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[Music]
if you're a fan or have been a fan of
chuck e cheese's you'd probably know
that some restaurants are home to
munch's make believe band an animatronic
show that plays throughout the day
although this group of characters has
now become the familiar faces of chuck e
cheese's this wasn't always the case
chucky cheese's opened its doors on may
17
1977 in san jose california under the
name chuck e cheese's pizza time theater
it was the very first family restaurant
to integrate food and indoor arcade and
animated entertainment as they say it's
where a kid can be a kid
nolan bushnell founder of pizza time
theater was very fond of the walt disney
company it was a company he looked up to
and wanted to work at but never got the
chance the introduction of the animated
animatronic figures in the pizza time
theater restaurant was sort of
bushnell's tribute to the walt disney
company since they were known for their
audio animatronics in 1980 another
little entertainment pizza restaurant
opened called showbiz pizza place and
although it was a very similar concept
to pizza time theater both restaurants
did very well in the early 80s when the
video game industry was booming in 1981
pizza time theater went public on the
stock market but with any ups there's
gonna be some downs and the video game
crash of 1983 took a big hit on pizza
time theater in 1984 the company filed
for bankruptcy and showbiz pizza place
bought off all their assets and now
owned pizza time theater both companies
remained separate entities until 1989
when they started to merge and brand all
the restaurants as chuck e cheese's by
1992
with the merge munch's make-believe band
the band we all know today was born and
left behind in history were many
different characters part of the pizza
time players that are now
extinct so today let's take a look at
the top 10 extinct chuck e cheese's
animatronic characters
number 10 to eight the original gang
when pizza time theater debuted its
first animatronic show in 1977
it was referred to as the portrait style
show where the figures appeared in
portraits on the wall the gang was
called the pizza time players and its
main cast of characters were chuck e
cheese jasper t jowls pasquale krusty
the cat and the war blitz krusty was one
of the original band members in 1977
and according to this pizza time theater
menu he was the cat's
meow now
and singing and joke telling and was
chucky's straight man krusty's time at
pizza time theater was short-lived and
became the first character to be retired
and go into extinction from chuck e
cheese's this only happened in 1978 and
he never made it out of the original
store in san jose california when he was
retired in 1978 he was then replaced
with mr munch who is still a character
that can be seen today at chuck e
cheese's another little fun fact is that
krusty the cat was also voiced by the
original voice actor for chuck
now every great band needs backup
singers and the pizza time players were
no exception in 1977 they opened with
the warblettes who provided the
background vocals for the band the
warblettes were three singing crows and
considering nolan bushnell's inspiration
from the walt disney company it wouldn't
be surprising if there was some
influence on these three characters from
the singing crows in the 1941 animated
feature film dumbo in 1978 the war
bloods went into a brief extinction and
were replaced with the mopsy sisters who
were three singing mobs but luckily they
were only used for a year then the
warblettes returned
during the late 80s with the
construction of the rocker and sea
stages the warblettes flew the coop and
became extinct in the restaurants
number seven to four the guest stars
before pizza time theater went bankrupt
and was sold to showbiz pizza place the
pizza time players featured a variety of
animatronic guest stars these characters
appeared in the original portrait style
show as well as in the newly designed
balcony stages all the guest stars
utilized the same animatronic figure but
were just reskinned as a different
character and had their backdrop changed
to coincide with the appropriate show
tapes the first guest star appeared in
1978 and went by the name of foxy
flanagan or foxy colleen she was a
female irish fox who performed irish
style songs next was madame oink a pig
that spoke with a french accent who'd
oink anytime someone told her a joke she
also premiered in 1978 and i guess you
could say she tried to hog the spotlight
when she was on stage now after madame
oink was sally sachet a disco singing
skunk she didn't have a very long run
and only appeared in 1979 then got the
boot
next came harmony howlett a tomboyish
cowgirl coyote from western texas
harmony stayed with the van from 1981 to
1982 while madame oink was also still
used until 1983.
