Reubens claims that "Pollyanna" is his favorite film. Halfway through writing the script, Reubens noticed everyone at Warner Bros. had a bike to get around the backlot, and so he requested one of his own. This inspired Reubens to start on a new script. Having left Walt Disney Productions and with "Frankenweenie" receiving positive reviews within film studios, Tim Burton was looking for a full-length film to direct. When Reubens and the producers of "Pee-wee's Big Adventure" saw Burton's work on "Vincent" and "Frankenweenie", they decided to hire Burton for their film. Burton felt he connected with Reubens' personality and the humor of the "Pee-wee Herman Show". After hiring Burton to direct, Reubens, Phil Hartman and Michael Varhol reworked the script again. The team purchased Syd Field's "Screenplay" and wrote the script as faithful as to what the book advised. "It’s a 90-minute film, it’s a 90-page script," Reubens explained. "On page 30 I lose my bike, on page 60 I find it. It's literally exactly what they said to do in the book...There should be like a MacGuffin kind of a thing, something you’re looking for, and I was like, 'Okay, my bike.'" Filming locations included Glendale, Pomona, Santa Clarita, Santa Monica, Burbank, Cabazon (at the Cabazon Dinosaurs), Port Hueneme, California, and San Antonio, Texas. Burton and Reubens had tensions with Warner Bros. studio executives over the shooting schedule. Burton hired CalArts classmate Rick Heinrichs for scenes involving stop-motion animation. Large Marge's claymation transformation was created by The Chiodo Brothers. To compose the film score, Burton brought in Danny Elfman, who had previously composed the music for "Forbidden Zone" and who was at the time lead singer/songwriter of the new wave band Oingo Boingo. He relished the opportunity to compose an orchestral score rather than a pop score and wanted it to be taken as the work of a composer rather than the dabbling of a pop musician. Elfman already had the main title theme written before he signed on. Elfman's original score draws inspiration from film composers Nino Rota and Bernard Herrmann, with the main title music paying homage to Rota's "Carlotta's Galop" from Fellini's "8½", and the tracks "Stolen Bike" and "Clown Dream" paying homage to music from Herrmann's scores for "Psycho" and "The 7th Voyage of Sinbad" respectively.