Helen Henny is a chicken who's the female vocalist, bassist and guitarist of Munch's Make Believe Band. Although not officially a musician in stage setups, Helen is commonly seen playing either bass or tambourine in most showtapes and artwork.
History
PTT Era (1977-1989)
Debuting in the first Pizza Time Theatre location during August 1977: Helen's name is a parody of Helen Reddy, an Australian singer and actress. During the short-lived Portrait period, Helen played the guitar and had just gotten back from a tour in Madagascar. To this day, the original Helen showtape is considered lost and still missing. After her debut, she was replaced by Madam Oink (later renamed to "Madame Oink") in February 1978.
Helen would later appear in Cyberamic form in 1979. The design of the character loosely stayed the same, but the backstory changed. She became a movie star for “Eggstravagant Motion Pictures”.
Helen became the “Broadway Hen” in 1983 and was the final guest star before the bankruptcy of the Pizza Time Theatre. She performed onstage to impress a Broadway talent scout in the audience. At this point, she'd cluck in-between every sentence, which would (of course) annoy Chuck E. Cheese. She remained the permanent female character after the company couldn't afford to change out characters. Nancy Lenihan, who originally voiced Helen, was replaced by Connie Nelson in 1986, when production of the showtapes was moved to ShowBiz Pizza Time in Texas.
For the Rocker Stage. Helen's outfit was slightly changed; her dress lost its glitter and became polka-dotted, to make her a more versatile character. This version got a single walkaround made for corporate.
Tux Era (1989-2000)
During Concept Unification, Helen was heavily redesigned, in order to make her look younger. This was because SPT felt Mitzi Mozzarella's marketability towards young girls was a crucial part that needed to stay after CU. She now had her black and white hair in pigtails (mainly to reuse the levers in Mitzi's head that allowed her ears to move, these same levers being used for the pigtails), lost the comb and wattles from the PTT design, and a more softened beak. Personality-wise, Helen permanently stopped clucking and was a younger, hipper girl, but her love of Broadway was unchanged. Connie continued to voice Helen until 1991, when Karlisa McKinney took over. Annagrey Labassee would later take over her singing voice starting in May 1992. This would last throughout the 1990s, with the exception of Disney's recasting actresses during 1994-1996. In 1995, Helen's green or dark purple cheerleading outfit was introduced, and her hair became blonde.
Avenger Era (1999-2012)
Helen was redesigned with the rest of the band in 1999. Summertime 2000 was first show in which Annagrey Labasse became the fulltime voice of Helen after Karlisa McKinney left. She also was depicted to be slightly older than previously, and her potential crush on Chuck E. became much more apparent. She teased him about it on stage, usually resulting in him getting nervous, shying away, or attempting to quickly change the subject. During this era, she acted as a voice of reason to the band, often giving them wisdom when they started making fun of one another or when a situation appeared. Two redesigns were made and were interchanged with each other. While the cheerleader outfit was retired, it remained the walkaround outfit until 2017, and a purple version made in 1994 was used more often in shows.
Rockstar Era (2013-present)
Helen was redesigned in 2014, with most of her personality traits from the Avenger era being carried on the early years of this iteration of the character. In 2016 longtime voice actress Annagrey was replaced with Caroline Taylor, who still voices the character to the modern day. Alongside with the recast, Helen's personality was heavily changed.
Helen became a gamer, having a love of video games while being a good sport, such as shown in the "Game On!" music video. She takes piano lessons from Munch, likes reading, and seems to have adopted a loyal and positive personality, and is kind to all of her friends. She also still has a crush on Chuck E., though not as apparent as before, and seems to have taken a minor interest in dinosaurs, as chickens are the closest descendants of them. She even played the acoustic guitar in one show. She is also shown driving a car in Summer Road Trip and can ride a bike as well.
Physical Description
The Portrait Helen animatronic originally had long brown hair and a pink/white collared shirt. She wore rings on her then-yellow hands. She had white feathers and brown eyes. Her appearance stayed the same for the Cabaret Cyberamic, except for her new blue dress and shorter, curlier hair.
Her Broadway design changed drastically, and her hair was changed to black and white feathers. She had blue eye shadow, an elongated beak (similar to that of a parrot's hookbeak), and wore a red V-neck dress. Later, it was replaced with a polka dotted dress.
Her Tux design, first present on the 3-Stage, had her black and white feather hair in pigtails with purple bows, a more youthful face, a neck collar with a purple flower, a black blouse with a frilly dark pink skirt, black pantaloons, and lavender & white sneakers. Helen's cheerleader outfit was green (or purple) with yellow stripes on it, along with an "H", she wore matching green/purple sneakers, and she has matching green or purple eyeshadow and hairbows depending on the color. Her Tux outfit was used for her animatronic, and her eyeshadow color differed between pink, blue, green, or purple and whether or not it has sparkles, depending on the location.
