“Everything is Enchanted”: Andy Kaufman and Paul Reubens

Left: Andy Kaufman arsenic Latka Gravas successful Taxi, 1979. Public domain, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Right: Paul Reubens arsenic Pee-wee Herman, 2009. AP Photo/Danny Moloshok.

Andy Kaufman and Paul Reubens some appeared connected the deed TV amusement The Dating Game, but not arsenic themselves. If you had tuned successful connected a Wednesday nighttime successful 1978, you mightiness person seen a alternatively weird bachelor amid the accustomed rotation telephone of dudes with disco medallions. While the different contestants were each throwing scripted innuendos astatine 1 fortunate lady, determination was Andy Kaufman! Except it wasn’t him, not exactly. He had shown up arsenic his squeaky-voiced Foreign Man character, Latka Gravas, whom helium would soon marque celebrated connected NBC’s amusement Taxi (1979–1983. But nary 1 knew who that was yet. On the show, it each got beauteous discombobulating. He was grinning similar a lad who’d conscionable discovered what occurrence could bash to his Action Man; helium deliberately misunderstood the jokes, and squealed “I won!” erstwhile helium didn’t win, each someway earning him the gleeful indulgence of the workplace audience. What the hellhole was that?

A twelvemonth later, a definite Pee-wee Herman was connected the aforesaid show, a then-unknown overgrown lad successful a glen plaid suit and reddish bow tie, played by a twenty-seven-year-old histrion called Paul Reubens. Looking similar Buster Keaton’s unhinged son, sounding similar a hyperactive imp connected a sweetener high, helium had the assemblage giggling similar drunk hyenas soon, too. Crashing The Dating Game wasn’t immoderate benignant of elaborate strategy Andy and Paul hatched together, but it’s bully to deliberation astir them successful divided screen: 2 cartoonish instigators of live-action anarchy, tricksters without immoderate malicious purpose, making drama retired of these antithetic characters.

It’s a bully clip to analyse the paradoxes and peculiar strangeness of Kaufman and Reubens, who are oddly alike successful immoderate ways and truthful antithetic successful others. Two fascinating caller documentaries effort to puzzle retired the stories of these 2 much-missed entertainers. (Reubens died astatine property seventy aft a conflict with crab long-kept secret, successful 2023; Kaufman died of lung crab successful 1984, erstwhile helium was conscionable thirty-five.) Matt Wolf’s Pee-wee arsenic Himself and Alex Braverman’s wacked-out representation of Kaufman, Thank You Very Much, supply the champion accounts of what powered their singular shenanigans, not to notation the occupation they got themselves into erstwhile they crash-landed successful the satellite of showbiz.

Personally, I similar to ideate a documentary astir some of them. Or a large buddy movie, possibly with Nicolas Cage arsenic Andy and Timothée Chalamet arsenic Paul. Two Inscrutable Jews! Andy Kaufman from Great Neck, Long Island, and Paul Reubens from Sarasota, Florida. Two oddball products of Eisenhower-era suburbia, who spent their childhoods successful staring contests with the TV, bewitched by fun-for-all-the-family entertainment: The Howdy Doody Show, I Love Lucy, The Little Rascals. Kaufman, the Philip Roth–level satyr with a saccharine bony (“He was benignant of a enactment addict,” his erstwhile spouse Lynne Margulies cheerily remembers successful the documentary); and Reubens, the willowy lad who dressed up arsenic a princess connected Halloween.

In a 2009 chat with Reubens for Interview magazine, Paul Rudd observed the Kaufman-esque vibe of that Dating Game appearance and wondered whether helium was an influence. “I was precise influenced by him. I liked his work, and I knew him a tiny, teeny bit,” Reubens said. I couldn’t find immoderate quotes of Kaufman talking astir his contemporaries. That wasn’t truly his style.

But among different things, Andy Kaufman whitethorn person been the designer of Reubens’s Saturday greeting TV masterpiece, Pee-wee’s Playhouse. Kaufman made a six-minute skit called “Uncle Andy’s Funhouse” for the TV amusement Buckshot successful 1980. Kaufman’s champion person and coconspirator, Bob Zmuda—a antheral who utilized to tally astir the Central Park Zoo with Kaufman, screaming, “The lion’s out!”—once called it “a kids’ amusement for adults” that ne'er got made into a full-grown show. An IMDb trivia leafage claims that earlier helium died, Kaufman approved of Reubens mutating the Funhouse into the Playhouse earlier helium died. While the formats are similar, the 2 shows are weird worlds unto themselves, 2 “houses” that are alike successful their eccentricity but it whitethorn beryllium the lone contention wherever Kaufman comes retired looking somewhat much “normal”: helium runs upstairs successful a hula skirt to outcry astatine his parents (actors); Pee-wee chats with a talking globe. They’ve some disappeared into characters that look to person beginnings and nary ends.

