Big Top Pee-wee

Big Top Pee-wee (1988)

Hero. Lover. Legend.

Paul Reubens stars as Pee-wee Herman in his second full-length film about a farmer who joins the circus after a storm drops a big tent in his front yard. Pee-wee, along with an outlandish cast of animals and circus performers, puts on the best show ever.

Date of release
1988-07-22
TMDB
5.0 / 10 (156)
Runtime
1h 26m
Genres
Comedy, Family
Director
Randal Kleiser
Collection
Pee-wee's Collection

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Based on: The Pee-wee Herman Show
  • Filmed in: California

Big Top Pee-wee is a 1988 American comedy film directed by Randal Kleiser. A standalone sequel to Pee-wee's Big Adventure (1985), the film stars Paul Reubens reprising his role as Pee-wee Herman, with Susan Tyrrell, Kris Kristofferson, Penelope Ann Miller and Valeria Golino in supporting roles. The original music score is composed by Danny Elfman, who could not re-use themes from his Pee-wee's Big Adventure score, due to contractual restrictions.

Production

Following the success of the 1985 Warner Bros. film Pee-wee's Big Adventure, Paul Reubens signed a development deal with Paramount Pictures to write, produce, and/or direct additional projects for the character of Pee-wee Herman. Big Top Pee-wee was the first project in the deal to go into production.

The Paramount production was directed by Randal Kleiser and written by Paul Reubens and George McGrath. Reubens also co-produced the film with Debra Hill. Filming locations included Disney's Golden Oak Ranch in Newhall, California, and the auditorium at Hart High School in Santa Clarita. Big Top Pee-wee was Kleiser's first movie for Paramount since 1978's Grease.

During a 1988 television special, Herman acknowledged the long hours of circus training undertaken by the film's actors and that they spent a year and a half working on the movie. He also humorously compared himself as an actor to James Cagney and Spencer Tracy and ended by saying that Big Top Pee-wee was "at least as good as Police Academy."

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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