was a truly great treat. It was a great gift from my parents, which I then proposed to my wife that hopefully we could combine it by going to Times Square on New Year’s Eve.
There was much anticipation on trying to find the Stephen Sondheim Theatre after our long multiple public transportation stops from the LaGuardia airport. After trekking through Broadway, I became giggly with excitement when I saw Pee Wee Herman’s face and cartoony style letters across the marquee.
I guess you would have to know me a bit to understand my utter adoration for Pee Wee Herman. As a kid, I would dress up like Pee Wee Herman at school whenever I could. It started back in 1985 when my parents created a home made costume for me when we saw Pee Wee’s Big Adventure in the movie theater, and I was then paraded around the mall and nearby record store as the miniature four year old, chubby comic genius. Even as I grew bigger and bigger, my parents helped me maintain this costume and I wore it at every possible chance I had – Halloween, Dress Like Your Hero Day, Career Day, and to the unfortunate premiere for Big Top Pee Wee.
Not to mention this costume, my parents spoiled me with a plethora of Pee Wee Herman merchandise and they always fully supported my obsession for my childhood hero. I had the entire Playhouse set with all of the action figures and a life size Chairy that my brother and I fought over when playing the NES. I had the talking Pee Wee doll which is now used by my brother Joey as a Christmas tree Angel at his house. My Grandfather even got me a customized rubber stamp that read: “James S. Gorcesky – Pee Wee Herman’s # 1 Fan,” so of course if I ever had the opportunity to mail a letter, I used that stamp.
My parents helped me to use the stamp when they hunted down the info for me to join the official Pee Wee Herman Fan Club, where I got some cool schwag and an eight by ten photograph which I held in a frame over my desk, along with a homemade cut out clipping from a TV guide that my parents made for me, which I still have to this day. My parents also knew that Saturday mornings at eleven am on CBS was a sacred time where I got my weekly fix of Pee Wee’s Playhouse. When that wasn’t enough, they frequently rented for me the 1981 HBO production of the Pee Wee Herman Show, which I would come to find later in years was what pretty much started it all.
In case you haven’t realized it yet, I was maliciously picked on by the older kids in elementary school. They would attempt to make me cry and make up rumors that Pee Wee was dead, but I knew more about him then they did anyways, so I would display my nerdy knowledge and retort, “no he isn’t, and did you know that his real name is Paul Reubens?” After being shoved against the wall and continuously mocked, I began to suppress my embarrassing Pee Wee fandom as I got older. Things didn’t help much after his little stint in a Florida Adult Movie Theater, but it was still great to see Pee Wee walk across the stage to start off the 1991 MTV VMA’s with the line, “heard any good jokes lately?” (see it here on You Tube.)
The character of Pee Wee went into seclusion, but my parents continued to always support my inner Pee Wee craze. And I secretly still loved Paul Reubens on the screen so I would try to hunt him down in his other movies during the early to mid 90’s (the dark times). They also encouraged me to hold onto my collectibles from youth and to cherish them, especially since Pee Wee’s Big Adventure had currently entered film moratorium, so that it was no longer available. But they still found it for me on old VHS copy for a Christmas gift, and later on the special edition DVD which we all rejoiced over on another Christmas morning.
So I was thrown back a few years ago when there became talks and rumors for a third Pee Wee film, or when Paul Reubens was getting bigger roles or more notoriety. I then couldn’t believe when my wife and I caught a segment of Rachel Ray when Pee Wee was on and promoted his play in Los Angeles. I was totally jealous on how he bragged that they had a lot of the old cast from the old Saturday Morning Show, including the set, props and puppets and that it was only going to be playing out in LA for a limited engagement of a few weeks.
Luckily, the play of bringing the Playhouse to life was so successful, that there became another limited ten week engagement out in New York City. My parents caught wind of this and once again surprised and supported my Pee Wee fascination and helped to fulfill a childhood dream of seeing Pee Wee in person. I was also fortunate to now have such a supportive wife, as we had to work out together for a budget of time and resources, especially after just recently returning from an over thirty hour long round trip car ride across country from Dallas.
But everything was so worth it and the adventure was most excellent. Out in front of the theater, I stood out in the cold taking photographs with my wife, two brothers and parents. My brothers had also adapted into the Pee Wee fascination. My now eleven year old brother Sal has also worn a homemade Pee Wee Herman suit by my parents, he even wore it to our sister’s Sweet Sixteen party. And my twenty five year old brother Joey is no different. Joey actually physically looks and frequently acts like Pee Wee (when need be). He has created his own suit, and even invested in a pair of white platforms to re-create the infamous Tequila Dance from Pee Wee’s Big Adventure.
It was really exciting to see Joey where his Halloween costume from our cross borough venture to the theatre. Even though he wasn’t wearing his platforms, he did wear his Pee Wee costume the whole time (even with a red Boomerang bow tie). What was surprising was how no one really paid him much heed until he took his black Michelin man jacket. My theory is because he just looked like another weirdo or European tourist so his fashion sense of the ridiculous just blended in.