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Inscrutability tin beryllium a performer’s champion friend—it makes everything much existent and unpredictable—but Kaufman’s and Reubens’s careers besides connection lessons successful its imaginable risks and pitfalls. In the interviews with Matt Wolf that marque up Pee-wee arsenic Himself, combined with thousands of hours of worldly from Reubens’s idiosyncratic archive, Reubens comes disconnected as, yes, a full sweetheart and a congenital mischief-maker, teasing and bedeviling Wolf astatine each turn. It’s chaotic amusive to watch, but you besides cognize he’s besides hiding things helium feels the request to conceal, including the crab diagnosis helium kept concealed from the nationalist and from Wolf. Previously profoundly backstage astir his sexuality, helium discusses his heavy romance with the handsome creator Guy Brown earlier the instauration of Pee-wee. Severely freaked retired by however helium “lost [his] full property by being progressive with idiosyncratic else,” helium swore disconnected immoderate semipermanent romanticist relationship, dedicating himself to his career. His celebrated instauration materialized not agelong after, partially shaped by Brown’s mischievous spirit. But Reubens was successful emotion and ached from the loss. He’s adjacent to tears erstwhile recalling Guy’s decease from AIDS-related unwellness 4 decades earlier.

Reubens besides admits he’s rather the power freak, and secretive arsenic a Cold War spy. “I’m not a trusting person,” helium tells the director, straightforwardly. Fathoming the reasons for this isn’t precisely rocket science. “My career,” Reubens observes, “would person perfectly suffered if I was openly gay.” Eventually, helium stops cooperating with Wolf connected the documentary, uncertain astir whether it volition archer the communicative helium wants, keen to signifier the full happening himself.

Maybe Reubens is sometimes coy due to the fact that he’s baffled by the inexplicably charmed communicative of Pee-wee Herman. The quality was coagulated golden close from the beginning, a deed with audiences arsenic soon arsenic Reubens slipped into the outfit helium recovered successful a cardboard container backstage astatine the Groundlings headquarters. He was acceptable to amusement you his chill toys, connection contented (“I was utilizing my imagination. I was being creative. You tin bash it astatine home, too”), cackle with glee, oregon outcry a snotty playground insult: “Act your age, not your IQ!” By 1981, helium was the prima of a sellout show. De Niro and Scorsese came to cheque it retired 1 night, possibly taking notes for The King of Comedy (1982).

Soon helium was a existent pop-cultural phenomenon, helium was connected on schoolhouse luncheon boxes; helium was a doll you could get for Christmas. But successful retrospect, nary of that occurrence seems to person been guaranteed. Reubens was a CalArts alumnus enthralled by the Warhol superstars. After assemblage helium was each acceptable to articulation an offshoot of the legendary anarchist resistance corporate the Cockettes. He played a “mermaid mentation of Cher” successful a trippy video agelong earlier Cher appeared successful a movie called Mermaids (1990). In Super 8 footage of Reubens arsenic a stoned sylph wreathed successful sequins and fur, experimenting with assorted resistance looks, it’s giving Rrose Sélavy via Peter Hujar. He referred to his Pee-wee enactment arsenic “performance art” plentifulness of times.

And past there’s the substance of his 2 arrests: the archetypal for nationalist vulnerability successful a Florida porno theatre portion Pee-wee’s Playhouse was connected hiatus successful 1991; the 2nd connected trumped-up kid pornography charges successful 2003. He owned a immense quantity of vintage erotica, overmuch of it stashed successful unopened boxes. Keen to marque headlines during predetermination season, the LAPD desperately isolated 1 perchance ambiguous representation retired of thousands and tried to skewer him with 1 number connected the reduced complaint of obscenity. Reubens protested his innocence successful some cases and pled nary contest.

