How HBO Max film Pee-wee as Himself about Paul Reubens came together after comic's death
Paul Reubens did not tell his director that he was dying.
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On July 31, 2023,
the news of Reubens' death came as a shock to documentary filmmaker Matt Wolf, who had spent a year trying to convince the actor and comedian to make the ambitious two-part documentary Pee-wee as Himself, now streaming on HBO Max, and over 40 hours interviewing him on camera.
But in 2023, the project was in danger of falling apart. The two had been at an impasse for a while over the issue of creative control, and they had finally found a way forward. He had one last interview scheduled, set for the first week of August. Then the texts started coming in. Wolf sat there shaking.
They had spoken about everything – Reubens' childhood, his relationship with fame, his ambitions, his commitment to his alter ego Pee-wee Herman, his sexuality, his arrest – except the fact that he had been battling
cancer for the past six years. But after the initial shock, a renewed purpose set in.
'I went to work the day after Paul died. I started to read the 1,500-page transcript of our interview through the night and was struck by the significance and meaning that came by understanding that he was privately contemplating mortality,' Wolf said.
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