Reubens auditioned for "Saturday Night Live" for the 1980–1981 season, but Gilbert Gottfried, who was a close friend of the show's producer and had the same acting style as Reubens, got the job. Reubens was so angry and bitter that he decided he would borrow money and start his own show in Los Angeles using the character he had been developing during the last few years, "Pee-wee Herman". (In 1991, while presenting at the Emmy Awards, Gottfried ironically got in trouble for joking about Reubens' indecent exposure arrest.)