You mightiness accidental helium became a unfortunate of his ain too-successful character. Reubens was wholeheartedly invested successful and identified with being Pee-wee, astir ne'er interviewed oregon making immoderate benignant of nationalist quality retired of character. Wolf’s documentary includes footage of Connie Chung referring to Herman’s lawyer successful a quality bulletin, arsenic if the quality had been arrested, Reubens not adjacent mentioned. The wicked dissonance betwixt the nationalist sprite and the meth-lab Gandalf successful his infamous Florida mug changeable felt acute indeed. Was it Borges oregon Liz Taylor who said, “Fame is simply a signifier of incomprehension, possibly the worst?”

And indeed, forty years later, cipher seems to cognize who Andy Kaufman truly was, either, not adjacent Zmuda. Remembering Kaufman from our ain deranged contiguous successful Thank You Very Much, Zmuda says, “It was similar moving for Harry Houdini. They weren’t jokes, they were illusions.”

Kaufman was a large actor: fearless, capable to person you helium truly meant immoderate helium did. And yet helium didn’t look funny successful playing anybody that didn’t travel retired of his head. But that’s a flaw lone if you’re funny successful the accustomed mode of doing things. It’s amusive to ideate Kaufman doing what Reubens did successful Blow (2001), for example, and giving a sly and delicate show arsenic a campy, drug-trafficking hairdresser. But possibly helium would’ve shown up arsenic idiosyncratic who wasn’t adjacent successful the script, conscionable for fun. Why does the show person to halt “here” alternatively than “there”? And decided that, anyway?

If Kaufman felt that what helium was up to was show art, of course, helium wasn’t telling. There’s nary grounds of him talking astir Fluxus; there’s conscionable his person Laurie Anderson successful Thank You Very Much telling the communicative of hanging retired with him astatine a Coney Island funfair and deliberately antagonizing ferocious carnival workers. Performance art, a goof, a huffy risk, oregon each of the above. He went connected TV and told David Letterman astir 3 men who’d mugged him recently, and announced helium was going to follow them arsenic his big sons. Or helium dilatory danced with his beloved Grandma Pearl. Maybe it was conscionable a backstage crippled helium was playing, and helium was wholly untroubled by thing different than his ain idiosyncratic definitions of occurrence and failure. Consider this country from Julie Hecht’s account, successful her publication Was This Man a Genius? Talks with Andy Kaufman (2001), of trying to illustration him for Harper’s Magazine astatine his peak, circa 1979. It sounds similar hanging retired with Don Quixote. Author and taxable amusement up astatine a Manhattan edifice conscionable earlier closing time. He tells the maître d’ they person a reservation, but successful the dependable of a fusty aristocrat.

“I’m precise atrocious but I conscionable phoned and was told I would beryllium served if I arrived earlier one.”

“It is astir 1 now,” said the maître d’.

Sir Andrew of Kaufmanshire retorts successful his faux-British accent, “Almost—but not yet one.” Dinner is served. Robin Williams noted connected the 1995 TV peculiar A Comedy Salute to Andy Kaufman, “Andy made himself the premise, and the satellite was the punch line.”

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Does anybody other consciousness high? Perhaps it isn’t a astonishment to larn that Reubens and galore members of the accumulation plan squad connected Pee-wee’s Playhouse were sustained by plentifulness of Cali weed. The acceptable for the amusement was 1 of the large artworks of the eighties. Every inch was psychedelic, from the acid-flashback patterns successful the carpet to the butterscotch-colored sphinx connected the roof, which was designed by the William Blake of LA’s punk artists, Gary Panter. Pee-wee is talking to a blistery Black cowboy who was successful Apocalypse Now. (Laurence Fishburne!) Ah, the walls are melting. Is Chairry a mint-green talking seat oregon a mint-green talking hippo? Every episode’s concealed connection makes the full acceptable detonate (“Fun!”), conscionable similar erstwhile you and your pals get tickled into Jell-O by a stoner in-joke.

Meanwhile, led astray by excessively overmuch On The Road successful his teens, Kaufman ran distant from location and spent a twelvemonth surviving successful a Long Island park, transmogrifying from bully lad to wastoid connected a fare of brain-frying substances that would’ve spooked Dennis Hopper. LSD, DMT, STP, Dexedrine, rivers of booze “every day!” arsenic helium recalled successful an interview. “Every day!” Luckily, Transcendental Meditation tweaked those encephalon waves to a antithetic frequency, and from 1969 onward, helium was astir a parody of a caller property idiosyncratic successful his squeaky-clean disavowal of thing remotely “toxic.” (Except erstwhile helium was being his lounge vocalist change ego, Tony Clifton, bellowing similar a hungover oversea lion—then it was clip for cigarettes and whiskey.)

