The Waning of Pee-wee’s Big Wax Adventure : * Culture: Paul Reubens’ unhappiness with his display figure led to the demise of exhibit, museum owner says.

There it sits, the paraffin head of Pee-wee Herman, in a position the nerdy bow-tied character could appreciate: between the bust of Brigitte Bardot and the face of Henry Winkler’s Fonzie.

Although Paul Reubens last April retired the spazzo persona from Saturday morning network TV and his arrest nearly three weeks ago at a adult theater threatened his popularity, Pee-wee Herman could have lived on indefinitely.

In wax, that is.

But according to the owner of Movieland Wax Museum, there was just no pleasing Reubens. Three sculptings and $15,000 later, the Buena Park hall of celebrity candles gave up trying. It put his wax likeness in storage and built Roseanne Arnold in her television-show kitchen instead.

Now all that remains of Pee-wee is a grinning wax head on a shelf. Admittedly, it’s in good company: Beside his are the wax heads of actors LeVar Burton, Jack Lemmon, Clark Gable and Frankenstein’s monster. Two Pee-wee torso rejects have been recycled at the Ripley’s Believe It or Not Museum across Beach Boulevard. One is now a Tibetan horn player, the other a New Guinea daredevil hanging upside down from a vine--the ancient equivalent of bungee jumping.

“We weren’t waiting for him to change his mind,” said Ron Thong, owner of the 28-year-old Movieland and co-owner of Ripley’s. “We just didn’t know what to do with the thing.”

After years in the business of sculpting the stars--from Mae West and Charlie Chaplin to the latest entry, pop singer Gloria Estefan--Thong knows what it’s like trying to replicate image-obsessed people in wax.

Singer Michael Jackson, probably the most popular solo figure with Movieland’s 400,000 yearly visitors, requested revisions of his eyebrows. Eddie Murphy, whose likeness will be unveiled later this year, asked for a change of expression, one of five revisions. (Some were requested by Thong.)

“I can’t remember anybody that we haven’t been able to please,” said Thong, who bought Movieland on April Fools’ Day, 1985, and whose father founded San Francisco’s wax museum in 1963. “That’s not to say they’ve all been perfect--some are pretty close and the star says, ‘Weeell, OK,’--but this is the first we’ve given up on.”

Two years ago, Reubens was approached through his agent about creating an exhibit at Movieland. It would feature the comedian in his trademark makeup, size-too-small suit, white socks and buckskins. He would be in the same setting showcased on “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” his award-winning Saturday morning children’s show--including Chairy the talking chair. Reubens accepted.

Typically, the museum measures stars to ensure the figures are to scale and takes close-up photographs, to which Reubens eventually submitted.

When the figure was finished a few months later, the museum was told Pee-wee didn’t like it. Then-sculptor David R. Cellitti said Reubens’ people offered general complaints but were never specific: “They could only say, ‘It just doesn’t capture Pee-wee’s ambience.’ ”

After the third effort failed to please the star, Cellitti said owner Thong put the figure in the museum anyway to test public reaction. Three weeks later, Reuben’s representatives asked that it be removed.

A spokesman for Reubens’ publicist, Richard Grant, said he knew nothing about the wax figure.

Legally, Thong says the museum could exhibit wax figures without approval from the stars, but it’s easier and more lucrative to have them cooperate, especially when it comes time for celebrities to attend the highly publicized unveilings.

Despite Reubens’ not-guilty plea, CBS yanked the remaining reruns of a show it has called the most successful live-action Saturday morning program in a decade after the 38-year-old star was arrested last month in Sarasota, Fla., for allegedly exposing himself in an adult movie house.

Thong said he never would have moved the character out of his wax museum:

“He was on TV and popular, and what’s happened now doesn’t change that. I think I would leave it for its historical significance. If Jimmy Stewart robbed a bank, we wouldn’t take him out either.”