For Chuck E. Cheese in the Galaxy 5000, Helen's purple cheerleader outfit did not have logos, her hair was longer, and her bows were placed on the top of her hair instead of slightly above her forehead and are slightly bigger.
Avenger Helen's first design, introduced in 1999 had blonde short hair. She wore a white shirt with a red flannel overtop of it, blue shorts, long white socks, and red heels. Her second Avenger design, introduced in the mid 2000s, had her hair in short pigtails with small blue bows, she now wore a pink long-sleeved shirt with a daisy on it, and blue jeans, along with white sneakers.
Rockstar Helen, unlike her previous eras, has a blonde ponytail tied with a pink holder, instead of her hair in pigtails, and is usually wearing a pink striped dress with a heart on the center, with a ribbon tied around her waist. She also wears blue bellbottom jeans, as well as pink shoes. Her hair also has a hair clip in it, and she has sparkly pink eyeshadow.
Abilities
Skills
Weaknesses
Portrayal
Voice Actors
- Nancy Lenihan (1978-1979; 1983–1986)
- Connie Nelson (1986–February 1991)
- Karlisa McKinney (March 1991–January 1994; August 1996-April 2000)
- Annagrey Labasse (May 1992–January 1994 (singing only); August 1996-April 2000 (singing only); July 2000-February 2016 (speaking and singing))[note 1]
- Stephanie Nadolny (April 1994–December 1995)
- Cathy Turner (August 1995; January–April 1996)
- Caroline Richardson (March 2016-present)
- Georgia Denney (1999, Chuck E. Cheese in the Galaxy 5000)
- Heather Garner (1999, Chuck E. Cheese in the Galaxy 5000; singing for "The Real Me")
Foreign Voice Actors
- Unknown (1992, Spanish)
- Unknown (2015, Spanish)
- Unknown (2018, Spanish)
- Unknown (2025-present, Spanish)
Costume Performers
- Georgia Denney (1999, Chuck E. Cheese in the Galaxy 5000; main performer)
- Linda Coleman (1999, Chuck E. Cheese in the Galaxy 5000; stunt/background performer)
Trivia
- Helen was initially the only female main character (as well as the most recent band member) until Bella's introduction.
- The eyeshadow on Helen's animatronic differed per location. Sometimes it's pink, sometimes it's blue, and sometimes it's glittery pink.
- Helen is the only main character to completely change her appearance during the transition from PTP to MMBB. Her original PTT appearance made her resemble a more taxidermy-like adult hen, while her current design makes her younger and anthropomorphic.
- Helen was also the only member who had differing outfits and hairstyles throughout the Avenger era, having four base outfits and three hairstyles.
- As mentioned in the Rockstar Era backstories, Helen has two older brothers named Harvey and Henry. Prior to this, a younger sibling of Helen's was shown with her and her parents in the flashbacks from Helen's childhood in "Merry Christmastime".
- In the Rockstar Era, she hosts a segment called "The Brightside with Helen Henny", telling you how to turn negative moments into something positive.
Gallery
- For a bigger gallery of Helen Henny's animatronics, artwork, and walkarounds, see Helen Henny/Gallery.
Notes
- ↑ Annagrey remained as the voice of Helen without new content until early 2016. Previously made content featuring Annagrey also continues to be occasionally reused.
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| Main Characters |
 Chuck E. Cheese  Helen Henny  Mr. Munch  Jasper T. Jowls  Pasqually  Bella Bunny |
| Secondary Characters |
 Nigel the Sasquatch  Ronaldo "Ronnie" Sagittarian  Justin Beaver  Mike Wolf  Copernicus  Horseface  Gary Ghost  Dino Summer  The Lamb  Phil |
| Tertiary Characters |
 Minor Characters  Movie Characters  Whatnots |
| Prop Characters |
 The Wink  Munch Jr.  Building  Moon  Pizzacam  Bird |
| Retired Characters |
 Rick Rat  Crusty the Cat  The Warblettes  The Mopsey Sisters  Dolli Dimples  The Clapper Board  Madame Oink  Foxy Colleen  Sally Sashay  Harmony Howlette  Artie Antlers  B.B. Bubbles  Dr. Quack  The Four Little Shavers  The Beach Bowzers  The Beagles  Wolfman Zapp  The King  King Kat  Singing Flowers  Charlie Rockit  The Bullhorns  Mr. Mouth  R.O.S.E.  Larry the Technician  Mike Manley  Wick Ladderback  Hank Howdy  Steve Waters  Betty  Marvin the Technology Guru  Hard Hat Hank  Zoey |