Chuck E. Cheese is looking for two more months to negotiate with its landlords over deferred rent, while it also proposes paying part of the full amount due, Bloomberg News reported. CEC Entertainment Inc., parent of Chuck E. Cheese and Peter Piper Pizza, asked to pay reduced rent depending on the status of its operations, rather than forgoing payments in full, attorney Alfredo Perez of Weil Gotshal & Manges, said at a status conference yesterday. The company reached an agreement with the unsecured creditors' committee that provides a sixty-day holdout period for CEC to pay landlords a portion of rent for restaurants that are either closed, open for takeout, or open with limited capacity, Perez said. Judge Marvin P. Isgur of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of Texas to set hearings for next week for further objections on the matter. CEC earlier asked the court’s permission to put off paying rent for 141 locations that were closed for in-person dining as a result of government measures aimed at preventing the spread of the coronavirus. After getting Judge Isgur’s approval earlier this month to defer rent payments for roughly 21 days on top of the two-month deferral already allowed, CEC reached initial agreements with landlords at 40 of the locations. An additional 10 landlords have signed on to the settlements as of yesterday, while others are in various stages of “getting done,” Perez said.
