The lasting power of Pee-Wee Herman

By Jordan Hruska

As a kid, brushing my teeth seemed infinitely more exciting when I employed Pee-wee Herman’s technique. As featured in the 1985 film “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure”, starring Paul Reubens as the titular eccentric, this involves lathering chompers with a toothbrush the size of a spatula and growling “Mad dog!”

Pee-wee’s universe of souped-up bicycles, toast-toting pterodactyls and prankster chewing-gum recently seduced a sell-out crowd to a screening at New York's Museum of Modern Art as part of their Tim Burton retrospective. Not everyone knows to attribute this cheery cult classic to Burton, whose body of work skews much darker. Yet his hand can be seen in the quirky art direction and oddball details, as well as in the film’s place in that murky space between gawky childhood and reluctant adulthood.

After a brief introduction by Burton, who mentioned the film’s place on a number of “worst-of” lists, the adventure began with applause and appreciative yelps. The film was a surprise box-office hit when it opened, made for $6m but earning $45m in ticket sales. The screening at MoMA revealed its lasting appeal. The audience’s jittery excitement was soon matched by the hysteric staccato of Danny Elfman’s score, his second ever (and the start of a rich and longstanding partnership with Burton). If you haven’t heard the Pee-wee theme, think of a circus-marching band headed off a cliff.

This urgent tenor perfectly accompanies Pee-wee’s manic antics. With high-pitched voice and apathetic sneer, he wryly mocks the adult world by tweaking its conventions. Pee-wee is both patronising and childish. At the screening such scenes elicited anticipatory laughter long before the gags and punch-lines. Much of the dialogue was recited aloud by the audience, and synchronised clapping accompanied his famous bar dance scene.

What makes Pee-wee so appealing? On a surreal quest to recover his prized bicycle, he runs away from home and encounters America’s most familiar and hardened transients. Despite his androgynous voice, fey swagger and elfish features, Pee-wee manages to warm the hearts of the most rugged truckers, hobos, rodeo cowboys and Harley riders along the way. He’s the quintessential American populist, humorously affirming the futility of our guises. By challenging these comfortable cultural divisions, Pee-wee shows us that a nation of rebels is, in fact, a nation with a common bond. (Need to break the ice with an ex-con? Just turn up the radio and sing along.) He is grandly affirming in his childish naiveté.