Chuck E. Cheese Pizza War (Encore)
In the late 1970s, a new and unusual concept for a restaurant chain emerged in California\u2014video games plus bad pizza plus animatronic characters. The result was Chuck E. Cheese\u2019s Pizza Time Theatre, an immensely popular chain with a pizza rat for a mascot. But the strangeness only starts there. Decoder Ring dives into the formation of Chuck E. Cheese\u2019s and its rival, ShowBiz Pizza Place; the conflict between the two; and the odd personalities of the mechanical animatronics that inhabited both stores and are still beloved by a select group of adults to this very day.\nThis podcast was written by Willa Paskin and was produced and edited by Benjamin Frisch, who also did illustrations for this episode. Cleo Levin was our research assistant.\xa0\nDecoder Ring is produced by Katie Shepherd, Max Freedman, and Evan Chung, with help from Sofie Kodner. Derek John is executive producer. Merritt Jacob is our senior technical director.\nIf you haven\u2019t yet, please subscribe and rate our feed in Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. And even better, tell your friends.\nIf you\u2019re a fan of the show, we\u2019d love for you to sign up for Slate Plus. Slate Plus members get to listen to Decoder Ring and every other Slate podcast without any ads. You also get unlimited access to Slate\u2019s website. Member support is crucial to our work. So please go to slate.com/decoderplus to join Slate Plus today.\nLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices