Last week, South Park creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker made it clear that they’re interested in buying Casa Bonita. The Colorado-located Mexican “eatertainment” restaurant beloved to the showrunners was actually featured on the Comedy Central show, but the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors seems to have waylaid the waterfall-filled establishment that Cartman once showed to the world.
Parker told a reporter last week that he wanted to buy the closed restaurant and spruce the place up, and the news has sparked a petition signed by a number of fans who are asking to make the sale happen. According to KDVR, a few thousand people have signed on telling the current owners that “we want Matt and Trey.” It’s a fairly inflammatory petition, all things considered:
Decades have passed, and you still haven’t changed. There’s no shame in serving horrible food to paying customers. Your prizes are lame and your games are broken. My last visit to your gift shop had embarrassingly few items. You got rid of Mariachi bands and balloons that inflated in front of you. The treasure room had rock hard tootsie rolls that were possibly years old. The hideous pink pony that played blaring music was not fun or cool! You need to admit you’ve failed, and let Denver see what our South Park friends can do to improve the current mess you’ve created.
There’s just one problem: according to TMZ, the still-closed establishment isn’t actually for sale despite its closure and some organizational restructuring at its parent company. And despite a report about their interest, the two South Park creators haven’t actually reached out about buying the place:
Since the bankruptcy filing, we’re told tons of people have reached out to Summit about purchasing Casa Bonita — but Trey and Matt weren’t among them.
We’re told the decision-makers at Summit plan to reopen Casa Bonita ASAP once the current bankruptcy process wraps, with the goal being to get folks back to work in the next month. Summit’s owned Casa Bonita for 25 years.
All things are possible with a lot of money, of course, so perhaps this is more of a negotiating tactic than a dismissal of the offer made through the press. But it sounds like right now that statement of intent was more bluster than actual business while the current owners of the treasure room and its rock-hard Tootsie Rolls are figuring out restaurant life amid a still-ongoing pandemic. Hopefully the waterfall starts flowing in there soon, no matter who’s in charge.
(Via TMZ, KDVR & Change.org)