In some ways, this omission is perhaps not all that surprising given this ¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor! was directed by Parker and Stone's longtime collaborator Arthur Bradford, and more cynical viewers might view the entire film as nothing more than a 90-minute commercial for the $40 million-plus project. But the documentary also presents itself as a complete version of this bold story. It doesn't shy away from showing how disgusting the condition of the restaurant was before it was purchased, how frantic and last minute some of the renovations were, and how financially stupid it was to even undertake the project.

It is all the more blatant that the film bypasses an important chapter in the Casa Bonita story that made headlines last year. In June 2023, Casa Bonita announced that tipping would be banned in the restaurant and instead the hourly wage would be more than doubled from $14.27 an hour to $30 an hour.

According to a restaurant spokesperson, this unorthodox strategy was not originally the plan and was only implemented after it was discovered during “soft opening evenings” that customers were not tipping due to Casa Bonita's “unconventional, prepaid ticket system.” “Of our 256 employees, 93 were part of the shift and a total of two were unhappy with it,” management claimed at the time.

Well, that wasn't entirely true, as it turns out. Many more than two people were dissatisfied. Several workers formed a group called “We Are Team Casa” and issued a list of demands to management that included: “A mutually agreed tip pool structure with contributions from all employees.” They weren't afraid to use them either South Park Memes to get their point across.

While $30 an hour may sound like a generous raise, bartenders pointed out that the “bait-and-switch” policy toward a no-tipping policy meant a pay cut of “up to 40 percent” from a previous salary had been promised “In the range of $40 to $50 per hour, including tips.” And that was $30 Only for bartenders; Waiters were reportedly expected to earn $28, while bus drivers and guest services workers earned even less.

The tip was just one of many points of contention. The workers stressed that the reduced hours of the restaurant's “beta testing phase” meant they were only expected to work “between 12 and 15 hours per week,” despite being “told to quit their other jobs.” for full-time employment at Casa Bonita.” The group also claimed that employees were “unfairly terminated” due to “contractual disputes.”

And while it's easy to say that the pay at Casa Bonita was far more generous than your average restaurant, it's not just any restaurant either. As eater pointed outAfter Parker and Stone's purchase, Casa Bonita became part of a business portfolio that also included “a $500 million animated feature producing approximately two hours of new content per year, a $900 million streaming deal, and a $750 Million-dollar Broadway show that continues to produce “earn about a million dollars every week.”

¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor! briefly acknowledges that staff, particularly those who quit their jobs to work at Casa Bonita, have been quite stressed by the reopening delays. But the film's primary focus on the workers' dissatisfaction concerns the restaurant's cast, who become frustrated by Parker's creative perfectionism as he constantly reworks the restaurant's narrative infrastructure, which obviously wasn't the biggest problem the workers faced.

Regardless of how you feel about the employees' demands, it was certainly a notable moment in the restaurant's recent history that deserved some screen time. And given that the debate between tipping and paying service workers a living wage is very heated in the current zeitgeistIt would have been invaluable to see one of the most public examples of this economic discourse.

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