Pretty overmuch everything Kaufman did was trippy, though, due to the fact that helium messed with the full conception of funny. Once, astatine a drama club, helium ate a bowlful of cocoa crystal pick onstage. The enactment was the classical Cheshire Cat switcheroo: the mean mode of doing things was abruptly revealed to beryllium nonsense. You could toil for years to nail 3 minutes of sassy one-liners, oregon you could spell determination tin name. Like Syd Barrett asked, “What precisely is simply a joke?”

At the aforesaid time, overmuch of their worldly was uncannily familiar. Reagan was successful the White House and everybody was getting flashbacks to the fifties. Cute surfaces, unusual depths: all-American aesthetics rendered darkly oregon sweetly perverse. David Byrne wandering astir Texas successful a Stetson similar a Martian astatine a barbecue successful his movie True Stories (1986). The Norman Rockwell suburbs seething with psychosexual nightmares successful Blue Velvet (1986). Cindy Sherman, the all-American miss from Glen Ridge, New Jersey, mutating each clip she raided her dress-up box. Was she a frightened bobby-soxer oregon a femme fatale from a movie noir that you fractional remember? Pee-wee materialized with a delicious enactment container afloat of chaos. What was helium up to? Like Kaufman, helium was creating demented echoes of his puerility programming, adjacent parts vaudeville and avant-garde, simultaneously wholesome and weird, a heartwarming tribute to contented and a sly parody of it. Look astatine Kaufman lip-syncing to the taxable opus from Mighty Mouse: “Here I travel to prevention the day!” Or spot the touching spectacle of Kaufman talking with Howdy Doody connected his 1977 peculiar Andy’s Funhouse, arsenic if the puppet were a existent person: “The archetypal person I ever had.” If they marque you consciousness similar you’re zonked connected psychedelics, it’s partially due to the fact that they ace unfastened a portal to a definite childlike wonder. It’s a satellite successful which, arsenic Glenn O’Brien pointed retired successful his epic exegesis connected Pee-wee for Artforum, “everything is enchanted.”

As soon CBS gave Reubens the greenish light, helium was connected a mission. He tells Wolf that helium knew astatine erstwhile that “I tin beryllium the beacon of being like, It’s good to beryllium different.” No large woody was made retired of the information that the formed was multiracial astatine a clip erstwhile this was highly rare. When Reubens confesses “there was cheery subtext successful Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” helium tin hardly fell his mirth: a large uncover of the astir evident happening successful the world. Who’s that knocking astatine the cherry-red doorway astatine the tallness of the ultrahomophobic Reagan era? A who’s who of LGBTQ royalty: Cher! Grace Jones! Little Richard! And that’s conscionable the Christmas special. It was benignant of radical, fixed that the president didn’t adjacent accidental the connection AIDS until 1985.

As gentle arsenic helium could be, Kaufman had a compulsive appetite for creating ungraded and disorder that was baffling past and would beryllium vocation termination now. The antheral who canceled himself! A troll earlier troll meant that. He got himself voted disconnected SNL for being truthful infuriating. Imagine idiosyncratic contiguous publically seeming to crook their drama vocation into a broadside hustle portion they go the “Inter-Gender Wrestling Champion of the United States,” a loudmouth schlub who insists helium fights lone women connected assorted TV wrestling franchises, taunting the audience, feasting connected their boos and getting rewarded with a hailstorm of popcorn and Coke.

Everybody’s grown acquainted with the conception of actors staying successful quality disconnected acceptable but this was mode earlier each those stories astir Daniel Day-Lewis making his ain canoe for The Last of the Mohicans. You’re falling autumn done a full different trap doorway erstwhile you retrieve that Kaufman caused each this occupation arsenic “Andy Kaufman.” It’s not arsenic if galore radical were adjacent successful connected the joke. The histrion Carol Kane told maine that aft helium was pile-driven by Jerry “The King” Lawler during a wrestling lucifer and bundled disconnected to the hospital, the formed of Taxi “thought helium was really successful [the] hospital, and we sent him magazines and effect baskets. And past Danny [DeVito] watched the portion of the lucifer and slowed it down—it was fake!”

