pee-wee

“Pee-wee as Himself” is far from your average Sundance celebrity doc, but that’s exactly what makes it so appealing.

This two-part documentary walks the line between artifice and reality as it explores a similar struggle that icon Paul Reubens had separating himself from his beloved character Pee-wee Herman, and how the perception of that character changed in the years following Reubens’ arrest for indecent exposure.

As Pee-wee Herman, Paul Reubens was a performance artist hiding in plain sight in mainstream popular culture.

His fictional character, a hyperactive, bow-tied man-child, provided subversive messages about nonconformity in films such as “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure” and his classic Saturday morning TV show, “Pee-wee’s Playhouse.”

But as shown in Matt Wolf’s riveting 2-part documentary, “Pee-wee as Himself,” which premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, Reubens lost himself as he found fame as his alter ego.