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| “ | Every boy, every girl, every kid around the world can have a place to laugh and sing and play. Kids can do what they please when they come to Chuck E. Cheese. They'll be rockin' here tomorrow, like they're rockin' here today!
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„ |
| ~ Chuck E. singing about his restaurant's legacy during "Every Boy, Every Girl" |
| “ | Have a Chuck E. Day! | „ |
| ~ Chuck E. Cheese’s current catchphrase. |
Charles Entertainment Cheese, better known as simply Chuck E. Cheese, is the anthropomorphic mouse mascot of the Chuck E. Cheese's chain of family entertainment centers since 1977. He is the titular main protagonist of the franchise of the same name.
Origins and Backstory[]
Chuck E.'s official backstory told by the company is that he grew up as an orphaned mouse in the St. Marinara’s orphanage. Unfortunately since there were no records of his birth no one knew when his birthday was, and because of that he could never celebrate it. To make up for never having a birthday party of his own and to ensure no child has to go through what he did, he hosted birthday parties at the orphange for children to make them happy. After winning a Pong tournament, Chuck E. Cheese used the prize money that he won to buy a bus ticket to New York where he met a man named Pasqually P. Pieplate, a chef and drummer who owned his own pizza restaurant. Unfortunately Pasqually's restaurant was going out of business and was on the brink of bankruptcy, thus he was afraid he was going to have to shut down his pizzeria chain for good. However, Chuck E. Cheese saved his business by working there as a singer and host for birthday parties ultimately the new entertainment saved his restaurant. Afterwards Chuck E. Cheese and Pasqually decided to become business partners and start a band and changed the name of the restaurant from Pasqually's Pizza to Chuck E. Cheese's after the mouse that save his career.
Sometime later Pasqually and Chuck E. Cheese booked a show in Nashville, Tennessee. However, their van unfortunately broke down in front of a farmhouse. But thankfully the owner of the farm was a friendly hound dog named Jasper T. Jowls. Jasper fixed their van and Chuck E. soon told him about their gig and convinced him to join their band seeing Jasper was proficient in musical instruments especially the bass guitar. However, Chuck. E. Cheese felt as though they were missing something he soon remembered a gamer chick he met named Helen Henny and asked her to join the band as a singer and she happily accepted. They went back to New York to sing for their next show but once again felt they were missing one final thing, however a alien monster named Mr. Munch who was eating pizza joined the band in the middle of the show and began playing his keyboard and with that the band was finally complete. Eventually the restaurant expanded into a chain and the gang opened the first of many locations in San Jose, California in 1977, and thus the Chuck E. Cheese business empire began and over the course of four decades has been bringing joy and happiness to the children of the world ever since.
Pizza Time Theatre Era[]
Chuck E. was originally going to be named “Rick Rat”, but this idea was immediately shot down by the team at Atari believing that a rat in the name of a restaurant would be too disgusting for people. In the first showtape, he had a completely different persona than the rest of the later incarnations. He was a rat down to the heart, and directly made fun of the other characters onstage. Chuck E. also originally smoked cigars in advertisements, and even on the first few animatronic portrait figures. This was eradicated from the later shows, ads, and with the Cyberamics.
Chuck E. Cheese was known as “The Big C” by the other Pizza Time Players, and even with his harsh actions, he always made it clear that he really cared for his friends onstage. He became softer until Concept Unification, where the character switched to Tux Chuck.
Tuxedo Era[]
“Tux”, as he is referred to by fans, took a drastic turn from the earlier, harsher Chuck E. Cheese character. He now wore a tuxedo and white gloves (similar to the walkaround version of Mickey Mouse) as opposed to the familiar red vest, and had a much more snappy, upbeat personality. The band itself, now known as Munch’s Make Believe Band, really adopted the whole band dynamic at this point. This era was during the boom era in the 90’s, and though it was short lived, it is arguably one of the most iconic and remembered eras.
