Paul Reubens: 'I Never Said I Didn't Want to Be Pee-Wee Herman'

In the late 1980s, Paul ReubenswasPee-wee Herman.

“I went out of my way for quite some time to try and make people think that he was a real person and there wasn’t an actor behind it all,” the actor says in the current issue of PEOPLE of the man-child he created as part of an exercise at the infamous Groundling’s improv studio in the late ’70s.

Reubens never imagined his goofy alter ego would be a success. But in 1985, Reubens found himself on the big screen starring in the cult favorite Pee-wee’s Big Adventure. By the following year, his kids’ show Pee Wee’s Playhouse was running on CBS Saturday mornings.

In a few years’ time, Reubens was simultaneously preparing his second Pee-wee film, Big Top Pee-wee and working on seasons 4 and 5 of Playhouse. It was too much.

• For more on Pee-wee’s big return – including why Joe Manganiello jumped at the opportunity to be a part of Pee-wee’s Big Holiday – pick up the latest issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday

“I never said, ‘I don’t want to be Pee-wee anymore.’ I loved what I was doing,” he says. “But I needed a break.”

Shortly after Playhouse went off the air in 1990, Reubens found himself back in the spotlight – this time entrenched in a scandal, after being arrested for public indecency at an adult movie theater in Florida.

It was years before he worked steadily again, but he also enjoyed the time off.

“I traveled. I spent time with family and friends. And I wrote,” he says.

In 2010, Reubens revived his original Pee-wee stage production, The Pee-wee Herman Show. During the show’s Broadway run, Reubens was approached by producer Judd Apatow about creating a new Pee-wee adventure.

The result is the new film Pee-wee’s Big Holiday, which is currently streaming on Netflix.

“I get to do something I love, that I created and that I made all the rules up to,” Reubens says of happily putting Pee-wee’s gray suit and red bow tie back on and resurrecting that infectious giggle. “It’s been fantastic. I couldn’t have asked for a better adventure.”