Michigan’s Forgotten Animatronic Pizza Palace From the ’80s

In 2014, the gaming world was taken by storm by the video game Five Nights at Freddy's, a point-and-click survival-horror game set in Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. The game is set in a fictional pizzeria that features a band of animatronics stationed in an arcade. At night, the animatronics would come to life and hunt for you.

While this game is a work of fiction, anyone who went to Chuck E. Cheese or ShowBiz Pizza Place during the 1980s and 90s knows where its inspiration came from (and probably fears the animals would come to life, too). These restaurants were prominent during this time, and Michigan had its own well-established animatronic pizzeria, The Razzmatazz Pizza Palace.

Inside The Razzmatazz Pizza Palace

Opened in 1985,  Razzmatazz featured the Electric Mouse Orchestra, an animatronic band of mice playing the guitar, drums, and keyboard, with a trio of birds observing on a balcony. Aside from the stage, there were games around the restaurant where guests could win tokens in exchange for prizes.

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There were locations around the country, but the one in Michigan was in Sterling Heights on Van Dyke Ave. at 15 Mile, across from the old Showcase cinemas. The best footage of the Pizza Palace interior comes from a video by Eric Sucar, who uploaded footage of his fifth birthday party. Unfortunately, there is no audio, but you can hear the Electric Mouse Orchestra in the video below.

The Sterling Heights location didn't last long. The Pizza Palace only operated for a little over a year before shuttering in mid-1985. All the items were auctioned off on September 17th, 1985. To this day, the fact that there was a genre of restaurants all themed around pizza and robot animals playing music is still pretty humorous. You can view up-close photos of a performance below.