(upbeat music)
Two laps.
Three more to go
with red holding that lead!
Four laps for the win.
Can he stay on?
Will he fall off and white is the winner!
My name is Frank Buzz Perri.
I am the original proprietor here 54 years
and it will be 55 in April.
This hasn't changed, it's the same as it was then.
Kids have a lot of fun.
They will tell each other hey we went to Buzz-A-Rama.
We had fun.
Everyone knows what to do?
Yeah!
All right here we go.
Out of 49 places like mine
I am now the lone survivor.
(swanky music)
I was originally born in Brooklyn here
on East Second Street.
I forgot how many years ago.
I'm not allowed to say 'cause that upsets my wife
'cause that makes everybody feel that she's older
than she's supposed to be.
I've been here.
Yeah she loves it. For the greater
part of my life. (laughs)
It was her idea to open to start off.
That would be the day. (laughs)
Kids do not have to steer the car, the car follows a slot.
All you're controlling is the speed.
All right this is the hand controller.
It's like a gas pedal with your finger.
If you wanna be good practice, practice and more practice.
Each track is different.
And you gotta know how to take the turns.
You gotta grip the hand controller if you're going
into a turn and then punch it as you come out of the turn.
That takes a little skill.
When you come to the turns you have to slow down.
How do you slow down?
You.
The kids that come here they don't have to be experts
they go right away, they learn in a matter of two minutes.
So it's good. (exciting music)
This is the brains of the operation.
This is the power supply.
Each lane on a track is powered by these,
these are timers.
My cars I keep them slow 20 miles an hour
because they break them faster than I can fix them.
The competition cars go over 100 miles an hour.
(cars humming)
Man, are you're all set. You don't get to race.
How's the batteries?
Fully charged up? No, you're gonna have to
go in there and do some wonders with the control.
When was the last time you here, the Stone Age?
It had to be 11 or 12.
Had to be.
One time. The years go by.
I remember the last race we had.
Last time we were here these guys were this big.
I know.
Well they used to come from the neighborhood.
(gentle music)
But the neighbors changed and now they come from Jersey,
Connecticut, they have to travel now.
Coming for our on year anniversary.
This May 1967. Wow.
And when I first opened the fare was 10 cents
for the subway and the subway's only one block away.
But a dime was worth money then.
In fact when they first raised the rates from 10 cents
to 20 cents I lost 1/2 of my customers.
For a lousy dime.
I used to come here as a kid in the late 60s
with my dad and then I started coming back
I guess it was 2000 maybe 2008.
I'm here so long how does that guy
stay in business so long?
It's no matter where we go. Somebody.
Somebody knows Buzz. They've been here once
or whatever. That's right.
I run a tight ship here.
Maybe that's one of the reasons why I'm still here.
I wasn't talkin'.
Excuse me sir, are you here for the party?
I will never retire. (upbeat music)
My wife wants me to retire.
From day one I've wanted him to retire,
but he doesn't listen. Day one, before day one.
(laughs) He doesn't listen though.
He just loves it, absolutely loves it.
So what can I tell ya. Yeah.
He hasn't listened to me in 54 years, do you think
he's going to listen to me now?
She never liked this business from the beginning.
In fact when she first started
she didn't know what a screwdriver looked like.
Or any kind of a wrench to fix the cars.
I trained her, I taught her everything she knows
now she's better than me.
Do you think that's the secret to a happy marriage?
(laughs) Playing slot cars?
Probably.
If I let her win a couple of times,
otherwise she gets bored.
Oh!