The Media Doesn't Get It: What is Wrestling?
Through the Decades (a staple of the classic TV channel Decades) aired a piece looking back at the WWE in the '80s and the day Vince McMahon admitted wrestling is entertainment. For those who don't know, the show is a docu-series that explores old news stories and monumental moments in history and pop culture. It's a program worth seeking out, especially if you want to recapture that edifying magic the History Channel used to be known for.
When I saw they had a segment about wrestling coming on, I was excited. They'd done episodes devoted to superheroes and comics before too, but this piqued my interest, even more, hitting right at the epicenter of my fandom.
When I saw they had a segment about wrestling coming on, I was excited. They'd done episodes devoted to superheroes and comics before too, but this piqued my interest, even more, hitting right at the epicenter of my fandom.
I watched the piece and I was pleased with the effort, but one thing bugged me, and it's the same thing that always bugs me when someone in the media wants to talk about wrestling -- the media, at every level, just doesn't understand the industry (or people who follow it or anyone associated with it, for that matter).
These days, it seems like those responsible for Creative don't have a clue either. But, for the press, their ignorance of pro wrestling has always been a nagging problem. In the wake of any scandal or anytime a promoter or wrestling personality seeks quick PR, people who are paid to have their two cents in print or on TV become the sage experts.
Meanwhile, lifelong fans and those who've made their living in the business get written off. Publicly or privately, wrestling is patronized, if not condemned, and fans wanting to enjoy their hobby in peace are treated condescendingly.
Decades didn't stoop that low but managed to fudge a few facts. First off, they made it look like WWE(F) was the only game in town at the end of the '80s -- no mention of Jim Crockett, Ted Turner, or WCW. As most fans know, the old-guard territories died a slow death, hanging on into the early '90s.
In the scheme of things, that is a minor editorial error -- forgivable, chalked up to cursory research.
The biggest gripe I had was they resorted to the typical narrative when describing the form (the sport, if you will). Following a transcript quote by Vince McMahon in front of the New Jersey State Athletic Commission, the narrator said Vince admitted wrestling was, in other words, "scripted."
Okay, I didn't fall out of my chair, but I still shook my head a little. "Scripted" stays along that condescending line of thinking; it's a nicer way of saying "fake." That's number one.
Number two is saying "scripted," or "fake," misses the mark (particularly this mark) because it's not entirely accurate, being ignorant of historical context. Wrestling dates, in one form or another, back to the dawn of Western Civilization. As we know it today, it traces back to the carny circuit of the post-Civil War, of barkers and traveling strongmen taking on challengers from the audience.
For a script, you need writers and back then there were no writers (we can safely assume). Finishes were arranged by the early 1900s but writers were still a nonentity until wrestling took television and the culture by storm, for the second time, in the '80s. This is largely due to the team of Vince and Dick Ebersol -- who, at the time, was NBC's VP of Late-Night Programming.
The two worked closely together and brought WWE to NBC with Saturday Night's Main Event. The entire industry was becoming a more TV-centric product so it adapted to fit the bill. In fact, writing wrestling like a TV show was the mantra of Vince Russo in the Attitude Era.
But that was in the late '90s and it wasn't until the last two decades, the new millennium, that writers and writing teams for a RAW and Smackdown that's categorically episodic/serialized TV was christened the norm.
So even after testimony (presumably under oath) by McMahon himself wrestling was not exactly scripted. It isn't quite so today either: plans fluctuate, crowd tastes and reactions can be unpredictable, and things go awry all the time, which leads to changes in direction.
Then what is wrestling given all these X factors? I contend wrestling is what it has always claimed to be -- a "work." What constitutes a work? A work is more akin to improv, throwing stuff out there to get a positive or negative reaction, a pop or heat, from a paying audience. In short, getting them to buy what you are selling them, and come back over and over.
Obviously, promos and matches are gone over in advance, but they can't go by an immutable script because they can't count on things going their way 100 percent of the time. Roman Reigns is supposed to be an over babyface and carrying the company; he's not.
The people can't be dictated to because you can't write for them without knowing them. They didn't get behind Austin, Rock, Hogan, to a lesser extent Cena, or anybody else because it was written for them to do so or because the characters of those guys were written out of thin air. Their personas developed over time because they got to know, or "worked," their audience.
Something clicked, it wasn't planned, and it was different. That's the essence of a work.
There's more to it but it boils down to something Eddie Guerrero once said, go in "blank." Be blank and work it out in the ring on the fly -- extemporaneous, feeling the crowd.
And you know something? The greatest work of all in wrestling history might be convincing yourself that someone from Hollywood can write this crap.
In the scheme of things, that is a minor editorial error -- forgivable, chalked up to cursory research.
The biggest gripe I had was they resorted to the typical narrative when describing the form (the sport, if you will). Following a transcript quote by Vince McMahon in front of the New Jersey State Athletic Commission, the narrator said Vince admitted wrestling was, in other words, "scripted."
Okay, I didn't fall out of my chair, but I still shook my head a little. "Scripted" stays along that condescending line of thinking; it's a nicer way of saying "fake." That's number one.
Number two is saying "scripted," or "fake," misses the mark (particularly this mark) because it's not entirely accurate, being ignorant of historical context. Wrestling dates, in one form or another, back to the dawn of Western Civilization. As we know it today, it traces back to the carny circuit of the post-Civil War, of barkers and traveling strongmen taking on challengers from the audience.
For a script, you need writers and back then there were no writers (we can safely assume). Finishes were arranged by the early 1900s but writers were still a nonentity until wrestling took television and the culture by storm, for the second time, in the '80s. This is largely due to the team of Vince and Dick Ebersol -- who, at the time, was NBC's VP of Late-Night Programming.
The two worked closely together and brought WWE to NBC with Saturday Night's Main Event. The entire industry was becoming a more TV-centric product so it adapted to fit the bill. In fact, writing wrestling like a TV show was the mantra of Vince Russo in the Attitude Era.
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Why does WWE have writers?
Blame Dick
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So even after testimony (presumably under oath) by McMahon himself wrestling was not exactly scripted. It isn't quite so today either: plans fluctuate, crowd tastes and reactions can be unpredictable, and things go awry all the time, which leads to changes in direction.
Then what is wrestling given all these X factors? I contend wrestling is what it has always claimed to be -- a "work." What constitutes a work? A work is more akin to improv, throwing stuff out there to get a positive or negative reaction, a pop or heat, from a paying audience. In short, getting them to buy what you are selling them, and come back over and over.
Obviously, promos and matches are gone over in advance, but they can't go by an immutable script because they can't count on things going their way 100 percent of the time. Roman Reigns is supposed to be an over babyface and carrying the company; he's not.
The people can't be dictated to because you can't write for them without knowing them. They didn't get behind Austin, Rock, Hogan, to a lesser extent Cena, or anybody else because it was written for them to do so or because the characters of those guys were written out of thin air. Their personas developed over time because they got to know, or "worked," their audience.
Something clicked, it wasn't planned, and it was different. That's the essence of a work.
There's more to it but it boils down to something Eddie Guerrero once said, go in "blank." Be blank and work it out in the ring on the fly -- extemporaneous, feeling the crowd.
And you know something? The greatest work of all in wrestling history might be convincing yourself that someone from Hollywood can write this crap.
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