Mitchell and I, juniors in college, sat at Bickford’s diner one night in Cranston, Rhode Island. We had been to the movies, I think. Our regular ritual. I’d go and pick him up, we’d drive to the movies, then we’d head to Bickford’s for breakfast at 11:00 at night. It was around 11:30 on the night in question, prime time for Bickford’s, and peak Rhode Island. You want to understand Rhode Island? Go to Bickford’s at 11:30 pm on a Friday night. It’s not the ONLY Rhode Island – there are other Rhode Islands – but you can’t fully understand the state unless you immerse yourself in the Married to the Mob vibe of its latenight diner scene, where people gather for pancakes after the first party, hair spritzed to the heavens, before heading on to the second party. It was mayhem. Loud. Mitchell and I, 19, 20 years old, were talking about Pee Wee Herman, with passionate and angry vehemence, because the first scandal had just broke. We were talking about Soupy Sales’ self-righteous public comments in regards to Pee Wee’s “degeneracy” and Mitchell got so angry he yelled across the table at me, and at the phantom Soupy Sales, right before his minds’ eye: “SOUPY. PLEASE!” Frustrated. Like, “Off your soapbox, Soupy, PLEASE.” The two of us lost it, because my God Mitchell MEANT it, I practically turned around to see if Soupy Sales was standing behind me. But it occurred to me yesterday when I heard the sad news, that 1. we were still connected enough to the previous generation that we knew who Soupy Sales was- because of the weirdness of the ’70s/80s television landscape where we saw all these near-octogenarians on Hollywood Squares, etc. – so we knew who he was and what he was famous for even though it was long past when we were growing up and 2. we were barely out of kid-hood ourselves, we were very young, but we could see what was happening. I’m proud of us for that. Shut the fuck up, Soupy. PLEASE.
I was scrolling around looking for intelligent personal reminiscences of Paul Reubens, essays reflecting what he meant to the people who were there as it happened, who “got it”, or those who could dig into what actually he was doing with this character Pee Wee, which he developed in the sketch comedy scene of The Groundlings. Like: what WAS Pee Wee? What was going ON? He was SO funny, and SO chaotic. Almost scary but makes perfect sense if you consider your own Id and what it would look like if you gave it free rein. I came across this essay by Glen Weldon for NPR, and I liked it, so I’m sharing it.
Along with my personal memories of watching Pee-wee’s Playhouse on Saturday mornings (it premiered when I was 5, the perfect age for it), I think a lot about Scorsese talking about watching it during the making of Last Temptation and comparing its form breaking sensibility to the Ernie Kovacs Show.
Correction: I found the quote I referenced above, and it was actually the interviewer who connected Kovacs and Pee Wee. Scorsese agreed with the observation and went on to say they watched tapes of the show on Sundays during the shoot.
Hey Jim – sorry for the delay. I legit was off the grid for a week, my blog being updated notwithstanding.
Thank you so much for this tidbit – I had no idea and it makes a lot of sense.
// went on to say they watched tapes of the show on Sundays during the shoot. //
this is crazy!!