Good Vibrations Magazine

An Interview with Sadie Lune, founder of Paul Reuben’s Day

Like a lot of kids who grew up watching Saturday morning cartoons in the mid 80’s, I too let out a collective sigh of loss when Pee Wee’s Playhouse went off the air due to Paul Reuben’s unfortunate run in with the law while masturbating in a porno theater in 1991. While no one at the time was too surprised when the hit show was quickly taken off the air following the salacious scandal, TV just wasn’t the same anymore without Miss Yvonne, secret words, singing puppets, and waiting with bated breath to see what magic wish Pee Wee would make this week.

It’s been over 15 years since the Playhouse was torn down and now those same kids are all grown up and celebrating the quirky goodness of Paul Reubens (and the goodness of masturbation) with Paul Reuben’s Day, which will take place this year on Saturday July 28th in San Francisco. To get to the bottom of this annual phenomenon we went straight to the source and spoke with PRD’s founder and lead “Wee,” Sadie Lune. For all you super GV fans, you also might remember Sadie as our brilliant Trophy Girl during last year’s Amateur Erotic Film Competition.

AG: How did you get involved with Paul Reubens Day?

The first year that I lived in San Francisco my then boyfriend and another East Coast transplant and I were talking about porn in a bar, and I bemoaned the fact that I had never seen porn in an actual porno theater. Very quickly the idea of Paul Reubens’ Day emerged, and while our original idea to get a bunch of Pee-wees to watch porn in a porno theater has never happened (there aren’t any more operating porno theaters in SF) the idea took on a life of its own in a different manifestation. So the first year Aaron Muszalski, Jamie Slater and I co-organized the event, and since then it has grown and gotten weirder and I have been the primary organizer with a roving group of very helpful volunteers and co-organizers such as Frog Gillmore.

AG: What kind of responses do you get on PRD when people on the street spot this huge contingent of Pee Wees walking around San Francisco?

Oh, it’s hilarious. Some people are frightened by the outlandish costumes- while most participants dress as a version of Pee-wee, we get all sorts of other characters (Cowboy Curtis, Jambi, the Flowers that sing the King of Cartoon’s song, one of the crazy nurse clowns from the Big Adventure, the Puppetland band, etc.) and since everyone has their own variation of “-wee” it can be a little disorienting and hard to figure out exactly what is going on. And then of course there is the simulated masturbation, which some people find delightful, while others are horrified. We always bring extra bow ties for people that were not planning to spend their day screaming at the secret word, but run into us and then can’t resist the absurdity. Hooray for them! Tourists tend to have a very wide-eyed look of mixed fear/disgust/curiosity/ and trying to play along, their faces tend to read like “oh, this is that part of San Francisco I have heard about”, in other words, the weirdos. When we accidentally ran into Andy Dick in Dolores park on year 2, he loved us and jumped up on one of the big fiber-glass heart sculptures that were sprinkled about the city so we could take pictures of him surrounded by -wees. But my favorite reactions are when Gen X-er type parents, those of the age-range who remember the Playhouse show fondly for its subversive and bizarre wackiness, see us humping everything, freaking out and spraying things with fake spooge and get all excited, and then point us out to their young children who have probably never seen Pee-wee’s Big Adventure or any of the episodes of Playhouse and say “Look, look its Pee-wee Herman!”

AG: What’s your favorite Pee Wee movie?

Perhaps the one that’s yet to be made. Supposedly there are two new Pee-wee movies in the works, thanks to the magic of after-effects. Mr. Reubens has said something along the lines of, “we may all end up looking younger in these films than we ever did originally”. But really, it’s hard to say. The Big Adventure is the classic and everybody’s favorite, and rightfully so; where else can you see a cameo by Mr. T cereal? But I have a soft spot in my heart for Big Top Pee-wee, both because of my circus/sideshow fetish and because it is not afraid to portray Pee-wee as the two-timing jerk he really is.

AG: Does PRD exist outside of San Francisco?

I am not omniscient, so I can’t answer with authority. Thanks to the internet, it exists in all possible places and dimensions, all the time. When Moby commented about it in his blog, he was in Australia. I like to think that worldwide on PRD people dress a little spiffier, masturbate a little more heartily, and find themselves taping their noses to their faces, even if they’re not sure why.

AG: What is your affiliation with Carol Queen / The Center for Sex and Culture?

Carol Queen kinda shaped the path of my life through her writing back when I lived on the East Coast. Her work is a big reason that I live in San Francisco now. And the most amazing thing is that we are close friends now. I am a huge supporter of her and her partner, Robert’s, work. I was an intern for the CSC a couple of years ago, and then a volunteer; though these days I mostly do the occasional benefit for the Center, because I believe it to be addressing a great social need. The very existence of the CSC increases the world’s sex positivism, how ingenious to associate the words “sex” and “culture” in the very title! I would love to see the time where every city had their own Center for Sex and Culture.

AG: What is the basic message you want to send out to the world through celebrating Paul Rubens?

