The Day Kayfabe Died in Wrestling, Explained

WrestleTalk

The Day Kayfabe Died in Wrestling, Explained Watch Why Wrestling Is Fake: https://bit.ly/3cQBvSm  SUBSCRIBE TO partsFUNknown: https://bit.ly/2J2Hl6q TWITTER: https://twitter.com/partsfunknown FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/partsfunknown/  For most of wrestling's life kayfabe was the veil that covered up all of the secrets of the business... until the day it wasn't. This is the story of how Vince McMahon exposed the business and killed kayfabe.  #wwe #wrestlinghistory #breakingkayfabe

Transcript

00:00 Hey kids, it's time to use the F word.

00:20 Because wrestling is a performance that has long blurred the lines between reality and

00:24 fiction.

00:25 The veil of kayfabe long left people questioning whether what they were seeing was combat or

00:30 contrived.

00:31 And as we explored in the last episode of Explained, the question mark over wrestling's

00:35 legitimacy was one that the media couldn't let go of, and it overshadowed bigger issues

00:41 regarding the business practices and treatment of talent.

00:45 So when someone drops the F-bomb and calls the business fake, people get defensive.

00:51 A quick glance through the comments on the last video on how wrestling transitioned from

00:56 legitimate competition into a work could tell you that it's the sort of thing that riles

01:00 people up.

01:01 It's not fake, it's predetermined, it's scripted.

01:06 You're an arsehole Laurie.

01:08 And I guess that's because everyone's definition of fake is different when it comes

01:12 to wrestling.

01:13 Is it about whether or not taking a bump hurts, because they obviously do, but the overall

01:17 aim isn't to actually hurt your opponent despite what the commentary, promos or narrative

01:22 is saying.

01:23 It's just a by-product of falling on your back a lot.

01:26 And a lot of people made the comparison to movies or TV in that they're pieces of entertainment

01:31 in which actors play characters and we don't exactly call those fake.

01:35 Which I think is a fair point, but the difference being that Daniel Craig doesn't turn up

01:40 to events claiming to be James Bond, apart from that one time at the Olympics.

01:45 But then he was also waved to by the statue of wartime Prime Minister, mad ol' racist

01:49 and Man City supporter apparently Winston Churchill.

01:53 Over the years wrestling's desire to keep a lid on the lie that it was a sporting competition

01:58 led them to try everything from stretching out random rubes from the crowd to prove that

02:03 the holds actually hurt, choking out comedians, slapping John Stossel and keeping heels and

02:09 faces from hanging out together on the road in case anyone spotted them.

02:14 All of this effort went into maintaining what was for many an open secret.

02:19 And as I said in that last video, which you can watch here by the way, people were writing

02:23 articles about wrestling being a fix since before the dawn of the 20th century.

02:29 So all of this effort over years went into keeping up the facade until one day.

02:34 I'm Laurie Hailing from partsFUNknown and this is the day that kayfabe died explained.

02:40 Before we get on with the video, please do consider giving this channel a subscribe

02:51 if you like any of our content, be it these explained videos, Luke's Actually Good series,

02:55 how Adam would book all the lists.

02:58 Subscribing is not only the easiest way to make sure YouTube shows you the new content

03:01 we put out, but it also helps us immensely because of the algorithm.

03:05 I don't know what it means, but it sounds provocative.

03:09 Nowadays, it seems almost inconceivable to imagine a time when we didn't know almost

03:23 every intimate detail about wrestlers and their personal lives.

03:27 Not only is the industry surrounding wrestling bigger than it's ever been, with journalists

03:31 closely tied to sources within the business breaking news day in and day out on Twitter,

03:36 YouTube and dedicated websites, but wrestlers themselves are giving us glimpses of their

03:41 personal lives on their own social media.

03:44 How else are we going to know that Braun Strowman or Adam Schur likes lifting weights and eating

03:48 steaks or needs 10 eggs but only 4 yolks, 2 grilled chicken breasts, a double order

03:53 of hash browns and an orange juice and a coffee to start the day off right?

03:57 I always assumed that he ran off of coal.

04:01 Because he's a train.

04:02 Sorry, he was a train.

04:05 Some things are a blessing in disguise.

04:07 But rolling the clock back 40 years to the 1980s and the backstage goings on in wrestling

04:13 were a mystery to most.

04:15 Wrestling was undergoing a bit of a renaissance in the territories and the promotions thought

04:19 that if what was really happening inside the ring became common knowledge it could seriously

04:24 hurt their bottom lines.

04:26 Because Stone Cold said so.

04:28 Hence the extreme measures to keep it covered up.

04:31 That's why in 1984 David Schultz was sent out by Vince McMahon to talk to 2020 reporter

04:36 Jon Stossel and shut down the standard question about whether wrestling was fake with a pair

04:41 of open hand slaps.

04:43 Ironically it was this act of realism that marked the beginning of the end of Schultz's

04:48 WWF career.

04:49 Stossel sued the WWF, settling out of court to the tune of $425,000 and Schultz was suspended.

04:57 Not by Vince McMahon but by the New York State Athletic Commissioner who had watched the

05:01 entire encounter unfold.

