Paul Reubens Quotes

I probably have become more infamous from two misdemeanors than probably anyone I could think of.

I know you are, but what am I?

There's a lotta things about me you don't know anything about, Dottie. Things you wouldn't understand. Things you couldn't understand. Things you shouldn't understand.

There were just things in Disney movies that probably were too scary for kids.

I'm just trying to illustrate that it's okay to be different - not that it's good, not that it's bad, but that it's all right. I'm trying to tell kids to have a good time and to encourage them to be creative and to question things.

I wouldn't sell my bike for all the money in the world. Not for a hundred million, trillion, billion dollars!

I'm right-handed, and the police report said I was jerking off with my left hand. That would have been the end of the case right there, proof it couldn't have been me.

I've always felt like a kid, and I still feel like a kid, and I've never had any problem tapping into my childhood, and my kid side.

Why would I, in a million years, want to do anything even remotely having to do with child molestation on a children's show? See, I take having a kids' show real seriously. I think it's an enormous responsibility.

I was always in disguise. I'd wear masks or weird get-ups so you couldn't recognize me. I was always afraid that if somebody caught on that it was me, I'd never work again.

I enjoy getting to be arty and quirky and weird and all the things that I don't have that much choice with. You just sort of use what you got.

There were nude pictures... a lot of it is erotic or sexual. But I don't view my collection as dirty in any way. I view it as art.

The first time I met Prince he invented me to his birthday party in Minneapolis. It was a costume party and I came as a beatnik - a beret and a charcoal goatee. He was dressed like an executioner. I talked to him for awhile and he didn't know who I was, and when I told him he was real surprised.

I was looking for a last name that was a first name. Growing up, I knew a kid who was the most obnoxious kid I ever knew, and his last name was Herman.

I take having a kids' show real seriously. I think it's an enormous responsibility.

I think my entire career path was determined for me when I was 6 years old, watching reruns of 'I Love Lucy' on TV and thinking about making people laugh.

When I was about five my dad built a stage for me in our basement. A full stage, with a curtain, a backdrop and a dressing room. There were three colored spotlights - a red one, a white one, and a blue one. Blue was for nighttime scenes, and red was for when we were in hell. If the neighborhood kids wanted to use the stage, they had to incorporate me into the play.

In my experience I haven't met too many uptight black people. I'm sure they're out there. Like I'm some big authority and I've lived in the inner city and ghetto.

I can sit in the room with the other writers and just keep saying no until there's something I really like or until I come up with something. In that respect the proportion of what's mine and what's other people's is controlled by me. It isn't even fair to talk about.

I've been super lucky in that I've either been in or helped create situations where I do what I want. I'm super lucky. I get to do what I want and create art and make people laugh, and it's really fun.

A large part of the reason I want to be so mysterious is so that I can move on and do something serious at some point in my career X years from now. It might be very difficult otherwise, because I'm... wild

The public may think I'm weird. They may think I'm crazy or anything that anyone wants to think about me. That's all fine. As long as one of the things you're not thinking about me is that I'm a pedophile. Because that's not true.

I remember one play [when I was kid] was about this murderous mad scientist, and my whole part was to be the guy who got thrown into a vat of acid as the curtain went up. I was very pissed off at these older kids; they'd outsmarted me.

We're in a situation now where fewer and fewer small films get made. People want these big giant tentpole sort of things, and I don't know, it's getting harder and harder to make a small movie.

I'd love to direct, and I think I'd be a great director, but... I've been approved by the studio to direct, which I think is a cool jump of faith for them. Or proof that they're really stupid. But I don't think so.

I think there's a danger that some people look at the success of my first movie as a fluke. So I want to make sure that my second film is an even bigger success. Then if I direct my third movie and it's terrible, it'll be okay.

People read so much into what I do. It's fascinating to me because some of it's probably there, but I haven't thought of it.

It's the most natural progression for me to becoming a singing sensation next. And so many people have offered to be on it. Eddie Van Halen... and Prince, Madonna and Cyndi Lauper will probably be a backup trio.

I'd love to work with Francis Ford Coppola. I met Coppola on an airplane.

Part of what I do comes from the fact that I don't know any jokes to tell. And when I do they're really flat and don't work.

I'm going to try to do as many styles as I can. A salsa number, rock and roll, country.... I've talked to a million people about it. Obviously, I'd love Prince to do it. I'm sure he'll produce the whole album for me.

I have a deal with a company that's going to do cards without the gum. I don't like sugarless gum, and I don't think it's much better for you.

I just feel in a lot of ways black people are so much looser and cooler. Just as a culture, it's so much more real.

I'm the person with the final say on everything. I really love being in that position.

I'd love to do a talk show. But I'm too busy for it. It's just too much work.

I feel the only way I'm going to be successful in moving on is if I keep a separation.

I can be on the Tonight Show, but not with Johnny [Carson]. He uses my name in his monologue all the time.

I think the first time I was on The David Letterman Show, he didn't quite know what to expect. I think people generally are just a little afraid.

I usually go in ahead of time, like at a rehearsal, or a meeting, and tell them, "It may appear that I'm going to go haywire, but I'm not." I always map out what I'm going to do. Still, a lot of it is improvised.

I don't really want to direct myself, but I'm certainly torn in that direction.

The original suit was designed by a guy named Mr. Jay from Hollywood. But nowadays I'm having the suit duplicated. At this point I have about three good suits and about three really raggedy ones.

I would love to be in Kansas.

I've always felt like a kid, and I still feel like a kid, and I've never had any problem tapping into my childhood, and my kid side. And I think that's a very universal thing, I don't think it's unique to me at all. People I've talked to in their 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s have all told me "You know, I still feel 20." So I don't expect that I'm going to be any different.

I don't think Bruce Willis can compete with me. I have a much better voice.

It's a lot easier to say you're a comic than a performance artist.

You'd get on the plane; and every single person is somebody really, really famous. It just killed me. On one flight you'd have Linda Gray, O.J. Simpson, Robert De Niro, Carol Burnett, Loni Anderson and Burt Reynolds... and Francis Ford Coppola.

Yeah, this is what I think was a quality of movies, is you're in a group of people. You're sharing something with people. Whether those other people make you laugh more, you're all laughing. You're all happy together. There's something... manmade about that in a way that's - I'm not sure how that manifests itself in nature, but culturally we've set that up when we invented theater and the movies and all that stuff.

I'm fortunately not in a situation where someone owns me.

The public already knows about me more than I ever wanted it to know.

I call it... the hot dog tree, because... it's a hot dog tree.