Masturbation is more than an unmentionable, shameful act; more than acceptable or snidely tolerated; masturbation can be affirming, healing, and a hell of a lot of fun! The fact that Surgeon Generals can loose their jobs and beloved celebrities arrested and publicly humiliated over the single most universal and safest sex act is a clear indication of the perceived power and danger of pleasure. It is all so painfully absurd that my retaliation is equally as absurd; and sometimes just as painful

Let’s not let our innate capacity for pleasure be co-opted and constrained by sex-negative authority, let’s take the sexy power back into our own hands!

Besides that, I like bridging the gap between people’s “lives” (i.e. non-sexual lives) and their sexuality, to show that sexuality is an integral incorporated part of everyone, even if they are celibate or asexual. And that play, whether its child-like screaming REAL LOUD at the secret word, or sexy “adult” play, is of great value to humans, though often unrecognized. To make a long story short, (too late!), reclaiming joy in sex, play and silliness.

AG: What does Sex Positivity mean to you?

It means analyzing “common sense” to find out what’s really behind all of these fearful, schizophrenic concepts floating around about sex, gender, and pleasure. It means being open about my work as a sex worker, my joy in multiple partners, my desire for kink. It means examining my own sexual fears and shame and attempting to help others realize they don’t just have to live with theirs. It means speaking up when I see a media portrayal of sex as dirty, or a crime victim as deserving because of their sexuality, or anything else based on the tenet that sex in and of itself, is wrong, sick, gross, damaging, or perverted (I actually like that one); not letting those thoughts be relegated to unexamined “truth” and saying that I disagree. It means encouraging others to talk about sex, what they want, what they do, what they are afraid to want and do. It means making space for people to be whole selves, including a sexuality which may not look like the one TV, or Jessica Simpson, or the religious right, or our parents, tells us we should have.

AG: Did you know there is a Tribe site dedicated to you?

Yes, an ex made that for me a couple of years ago. I’m not on Tribe anymore, so I doubt there’s been any activity on that site for about 2 years.

AG: Since this is the 5th anniversary of PRD, what can people expect to see this year?

We are revisiting the site of the first PRD, which is before we had a benefit party as part of the event, starting at our very first stop: Vesuvio. We will have some circus-style entertainment to greet the -wees and then we are off into North Beach, for gelato, tequila dancing, porn stores and of course a visit to the Lusty Ladies, the highlight of PRD I. I just found out that the North Beach Jazz Fest is concurrent, so we will see if Pee-wees and Jazz fans are natural enemies or allies.

Then, the benefit Playhouse Party! From 4-6 pm the Stud (in SF) will be transformed into an overflowing Playhouse full of -wees, including a Spank It! booth, Kissing Booth, Miss Yvonne Beauty Pageant, Amazing Larry’s Trivia Contest, and the Reubens-esque costume contest. And a host of fabulous performers including burlesque from Lady Monster and Ginger Virago, comedy from Mary Van Note and Wendy Vinaigrette, and erotic spoken word from Sherilyn Connelly, horehound stillpoint, Charlie Anders, and Raina Bird, and more. All set to the twisted and demented audio/visual stylings of KrOB. Think Pee-wee/porn mash-up. And of course there are the clips from the very porn Mr. Reubens was watching when arrested! And, specials on tequila shots- I don’t drink but if Pee-wee’s at a bar, it’s either a banana milkshake, a Shirley Temple, or a shot of tequila for him.

AG: What porn titles might someone spy you watching in a dark theater one day?

Porn titles I’d *like* to see: “Dentata” (queer femme vampire porn), Tooth and Claw (anthro-furry kinky porn), Spare Some Change? (a story of a femme cougar who picks up crusty street kids and gender fucks them), Keep On Fucking (a mostly live-action, multi-gendered, porn interpretation of the work of R. Crumb, starring a trans-lady Crumb girl), or a x-rated version of Velvet Goldmine.

The best porn I’ve *actually* seen lately was Pink and White’s CrashPad and the shorts from the Good Vibes amateur porn contest. I don’t watch very much video porn; the quality, messages and aesthetic tend to make me sad. I like magazines and live-enactments for my viewing pleasure.

AG: Do you have any other projects in the works that you’d like to tell us about?

Whew! I just finished a lot of performances for the Sex Workers Film and Art Fest, so July has been a super busy month!

I play Miss Scarlet in the play “Clue” at the Dark Room Theater (www.darkroomsf.com) for one more weekend, and on Saturday I get to make a quick transformation from ‘Kink-wee’ into the 1950’s madam. My comic, Saturn Returns Komyx, also appears in $pread magazine ( http://www.spreadmagazine.org/), my short film “Yum” will be show at the Parkway Theater in Oakland on August 9th and I will be featuring at Queer Open Mic at the GLBT center on August 10. I have plans for both an illustrated zine and a book about sex worker issues in the works. My biggest goal for immediately after Paul Reubens Day is to relax, travel a bit, and make space in my life for lots of kinky sex!

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For more information about Paul Reuben’s Day events go to: http://www.paulreubensday.com/