Pee-wee's Playhouse
Now You See Me, Now You Don't
TV Flash files “Now You See Me, Now You Don't” as hour 4 of 45 in the TV Flash guide — Pee-wee's Playhouse (1986–1990) on CBS, season 1, episode 4, aired 1986-10-04, 30 min.
From the desk
How this hour is filed
This leaf is S01E04: listed hour 4 of 45 in the Pee-wee's Playhouse guide, hour 4 of 13 in season 1. It aired 1986-10-04 (30 min). The listed hour before it is “Rainy Day” (S01E03). Next is “Just Another Day” (S01E05).
Viewer FAQ
Where does Now You See Me, Now You Don't sit in the Pee-wee's Playhouse guide?
S01E04 is listed hour 4 of 45 — hour 4 of 13 in season 1, season 1 episode 4.
When did Pee-wee's Playhouse S01E04 air?
Now You See Me, Now You Don't aired 1986-10-04 and is listed at 30 minutes.
Can I separate the Playhouse from the later scandal?
The scandal complicated the man; the craft still looks like nothing else on a network morning. Watch the design, the secret word, the assumption that kids are aesthetically smart.
In the series
Why this series still plays
Saturday-morning surrealism designed by people who had been to art school: secret-word screaming, talking furniture, and Paul Reubens treating children as aesthetically smart. Emmy-magnet kids TV that looks like a fever dream of Memphis design. The later scandal complicated the man; the Playhouse's craft still looks like nothing else on a network morning.
CBS Saturday mornings, 1986–1990: Pee-wee hosts a living playhouse full of talking furniture, friends, and absurdist bits — secret-word screaming, Saturday-morning surrealism designed by people who had been to art school. That is the window, not a kiddie leftover. Pee-wee's Playhouse is Paul Reubens's creation, with Laurence Fishburne as Cowboy Curtis and S. Epatha Merkerson as Reba among the humans. Multiple Daytime Emmys for design and writing. Children treated as aesthetically smart. Memphis-design fever…
Filed against
- Paul Reubens as Pee-wee Herman
Paul Reubens made Pee-wee Herman the Saturday-morning surrealist on Pee-wee’s Playhouse — 1980s secret-word screaming, talking furniture, children treated as aesthetically smart. Emmy-magnet kids TV that looks like a fever dream of…
- Laurence Fishburne as Cowboy Curtis
Laurence Fishburne’s Cowboy Curtis turned Pee-wee’s Playhouse into Saturday-morning surrealism with a drawl — talking furniture, secret-word screaming, art-school kids TV — then brought FBI gravity to Hannibal’s lethal dance of empathy…
- S. Epatha Merkerson as Reba
S. Epatha Merkerson’s Anita Van Buren ran Law & Order’s precinct as a long occupation — captain as walnut, dun-dun as civic punctuation, cast churn as a business model that still needed a boss. Street then courtroom. TV Flash still clocks…