In 1993, ShowBiz Pizza Time Inc. redesigned Chuck E. Cheese to compete with new family entertainment center Discovery Zone, which resulted in "Tux" being phased out as the primary design and replaced by a new design, "Cool Chuck". By 1997, the design was no longer being used; nevertheless, the "Tux" design was still used in restaurant decor, and "Tux" walkaround costumes were still used in circulation as alternate costumes up through 2004, when CEC Entertainment, Inc. (the renamed ShowBiz Pizza Time) retired the design completely at the onset of Phase 4.
Avenger/Cool Chuck Era[]
The third incarnation of Chuck E. began in 1994 when the showtapes were being made by The Walt Disney Company. He still had the same personality as Tux Chuck E., but new voice actor Duncan Brannan originally continued the character's New Jersey accent. The Disney phase didn’t last long, and the shows were made by the entertainment part of ShowBiz Pizza Time Inc., which would later be named “Department 18 Productions”.
1996 was the start of the Awesome Adventure Machine period, which was a test stage that never made it past the three test locations. Duncan Brannan’s voice was slightly lowered for these shows, and Chuck E. as a character had a slight shift. He invented a machine to take the band wherever they wanted, and this would result in the adventures they would go on. This period was cut short, as the AAM failed, and it was back to the drawing board with the new stage concept.
In 1998, Studio C was introduced to the public with a new look, and another Chuck E. shift. Chuck was this time voiced by Jeremy Blaido, who would eventually become the voice of Jasper T. Jowls. Studio C was meant to replicate a talk show set, which unfortunately gave Chuck E. a blander personality. After CEC Entertainment couldn’t afford to replace the existing stages with Studio C, they dropped the News Show format and went back to the band dynamic. This is when the modern Chuck E. really started to form. Brannan was hired back on the job of voicing Chuck, and he was in that role until 2012.
In 1997, Chuck E.'s Avenger look was introduced. He was dressed as a skater in the advertisements, but never had the personality of one. Avenger Chuck went back to the roots of Tux Chuck and became an everyman who loved to entertain with his friends. He always tried to keep things in control, though he has lost his temper with the band in a few shows. He was also shy to have Helen's crush on him, even though in the music videos they’re almost always seen holding hands. At the end of the day, he loves his guests and wants to be where they are. Avenger Chuck is arguably the most iconic and famous version of Chuck E. Cheese.
Rockstar Era[]
Due to an ongoing decrease in sales during 2011, CEC Entertainment decided to redesign Chuck E. Cheese in order to keep their restaurants contemporary with kids in the 21st century. In early 2012, a silhouette of the redesigned character appeared on the official Chuck E. Cheese Facebook page and was officially unveiled in July of that year. Chuck E. had an immediate switch with a new ad campaign for the summer, “Say Cheese it's Funner”. This was the first time the character was presented in CGI in the promotional material, replacing the hand-drawn Avenger ads. The Duncan Brannan voice was switched to Jaret Reddick, the lead singer from the band Bowling For Soup. The redesign was initially met with a mixed response from fans and regular customers of Chuck E. Cheese’s. His personality changed again to be more like a Rockstar, and radical to the current generation of children. In the shows, he’s typically trying to do this his own way, but the other characters stop him from doing so. He always tries to appeal to kids and take birthdays seriously.
Trivia[]
- The character of Chuck E. Cheese was clearly inspired by The Walt Disney company's mascot Mickey Mouse, another famous and fun loving mouse mascot with company execitives believing he would even surpass Mickey's popularity.
- Rockstar Chuck's voice actor Jaret Reddick is an actual rockstar in fact he sang the opening song for the iconic Disney Channel animated cartoon series Phineas and Ferb.
- Despite the character being synonymous for being a mouse since the 1990s, the walk around mascots of Chuck E. no longer have tails obviously due to children constantly pulling on them and breaking them.
- During the Pizza Time Theatre era Chuck E’s birthday was stated to be May 17. However this was later retconned when his backstory was revealed in which he was said to be an orphan with no known date of birth.
External Links[]
Chuck E. Cheese on Chuck E. Cheese Wiki.