05:04 Once again the circus around wrestling's realism became the dominant story in this

05:09 expose, with Schultz's actions and Eddie Mansfield's blading becoming the two stand

05:15 out moments of the segment.

05:16 Which is something another contributor, Jim Wilson, was annoyed by in his book Chokehold

05:21 Pro Wrestling's Real Mayhem Outside the Ring, he said.

05:25 The obligatory topics of working and blading dealt with, 2020 finally turned to what I

05:30 regard as the only important issue raised by pro wrestling and its only well-kept secret.

05:37 The industry's illegal business practices and shoddy treatment of wrestlers.

05:43 Wilson was a controversial figure and had made a habit of exposing the business in order

05:47 to get his points across about blacklisting and the broken promises that promoters utilised.

05:52 And he was thoroughly underwhelmed by 2020's reporting on the matter.

05:56 Because after airing Mansfield and Wilson's stories in the segment, they turned to Vince

06:00 McMahon for a response, who denied fixing matches and knowing anything about blading

06:05 at all and said of the blacklisting.

06:17 In his book Wilson called this "flimsy homework and stumbling inquiry" on 2020's part,

06:23 adding that Stossel failed to ask McMahon the obvious follow-up question.

06:28 Why no promoter outside of McMahon's own family had been permitted to stage wrestling

06:31 shows in Madison Square Garden for over 30 years and why McMahon paid arena managers

06:37 and TV stations in several cities to grant him exclusive deals.

06:42 And why two of his competitors sued him for antitrust violations and racketeering.

06:48 So at this time the curtain of kayfabe was not only covering up how the business worked,

06:53 but how the business was run.

06:56 And here was Vince McMahon, Mr Monopoly himself, trying to keep it from coming apart at the

07:01 seams.

07:06 Because pressure was mounting throughout the 80s as the media circled looking for any break

07:11 in the fake debate.

07:13 And while it had always been an open secret that wrestling wasn't exactly on the level,

07:17 just looking at the reaction to The Iron Sheik and Jim Duggan both being picked up by New

07:21 Jersey police in 1987 for drug offences shows you that it was still real to a lot of fans.

07:28 Because it wasn't the drugs that shocked the audience, it was the fact that babyface

07:32 Patriot Duggan and hated Foreign Heel The Iron Sheik, bitter rivals would be car sharing

07:39 and sipping beers together.

07:41 Duggan says that he phoned Vince about the incident who said "what have you done to

07:45 us" and told him to go home.

07:48 It was a scandal that properly stalled Duggan's momentum for a while.

07:52 But all the while Vince was making this out to be some business killing event, he had

07:55 already been making moves to expose the business himself.

07:58 It's become a bit of a meme now, but the sports entertainment moniker sprang up around

08:04 this time.

08:05 In one interview with the Boston Globe in 1985 they asked if WWE was real or fake, to

08:10 which Vince replied "I really don't respond to that question.

08:15 I think it was done to death in the '20s, but I hasten to say that we're in the sports

08:19 entertainment field.

08:21 It's not important to determine what wrestling is or not.

08:24 It doesn't fall into one particular category.

08:27 It's not in the category of sports in the strictest sense of the word."

08:32 The company was also forced to admit that what we were watching wasn't exactly true

08:35 to life in 1986 when volunteers from a hotline for abused women threatened to protest a WWF

08:42 event over the portrayal of Randy Savage and Miss Elizabeth's relationship.

08:46 Which forced spokesman Mike Weber to say that wrestling is entertainment and the couple's

08:51 dysfunction was part of the show in an effort to quiet the demonstrators.

08:56 And the crazy thing is that after the melodramatic "what have you done to us" he laid at

09:01 Duggan's feet in '87, it was just two years later that Vince peeled the curtain

09:07 back on kayfabe himself.

09:12 It was February 10th 1989 when Vince went before the New Jersey State Senate to comment

09:18 on a bill that would remove wrestling from the regulations applied by their athletic

09:22 commission.

09:23 You see, because wrestling was masquerading as a real sport it got tied up in sporting

09:28 sanctions meaning that each state's athletic commissions would have a presence at each

09:32 wrestling show and grant licenses to the wrestlers, referees and timekeepers in order for them

09:38 to compete and put on a fair competition.

09:42 Different commissions also had certain requirements and restrictions like the need for an ambulance

09:47 at a show or injury insurance for the wrestlers or in the case of Louisiana, bans on certain

09:53 wrestling moves, which is still a thing and came up around WrestleMania 34 where it was

09:58 revealed that powerbombs, pile drivers, moonsaults, fighting in the crowd and bleeding among others

10:04 were all banned.

10:06 Not for major promotions like WWE mind.

10:09 At the time the WWF had to adhere closely to these rules or risk losing its license.

10:16 It also had to shell out cash as tax and a share of percentage of the gate in certain

10:20 states too, which you can bet your ass Vince wasn't thrilled about.

10:26 When interviewed for a 1989 Nightline episode about the regulations Michael Hayes said

10:30 Jesse Ventura also told ESPN that sometimes there would be 14 guys in suits sitting around

10:44 the ring and doing absolutely nothing.

