This whimsical little documentary focuses on Wayne White, a strange, iconoclastic artist. His professional career began with him making sets on a public access television show and it’s ended with his paintings being shown in high-tone art galleries all over the country. It’s a long, strange trip. Along the way, he designs and controls all the puppets on Pee Wee’s Playhouse; creates a massive Lyndon Johnson head out of cardboard; paints profane, often nonsensical sentences/phrases on top of landscape paintings he buys at thrift stores; performs banjo concerts; and creates and performs a one man show. The dude stays busy and the film is witty, subversive and really good. White is a guy who seemed to never really have a plan for anything, but pride in everything. For him, doing the voice of Diggity Dawg on Pee Wee’s Playhouse is just as much art as anything else he’s ever done. He could come off as a trickster, but in the interviews and in his one man show, you really do see the heart of the guy and how much he really loves being weird, off-beat and yet, somehow, emotionally true. It’s an entertaining movie. I’d say it’s a really good one. Recommended. 3 1/2 stars.
tl;dr – documentary about weirdo puppeteer/sculpture/designer/painter is fun and energetic; occasionally thoughtful as well. 3 ½ stars.