It Was Easy to Get Pee-wee Herman

The latest in pop-culture news, recaps, and reviews, plus close reads, profiles, interviews, and more from Vulture.com. [Brand Logo]( remembrance [It Was Easy to Get Pee-wee Herman]( He was one of many characters Paul Reubens inhabited. Any of them could have been stars. Photo: Marco Grob The first time I saw Pee-wee Herman, in his 1981 HBO comedy special, I was in sixth grade, close enough to the character’s maturity level to immediately feel the truth of the portrayal. I didn’t understand everything Paul Reubens was doing as a performer — I had seen that kind of sketch comedy only in little bursts on Saturday Night Live, never stretched out to an hour — but it spoke to me, as it did to nearly everyone who saw it, even those who initially found it grating and weird. Pee-wee was Everykid. He was chatty, bratty, imaginative, annoying, charming, and profoundly narcissistic in the manner of an elementary-school-age person who hasn’t yet figured out that other people don’t merely exist but are as important as he is. If he came up against a reality that was too harsh to deny, he would deny it anyway. His comeback to being insulted, “I know you are, but what am I?,” would have been laughed off any real-world playground. But Pee-wee delivered it as if blessed by the ghost of Oscar Wilde. [read more]( The Latest TV Recaps • Justified: City Primeval: [Flip the Switch]( • The Afterparty: [One Last Score]( [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( Stories We Think You’ll Like [Robert Plunket Is Fine With Being Rediscovered “It’s more time-consuming than you would think,” the author says of his recent revival.]( By Brandon Sanchez [Travis Scott Is Raging Into Oblivion On Utopia, the rapper is too scared to mess with the blueprint.]( [Chappell Roan Just Wants to Be Hannah Montana “Pop music is pop music. It’s not trying to be all indie math-rock bullshit.”]( By Rebecca Alter [The Best Comedy Books of 2023 (So Far) These books give us a record of our times via the moment’s best comic minds.]( By Brian Boone [The Comedy Cellar Is Coming to a Big Screen Near You On August 5, the famous New York club will livestream two shows to 48 theaters across the country.]( By Hershal Pandya [Spamalot Will Not Succeed on Broadway, Again Monty Python is not dead yet!]( By Jason P. Frank [Beyoncé Answers It All With One Ad-Lib Addressing Erykah Badu and Lizzo, like a queen.]( By Justin Curto [Learn more about RevenueStripe...]( [Today’s Crossword]( 6-Down, Eight Letters: Song sung by M3GAN, in M3GAN. Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: Getty Images, Everette [Beach Read Book Club]( For our inaugural Beach Read Book Club, New York writers Brock Colyar, Allison P. Davis, Emily Gould, Matthew Schneier, and Alison Willmore will discuss the season’s buzziest book, Emma Cline’s The Guest. [Sign up here](to join the discourse and get the newsletter. [Read more from Vulture]( A newsletter of TV and movie recommendations. [Sign up]( to get it every week. [Get the Newsletter]( [logo]( [facebook logo]( [instagram logo]( [twitter logo]( [unsubscribe]( | [privacy notice]( | [update preferences]( This email was sent to {EMAIL}. Was this email forwarded to you? [Sign up now]( to get this newsletter in your inbox. [View this email in your browser.]( You received this email because you have a subscription to New York. Reach the right online audience with us For advertising information on email newsletters, please contact AdOps@nymag.com Vox Media, LLC 1201 Connecticut Ave. NW, 12th Floor Washington, DC 20036 Copyright © 2023, All rights reserved