10:48 So a lot of promotions frowned on this obvious cash grab and the Athletic Commission's

10:52 position wasn't exactly helped by outlandish asks like the Pennsylvania Commissioners threatening

10:57 to shut down a show if a table wasn't made available for them and their family at ringside.

11:02 So Vince must have weighed up the importance of kayfabe compared to the cost.

11:07 After all kayfabe had been created to up the cash flow of wrestling shows, first through

11:12 rigging the gambling and then through creating more exciting matchups and storylines which

11:17 would bring more audience in.

11:19 So if it was going to save them money in the long run, what harm could revealing the secret

11:24 do?

11:25 So Vince, representing the WWF, tells the New Jersey State Senate that professional

11:30 wrestling is "an activity in which participants struggle hand-in-hand primarily for the purpose

11:37 of providing entertainment to spectators rather than conducting a bona fide athletic contest."

11:43 This moment was the culmination of a years-long quest by Vince and Linda McMahon to change

11:49 the legislation, one they had poured a reported $400,000 into.

11:55 Linda had already testified before an ad hoc committee in Pennsylvania's House of Representatives

11:59 a year earlier equating WWF athletes to the skilled athletes you see in the circus or

12:05 the Harlem Globetrotters.

12:07 Our athletes are well-conditioned professionals who are the best at what they do, and what

12:11 they do is entertain people.

12:14 The New Jersey State Senate was swayed by Vince's testimony, voting 37-1 in favour

12:19 of deregulations, but the bill never passed.

12:23 Good old American politics.

12:25 So Vince had opened up a can of worms and pissed off a lot of the smaller promotions

12:28 in the process who were very worried that they could never put the genie back into the

12:33 bottle as it were.

12:39 It would take 8 more years before the bill was pushed through in New Jersey as State

12:44 Governor Christine Todd Whitman signed the legislation while flanked by the Undertaker

12:49 of All People, a symbol of just how far professional wrestling had come from its sporting roots.

13:02 The signing removed a $100,000 media tax on wrestling and brought the WWF back to New

13:08 Jersey as they had been avoiding putting on shows there due to the cost.

13:12 It's a similar decision that a lot of states weighed up.

13:15 Arizona, Colorado, Tennessee and West Virginia all deregulated wrestling as well to attract

13:21 the shows and their business to the area.

13:24 While other states have stopped due to the financial costs involved in running a commission

13:27 outweighing the actual money brought in, others have never regulated at all.

13:33 But some states took the revelation of wrestling not being a true sporting contest as a reason

13:38 to move the jurisdiction to a different governing body from the athletic commissions.

13:44 But in states with lax or no regulations this created a bit of a boom of indie promotions.

13:49 Because without the massive overheads of having to share your profits or pay for licences,

13:53 smaller wrestling promotions were able to flourish in these spaces.

13:58 So while it was always thought that exposing the business would hurt it, it made it stronger

14:04 eventually.

14:05 And it also coincided with the birth of a new era in the WWF.

14:13 The attitude era was to allow WWE to push the

14:41 creative envelope and move away from stories of good guys and bad guys and borrow more

14:47 from soap operas or Jerry Springer to fully embrace the entertainment product.

14:53 Because the audience had already been primed that this was not a real sport anymore.

14:58 So it's weird that real life still bleeds into wrestling in such a strange way.

15:04 Sometimes through the very nature of performing in front of a live crowd like when Edge and

15:07 Lita's affair was discovered or through the awkward interest of tabloids like TMZ

15:16 who derailed the Rusev storyline by breaking the news that he and Lana had got engaged.

15:20 It's a weird hangover of the kayfabe era that the performers and characters are still

15:26 sort of interchangeable.

15:27 Like I said earlier, we don't constantly conflate Daniel Craig and James Bond as one

15:32 and the same, otherwise Daniel Craig would be on trial for war crimes.

15:36 So it's really weird that WWE would change direction on Rusev and Lana or even be annoyed

15:42 because the characters are not the same people as CJ Perry and Miroslav Baneishev.

15:47 The audience already knows it's not true, we're already suspending our disbelief,

15:52 so why does it matter?

15:54 And I think the answer is that people just don't know why it matters still.

15:59 As Arn Anderson revealed about the tense moments surrounding the Rusev story, had he thought

16:04 old school about it, he would have been like "they shouldn't have done that".

16:08 But then again entire companies and groups of people *cough* Vince *cough* are exposing

16:13 the business on the other side of the tracks.

16:16 So I don't know what to think to be honest with you.

16:18 Looking into this it's just funny to me that this fiercely guarded tradition springs

16:22 up out of this swindle.

16:24 It turns into this way to protect the mystique of the business and amplify the interest,

16:28 it's then shattered because Vince wants mo' money, and yet wrestling is still 20

16:34 years later struggling to untangle itself from the knotted web of lies it wove over

16:39 the course of its lifespan.

17:02 And if you're in the mood for more explainers why not watch this one about the history and

17:06 origins of lucha masks, which is not as Mexican or as simple as you might think.

17:13 I'll see you next time, Jam That Jam.

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