Pee Wee Herman's return to live theater could have been really sad. Pee Wee is, after all, approaching 60 and if you look at The Marx Bros, The Stooges and a host of other comedy acts once they crossed middle age they should have stopped. Somebody should have sat Moe down and told him to enjoy retirement and leave the memories fond-- instead he opted to go around the world in a daze and meet Snow White. Not good stuff by a long shot.
So it was with mixed feelings that I watched my good friend Paul Reubens don the Pee Wee garb and kick that act into gear again on either Conan or Letterman or the Daily Show-- they all kind of blur together for me. My first thought was he's put on a little weight but he still looks the part. I opted to give good thoughts to the Broadway show.
I decided against getting tickets to the show, it just didn't fit in my schedule but I caught the taped version on HBO the other night and you know what-- it didn't suck.
Not only didn't it suck, it was like an extended episode of Pee Wee's Playhouse, combining his children's show with his slightly more racy live show from 1981 at an LA Theater that had been released on DVD.
If I didn't love it I liked it a whole lot, enough that I bought the DVD when it became available on Amazon.
There's talk of a new Pee Wee Movie, and it's beyond the planning stages. I hope it's more Big Adventure and less Big Top (the sequel to Pee Wee's brilliant debut movie was less than stellar).
I'm available for re-writes Mr Herman.
