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But fame was way more complicated.”
Pee-wee as Himself was first announced in 2021, with Matt Wolf directing and Josh Safdie and Benny Safdie serving as executive producers. "He was key to the return. It was devastating.”
Indeed, the media backlash had a lasting impact on Reubens. Sitting down for over 40 hours of interviews for the HBO documentary Pee-wee as Himself, the actor, comedian, and Pee-wee Herman creator came out as gay, discussed his “devastating” scandals, and offered new insight into a life that he had always kept secret.
“I had many, many secret relationships,” Reubens says in the documentary, which premiered this week at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival.
“It’s still a significant footnote … 30 years later I still feel the effects all the time.”
Elsewhere in the documentary, Reubens details hardships the public wasn’t privy to, like his struggle with identity when Pee-wee Herman first took off. “I was secretive about my sexuality even to my friends [out of] self-hatred or self-preservation,” he says at another point.
Reubens himself consented to the project and spent “several hundred hours” discussing it with Wolf (per Variety), but kept his struggle with cancer secret to the filmmakers until days before his death.
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In an audio recording sent to Wolf during his final days, Reubens explained, “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.
“It’s shocking what horrible, awful stuff people think about me,” he says.
In the final months before his death in July 2023, Paul Reubens got a chance to get a “message in at the last minute,” as he put it. In his final audio message to the director, without revealing his terminal diagnosis, he had a message of love.
"My whole career, everything I did and wrote, was based in love." The documentary serves as both a coming out story and a final testament to an entertainer who spent decades bringing joy to others while keeping significant parts of himself hidden from public view.
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"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," the announcement read.
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"Paul bravely and privately fought cancer for years with his trademark tenacity and wit.
I lost control of my anonymity. “I was conflicted about sexuality. “I was conflicted about sexuality. Actress Debi Mazar, who dated Reubens, addressed this in the documentary, stating, "I know people will say, 'He was gay!' So what?"
The pressure of maintaining his public image contributed to his career's eventual downturn, including his 1991 arrest for indecent exposure and later legal troubles in 2000.
After a long hiatus, the character was revived for the stage with "The Pee-wee Herman Show" in 2010, which ran in LA and on Broadway. “I wasn’t pursuing the Paul Reubens career, I was pursuing the Pee-wee Herman career.”
Pee-wee as Himself is slated to stream on Max later this year.
'Pee-wee Herman' star Paul Reubens comes out as gay in documentary after death
The late Paul Reubens, aka Pee-wee Herman, is defining himself after years of speculation about the star's sexuality.
Reubens reveals he was gay in the new two-part docuseries “Pee-wee as Himself," which made its debut Thursday night at Sundance Film Festival in Salt Lake City.
And all of a sudden, I had a Charlie Manson mugshot. “I wasn’t pursuing the Paul Reubens career; I was pursuing the Pee-wee Herman career … I hid behind an alter ego.”
As for Guy — who shaped Pee-wee’s character with campy sayings like “Mmmm! "My career would have absolutely suffered if I was openly gay, so I went to great lengths for many, many years to keep it a secret."
He sat down for 40 hours of interviews with director Matt Wolf for the documentary, which includes Reubens discussing his relationship with Guy, a painter he lived with in Los Angeles in the 1970s.
The actor chose his professional life over his personal life, and reveals that years after they broke up, Reubens visited Guy just before he died from AIDS.
I have loved you all so much and enjoyed making art for you."
In 1986, "Pee-wee's Playhouse" premiered on CBS and the Saturday morning children's program ran until 1990.
Six years later, Pee-wee returned on Netflix for the film "Pee-wee's Big Holiday," produced by Judd Apatow and co-starring Joe Manganiello.
Apatow was a fan and "he wanted to bring Pee-wee back," Reubens told USA TODAY in 2016 while discussing the film.