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The History Of Rolfe DeWolfe & Earl Schmerle - Showbiz's Showy Showmen

Mr. Tele-Tell

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In today’s video, I take a pretty extensive look at the History and Evolution of Rolfe Dewolfe AND Earle Schmerle, can't have one without the other

From his origins in 1977 as Colonel Stonewall J. Fox for the Confederate Critter Show... can't believe I just said that. Toi his role as Emcee with the Wolfpack five or 5 whichever it is. and all the way up to the early 1980's when Showbiz Pizza Place first opened and he became Rolfe DeWolfe the resident comedian, ventriloquist, and narcissist, to the Rockafire Explosion. and since I'm talking about Rolfe I also have to talk about his constantly grumpy hand puppet Earl Schmerl, who, I at first thought was alive, but now I really can't tell, maybe Rolfe is voicing him...

I also, of course, discuss concept unification, and the final showtape made for showbiz, that being The Rolfe And Earl show, which played while Fatz Geronimo, Mitzi Mozzarella, Beach Bear, Billy Bob, Looney Bird, and Dook LaRue, were getting either removed or reborn. And then at the end of the week, Rolfe became the Rat himself, Chuck E. Cheese, and that's pretty much where Rolfe's story in regards to Showbiz came to an end.

Also feel free to let me know if I missed or mucked up any info here, as if I do another showbiz character, I'd like to make sure I get it accurate

Maybe you wanna watch some of my other videos? If so, here are some of my personal favorites I've made!!

The Full History of Chuck E. Cheese and Showbiz Pizza Place - The Strange Full History Of Showbiz Pizza ...

Ronald McDonald's bizarre animated series - A Way Too In-Depth Look At Ronald McDonald...

History and evolution of WIle E. Coyote and Roadrunner - The History and Evolution of Wile E. Coyot...

Looney Tunes' Knockoff Chuck E. Cheese - The History Of The FAILED Looney Tunes Chu...

Rocky & Bullwinkle's knockoff Chuck E. Cheese - The History Of The FAILED Rocky And Bullwi...

The Puppet Show that ended Communism in Czechoslovakia - How This Forgotten Creepy Puppet Show Ende...

History of Jack Box - Jack Box: The Ad Mascot That Saved Jack In...

I really don't know why Aaron Fechter didn't bring Rolfe over to the Mijin animatronics, or the Moon rockers, that was pretty messed up.

20 Comments

@Bobbys_purse 7 months ago

Rolfe being a confederate soldier is so wild to me honestly

@therockafire 7 months ago

I should mention something else that seems to not be well understood. The fact that Rolfe DeWolf and The Confederate Critter, and Buddy Crash Whoever from the Hard Luick Bears, and The Wolfman and several other characters we built in the last 1/2 century had the same face is not indicative of anything except that it costs a lot of money to sculpt and create new faces and molds. So we reused them as we could. We turned the same mask into new characters all the time. It is not an evolution of the same character. That particular face just happened to be a good one with a great mouth and in one case it worked as a bear, and in another case, ot worked as a wolf, etc. You shouldn't go reading anything more into it than that.

@valery_draws 7 months ago

Oh man!!!! Rolfe is one of my favorite animatronics; really ironic he becomes Chuck since he’s one of my top favorite too.
If I had to choose between Rolfe and Earl…it’s definitely Rolfe. I’m sorry Earl!!!!
Thank you for this awesome video!!! 😁😁

@imjustcurious432 7 months ago

i'd do literally anything for a rolfe de wolfe animatronic hes my favorite

@hippiechik95 7 months ago

I finally realized what the Wolf Pack 5’s song at 3:09 reminds me of. It has a very similar melody to “Lucky Ball and Chain” by They Might Be Giants. I knew it reminded me of something but I couldn’t figure out what until just now!

@daniexists6 4 months ago

Correction, naturally.

It wasn't just a "cost saving measure" as to why SPT tried to cut out Creative Engineering. There was complicated back and forths for ages at that point regarding Aaron Fechter and the higher ups, mostly due to the atmosphere at CEI at all moments. The straw that broke the camel's back was the lateness of showtapes that caused Showbiz to have to do it in house, and they even attempted to with Pizza Time Theatre at that point, too. And, eventually, they were given another chance. And on the night that a programming session's completion, a party was held. And someone drunkenly deleted all the efforts when they needed to turn it in the next day.

@CalamityCritters 5 months ago

Seems like Rolfe isn’t the only son of the WolfMan.

@therockafire 7 months ago

You did a great job on this video. It brought back memories for me and I loved seeing the show we created 50 years ago at the request of Jim Sidwell, the creator of Magic World. Since Pigeon Forge Tennessee is in the heart of "The South" he specifically requested that we produce a Confederate Critters show. The Conferacy was a very popular subject to poke fun at back then and when he asked us to create that show, none of us could have imagined that in the year 2026, there would be a bunch of young history geniuses who would consider the creation of the show to be racist. But then, everything to these geniuses is racist these days so it isn't surprising that these geniuses might be triggered by what used to be considered funny and wholesome entertainement and would go out of their way to start fights about it now. It should be noted that even back in the dark ages of the 70's, the battle cry, "The South Shall Rise Again" was considered to be a joke.

@lulotus 7 months ago

I love these videos about the history of the animatronics! I'm from Spain and I have never been at one of these restaurants in my whole life, but these videos are so interesting lol, so thank you for making them!!

@JPSauter 2 months ago

6:27 Bruh, ain't no way Rolfe is seen smoking a cigarette, while being friends with Uncle Klunk, who be telling kids not to smoke Crayolas!😭

@ThecoolJessa456 7 months ago

This dude taught me more in less then 20 minutes then my teachers have for over an hour. But in all seriousness this made my day, keep it up!

@banta5308 7 months ago

Yes! More CEC and animatronic history!!! Keep up the great work! Can't get enough

@mathieuleader8601 7 months ago

Earle reminds me of the iconic kids show host the yellow fuzzy Australian puppet Agro

@Ralsei_The_Fluffy_Boi 2 weeks ago (edited)

Dude, I just find it wild to think that if whatever happened and that IAAPA convention never happened or for whatever reason CEI didnt show off their shows or gotten in that contract, the world would probably be vastly different

I also like to imagine that rolfe in reality and off stage is just a chill guy, but instead of the "oh yeah hes a normal dude with a puppet" theory Imma say that earl is actually alive

@TomasGomezGoitia 6 months ago (edited)

12:19 Jazz, Soundwave and Blaster would have been better fitted for this as they are more music-centric characters

@JPSauter 2 months ago

3:36 Why did nobody talk to this guy about the confederate wolf animatronics?

@synthmoth 7 months ago

Thats my guy!!!! LOL the way i clicked so fast 🥺 i love rolfe

@AsherVeenusKyle 7 months ago

A video about my husband 🥹
Thank you 🙏

@EthansCloset 7 months ago

I care about top cat and snagglepuss 13:59 also this was a great video about the history of Rolfe and earl !

@muppetsretrofan8873 7 months ago

Not a big fan of Rolfe and Earl, but I LOVE Dook. Dook is so goofy and awesome at the same time. On a different note, on WorthPoint, there is a 16mm reel of a Jack In The Box 1970s animated commercial with the Jack In The Box Bunch. I hope the person who bought that reel will upload the commercial to YouTube soon.