Some radical inactive deliberation Andy Kaufman isn’t dead. He’s been sighted, among different places, astatine a Walmart successful New Mexico. Zmuda cryptically suggests that “if helium wasn’t dead, he’d beryllium faking his death.” Is helium secretly watching Nathan Fielder’s reality-mangling antics connected The Rehearsal and giggling with approval? Why did helium enactment arsenic a busboy portion helium was connected Taxi? He was similar immoderate mythological carnal that exists conscionable to bewilder radical and bask successful their responses.

Underneath each the chaos, determination whitethorn person been peace, maintained by a heavy interior purpose. Thank You Very Much points retired the power of Transcendental Meditation: The straitjacket of the aforesaid does not exist. Rather than lamenting what you supposedly are, research what you could be, whether that’s Elvis, a wrestler, oregon idiosyncratic who screams “You’ll Never Walk Alone” portion thrashing a hi-hat connected The Mike Douglas Show. Forty 1000 dollars is lone a fiscal loss; it doesn’t mean existent failure. Accept bully oregon atrocious reactions arsenic beauteous successful their ain way. “Let beryllium be finale of seem,” successful the words of Wallace Stevens, but successful beforehand of a unrecorded workplace audience, ideally. “He was truthful courageous,” Kane told me, “because helium ne'er broke character. He was truthful honorable and existent to immoderate helium wanted to conception arsenic an artist. He ne'er fto on. He ne'er winked.”

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I called Kane, the sui generis Upper West Side Good Witch from specified classics arsenic Scrooged (1988), Carnal Knowledge (1971), and Addams Family Values (1993). She knew them both. She acted with Kaufman arsenic Latka’s girlfriend, Simka, connected Taxi, and was pals with Reubens for years, stepping retired with him for his archetypal nationalist quality successful LA pursuing his infamous Florida arrest. They had meal astatine a restaurant; the property was there. “Paul arranged it all,” she said. “He did it precise elegantly.” Happily recalling Kaufman, she said, “He felt that rehearsal was not the champion happening for his peculiar process. During the week you had to rehearse with a young antheral with a cardboard motion astir his cervix that said andy connected it. He was a beauteous young antheral but the chemistry wasn’t the same.”

How were Kaufman and Reubens alike? Were they alike? “Kindness,” Kane said, “is thing they had successful common.” Giving radical delight is simply a precise generous act. See Andy’s wide-eyed boy-at-the-carnival glee erstwhile he’s chatting with Orson Welles connected The Merv Griffin Show. He was a goofy kid from Great Neck, and present he’s talking with a fable arsenic if helium were talking to his grandpa. There’s footage of him, toward the extremity of his life, greeting a blessed assemblage astatine the Improv successful Los Angeles. He’s the cheeriest idiosyncratic you’ve ever seen successful a punk leather overgarment and a Travis Bickle Mohawk. (And astir apt the lone idiosyncratic whose Mohawk was concocted from post-chemotherapy hair.)

In the heartrending audio that concludes Wolf’s film, recorded by himself the time earlier helium died, Reubens declares that his enactment arsenic Pee-wee was “based successful emotion and glee.” Kane said, “Paul was 1 of the sweetest radical connected the look of the earth.” The sweetest infinitesimal successful Wolf’s documentary comes erstwhile we spot Reubens arsenic Pee-wee astatine the 1991 MTV Video Music Awards. “Rave response” would beryllium an understatement of the audience’s reaction. He tries to goof with the crowd, telling them again and again, “Shut up! Stop!,” but the roar keeps coming. An look moves crossed his look that isn’t an particularly Pee-wee one: he’s touched, arsenic if he’d conscionable stumbled into a immense astonishment enactment being thrown successful his honor. But helium recovers and asks, successful that trademark whine, “Heard immoderate bully jokes lately?”

Kane told maine her 2 aged friends “were magical, some of them, successful antithetic ways.” Different brands of magic; akin kinds of spells. They conjured up chaotic caller spaces to execute wrong wherever things were multicolored, discombobulating, hysterical. Just similar successful the taxable tune for Pee-wee’s Playhouse, “you’ve landed successful a spot wherever thing tin happen,” and you tin marque it into your home. Magical indeed.

Charlie Fox is simply a writer and creator who lives successful London. His publication of essays, This Young Monster, is published by Fitzcarraldo Editions. He curated Flowers of Romance for Lodovico Corsini successful 2024.