once pizza time theater filed for
bankruptcy in 1984 madame oink became
the last guest star to be featured then
helen henney who was a past guest star
for the portrait stage in 1978 was her
replacement on the balcony stage at this
moment in 1984 all the pizza time player
guest stars minus helen henny became
extinct and were never seen in the
spotlight again
number three and two the cabaret stage
a little while after the opening of
chuck e cheese pizza time theater in
1977 locations began receiving a cabaret
stage that was added to a separate room
in the restaurants these cabaret stages
would feature animal characters who'd
parody and impersonate famous musical
artists not to mention the names of the
characters were pretty punny the beagles
were a group of animatronic dogs who
were designed to parody and look like
the beatles they were able to be seen in
the restaurants performing to beetle
songs until they were replaced by the
beach bowsers who utilized the same
animatronic robots and were retrofitted
to fit the old figures the animatronics
remained dogs with each figure designed
to look like a member of the beach boys
and would perform the beach boys songs
also to appear on the cabaret stages was
the king animatronic
[Applause]
he was a nine foot tall lion that was
designed to be an elvis impersonator
with the hair white suit and guitar just
like elvis presley himself
later down the line some of the king
animatronics were retrofitted to become
the king cat who was a michael jackson
themed character the animatronic was
given a new wig sunglasses a red sequins
jacket and a glove just like mj himself
was famous for
the king cat was said to be chucky
cheese's last hope for success since the
company was on the brink of filing for
bankruptcy only a few restaurants got
the king cat installed before the
company went bankrupt in 1984. the
remainder of the restaurants kept the
elvis inspired character the king and
the last figure was said to have been
around until 1995. it should also be
noted that at the time these cabaret
figures were programmed to the original
artist song tracks this would have
required a music license to use the
songs for the shows and was most likely
very costly for the company by the
mid-1990s most locations had all the
cabaret acts removed they became extinct
with the focus of animatronic
entertainment now being in the main
showroom
number one munch junior once the company
officially merged all restaurants were
branded as chuck e cheese's by 1992.
this meant that previous showbiz pizza
place locations with the rockafire
explosion band had their characters
retrofitted with the chuck e cheese
characters one rockifier character was
chuchu a baby bear who lived in a tree
stump during the switchover chuchu
became the munch junior character who as
his name suggests is a mini version of
mr munch with one tooth and an orange
propeller cap he'd be seen bouncing up
and down to the music but never spoke
since the mid to late 1990s all the
munch junior animatronics were removed
their areas were boarded and carpeted
over and from that moment he became
extinct now to this day though there is
still one munch junior animatronic
hanging around it's at the wilmington
north carolina location it's not in
working condition so it's only a matter
of time probably until he's removed and
joins the rest of the animatronics in
extinction
the present day
now depending on the chuck e cheese
location you go to some of the
restaurants got an update to the studio
c stage in the 90's which just had the
chuck animatronic so in a sense the
other band members have already become
extinct at some locations in august of
2017 cec entertainment announced that
select stores would receive a new test
concept it would remove the animatronic
band members in favor of a large dance
floor and the frequent appearance of
their live costume characters tom
leverton ceo of chuck e cheese's said
that the animatronics have become the
sideshow and the kids stopped looking at
the animatronics years and years ago but
do you guys think that that's true now
this overhaul has already been carried
out at the san antonio texas location
and is set to take effect at six more of
the restaurants in the chain if these
tests do go well there's a good
possibility that all stores would
receive the new concept it could mean
that the chuck e cheese animatronics
will take their final bow become
completely extinct and go down in the
chuck e cheese history books
so what's your opinion on this recent
new look of the restaurants and the
possible removal of the chuck e cheese
animatronics in all the restaurants and
if you could bring back or save one
character either from the extinct
animatronics or the current band members
which would it be leave a comment down
below and start a conversation if you
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restaurants you'd like to share to be
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[Applause]