Joey stood up on the window ledge in front of ginormous posters of Pee Wee that promoted the show, it was then that the tourists shouted out Pee Wee imitations or his ridiculous chuckle as a mating call to get my exhausted brother to do the same. Walking into the theatre, with my ticket stub shaking in my hand, I once again squealed with excitement to find authentic and original Pee Wee Herman merchandise, so as an early birthday gift I got this really cool and collectible type of scrap book full of tattoos, post cards, a spinning Pee Wee, interviews and a whole lot more pretty boy schwag.
As we got to our seats, we were all the way at the back of the theatre in top of the mezzanine, but the place wasn’t that full and I still had a great view. We waited for a while, but I had to gasp when I saw Pee Wee walk across the stage and then encourage us to say the Pledge of Allegiance. I bought into the show as if he was directing me again like he did several Saturday mornings ages ago.
He went behind the stage and a screen came down that showed visuals very similar to his HBO special of The Pee Wee Herman Show. Throughout most of the play (I don’t want to spoil too much) I guess you could say that the plot of it is a hybrid of the original HBO special, combined with the fact that the Playhouse needs to be modernized with a computer and technology, but the Playhouse puppets are against it.
Oh – did I forget to mention the puppets? It just seems that puppetry has been a dead art after the legend Jim Henson passed away. But these puppeteers do a great job, and even include a funny gag bit of floating white eye balls in the darkness, much similar to the scene in Pee Wee’s Big Adventure when he puts on the night vision goggles and he is surrounded by numerous examples of taxidermy.
The show brings back and unites Pee Wee’s old stomping grounds with the comedy troupe of The Groundlings such as John Paragon (Jambi the Genie), John Moody (Mailman Mike) and Lynne Marie Stewart (Ms. Yvonne). Unfortunately, one Groundling that was not able to return from the 1981 stage production was Phil Hartman, who played Captain Carl and helped to write the show and Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. Instead, another former Groundling, Phil Lamar plays the role of Cowboy Curtis, which was originally made famous on the Saturday morning show by Laurence Fishburne. Even though Curtis didn’t appear on the original HBO special, the Captain Carl character is pretty much re-written as Cowboy Curtis for this play and he follows the same plot of being wished into falling in love with Ms. Yvonne.
But I got to say from the very moment that the curtains opened up and the music played, I bounced up and down in my chair like I did in my Chairy years ago. But it was when the neon lights blinked on one by one that created a border around those legendary objects within Pee Wee’s Playhouse including Mr. Window, Clockey, the singing Flowers and the joking Fish in their aquarium. My jaw dropped and I screamed “Oh my God!” to my wife, it had been as if I was instantly transported back to my childhood in a flash.
The rest of the show was great, but I honestly did feel a bit cheated that several bits were just rehashed from the original HBO special. But at the same time, Pee Wee could make something seem so childlike and innocent, and then throw something out in a double entendre or some dirty material that only the adults in the audience would get. Another thing that was entertaining was how Pee Wee could take something so simple, and to still have a unique gift to just keep doing it and over doing it as he gets rolls of laughter from the audience just by doing something as simple as playing with a balloon.
After the show, my wife had found out that Pee Wee sometimes comes outside the back of the theater to speak to the fans. My super sleuth also discovered that Pee Wee loves it when people dress up. She dragged my brother and I outside to the theater to a crowd of people waiting by a fenced off railing. I didn’t know what to expect, but I had hopefully anticipated getting to meet Pee Wee, so I brought this really cool Pee Wee Herman yoyo that my wife’s step mother gave me for this Christmas. My hands shook in the cold while I fiddled to get it out of my backpack along with a marker.
When he arrived outside, dressed in a white scarf to conceal his trademark bow tie and to rest his throat for that night’s performance, which was going to be taped by HBO and was the second to last show of the whole run. I was worried that we had travelled all of this way and there would be no way we would get to meet Pee Wee. My competition were parents who grew up on Pee Wee, and were introducing their own children to the comedy genius on their shoulders amongst the crowd. Pee Wee really gave a lot of attention to his next generation of fans.
I knew I wasn’t going to be beat by any simple toddlers, and I was going to utilize the gift that befallen upon my brother, his uncanny appearance to Pee Wee and that I was going to wave him around like a white flag to get our hero’s attention. I picked my brother up around the waist, dead lifted him up to my hips and waved him back and forth shouting screams and squeals like little twelve year old girls at a Justin Bieber concert.
Finally, as Pee Wee scanned through the crowd, he said in his nasally voice through the megaphone, “Hi Pee Wee,” and we glowed with giddiness. Pee Wee continued to talk to the crowd, and apologized that he only wished if he could sign everything we had, but he would never have enough time to rest up for his next performance. He gave his final goodbyes and thanked us all for being such big fans. I was hoping that he could openly talk about a future Pee Wee film, but I feel that with the attention that he has been getting from these performances and appearances on shows throughout New York City as we speak, I am in hopeful anticipation that the world is ready to laugh again and allow this strange man-child to Tequila dance on platform shoes back into their hearts.
References:
http://peewee.com/broadway/gang.html
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090500/fullcredits#cast
For a great montage of footage of this stage show, click here to view it on Pee Wee’s site.
