When CASPER Haunted Pizza Hut | A Free Memory With Every Kid’s Meal
If you’ve been following my blog for a while, then I am sure you have noticed my far from low key obsession with all things related to “Casper the Friendly Ghost” and Brad Silberling’s Amblin-produced big screen live action version starring Bill Pullman and Christina Ricci. This is not my first article about 1995’s “Casper” and it certainly won’t be my last, and the character makes routine appearances on my Instagram and Twitter feeds as well. As you can probably tell from this gooey affection of mine, “Casper” was one of those BIG movie releases that left a huge impact on me as kid, and even to this day, nestles in the warm and soft confines of my heart where, along with the likes of “Jurassic Park” and “Batman”, it invigorates my spirit with happy memories and a much needed supply of inspiration and, yes, nostalgia. Suffice to say, I look back fondly of the time of its release, when, as the tagline suggested, seeing was believing and the film’s comical and soft hearty essence touched me so much I asked my parents to take me to see it again the very next week; as well as the time after, when I impatiently awaited its arrival on VHS and found myself invigorated later that autumn when I across a cardboard standee in a video store heralding such a release.
But let’s rewind to the time just before its release, shall we, to when I was a small child who was just two summers away from fully unlocking the gates to a whole new world of creaky manors and spooky vapors, of haunted bones and otherworldly tones, a world of ghoulish delights and other ghastly frights; to the time I eagerly anticipated the cineplex debut of what would almost certainly be a gateway to my eventual love of horror movies and when I ate up whatever information and promotional item I could find of it, which I eventually did at a place of which I was no stranger to eating things, and by “things”, I mean pizza, oh yes, chewy, tasty, delectable, pizza served in a personal-sized pan. Hell yes, this is why we are here, folks; I of course mean Pizza Hut’s promotion of “Casper”, by far the best hauntings under one roof.
Casper and his devilishly devious uncles, the Ghostly Trio, Stinkie, Stretch and Fatso, invaded our local Pizza Hut in the late Spring/early Summer of 1995. The film hadn’t really come out yet, but it was about to and I was anxious to see it. Therefore, seeing the characters at one of my favorite restaurants acted as an accelerant to fire up my anticipation even more.
I remember that Pizza Hut quite well. It was one of their old school diners with the red roof and hut-like design, its interior was lit with that moody but relaxing, almost bar-like ambience and its atmosphere elicited a distinct cheddar-y aroma one could almost package in a scented candle labeled “That Vintage Pizza Hut Smell”.
Walking in, you were immediately greeted by the front counter. To your right were the bathrooms and to the left was a tiny Pac-Man machine. Next to it hung an 11×17 poster for “Casper” that was dark blue with a sharper logo (with a font treatment I always preferred, which differed from the font used on most of its promotion, including the VHS and some of the items I mention in the article) and a tagline that read “GET AN AFTERLIFE”. (That poster lasted longer at that Pizza Hut than their actual promotion for the film.) Once seated, your table was decorated with a little cardboard flyer framed in one those flimsy plastic stands which advertised their promotion, as well as a paper placemat that detailed what you get with the children’s themed “Munch Down Meal.” The meal included: a single-topping personal pan pizza, breadsticks, a small-sized “Casper”-themed collector’s cup and a set of stickers.
But Pizza Hut’s biggest “Casper” offering came with an additional cost of $1.49. Slamming those big bucks on the table got you one of four “Glow in the Dark” hand puppets, modeled after the four ghosts in the film: once again, Casper, Stinkie, Stretch and Fatso.
Design-wise, they were of high quality and very well-crafted, but function-wise, they made for lousy hand puppets. Even as a kid, I couldn’t fit my hand in all the way and I couldn’t really perform a lot of movement with them. But for me in this case, functionality wasn’t a prerequisite. There was just something about physically holding the characters in my hand and being able to place them on my shelf. Without completely being able to find the words to truly convey this feeling, but somehow in my childish mind, it almost made the movie seem more real.
Plus, they just looked really cool!
At the time, I was only able to get my hands on Casper and Stinkie, and for the longest time, that’s how it remained. It wasn’t until this past year that I was able to add all four puppets to my “Casper” infinity gauntlet, if you will. (Maybe if I snap my fingers, we’ll finally get that a real “Casper II”? The “made for video” Saban films don’t count.) Even as I’ve gotten older and debatably more mature, though the jury is still out on that one, having Casper and the Ghostly Trio on my shelf still makes me feel all warm and gooey inside. Maybe it is just me, and yes, I am probably just weird like that, but holding one of these hand puppets in my hands, of which I can now barely fit only three of my fingers in, transports me to another time, when I was younger and Pizza Huts were still Huts and existed as blissful venues where I could play arcade games and binge the pizza buffet (you know, without having to face the many consequences that come with binge-snacking in my late 30s), and when I was gearing up to see one of my all-time “spoopy” (as the kids say) Halloween favorites for the very first time. It also makes me think of pizza!
Hmm.. I think my stomach is growling. Now that I mention it, I could totally go for a deep dish right about now.. Say, who wants to go for pizza?
