Word: wrestlemania
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Dates: during 1985-1985
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...infantry of pickup trucks; one bumper sign reads GOD GUNS AND GUTS MADE AMERICA--LET'S KEEP ALL THREE. Inside, an army of tattoos comes to attention as the houselights fall, the speakers blare That's Entertainment, and the giant screen flashes the words LIVE FROM MADISON SQUARE GARDEN: WRESTLEMANIA. The magic moment has arrived. And so, for the moment, has the bastard sport of pro wrestling. From glittery Manhattan (where some aficionados were offering $200 for a good seat) to good-ole-boy Kissimmee, in closed-circuit auditoriums in the U.S. and 26 foreign countries, wrestling fans...
Only pro wrestling, as perpetrated by Vince McMahon's World Wrestling Federation, could provide such a uniquely 1980s fusion of chic and sleaze. WrestleMania's guest referee is Muhammad Ali; the guest ring announcer is Battlin' Billy Martin; the guest timekeeper, manipulating a tiny silver bell that might have come from King Farouk's dinner table, is Liberace. Pop Thrush Cyndi Lauper is "managing" Wendi Richter ("150 pounds of twisted steel and sex appeal") as she attempts to regain her W.W.F. championship belt from zaftig Leilani Kai, managed by former longtime (28 years) women's champ, the Fabulous Moolah...
...WrestleMania? The term is an understatement for an attraction now enjoying its biggest boom ever. Four wrestling shows, all produced by the W.W.F., are among the top ten programs on cable TV. NBC will present Saturday Night's Main Event, the pilot for a possible monthly series, in its Saturday Night Live slot May 11. Three videocassettes, including one on the Hulkster, are scheduled to hit the stores next month. There are Hulk Hogan action dolls, T shirts and sweatbands. Propelled by Hogan and Lauper, who last year brought her rock-'em sock-'em glamour to the "sport," wrestling...
...even want to have a little show- biz fun with the 6-ft. 8-in., 300-lb. Hulkster. Billy Crystal got away with it on Saturday Night Live, but Richard Belzer, the pencil-armed host of cable TV's Hot Properties, was not so lucky. Four days before WrestleMania, Hogan was demonstrating a front chin-lock on Belzer, who went limp and fell unconscious to the floor. When he rose, a pool of blood had formed under his head; the comic required eight stitches. John Stossel, a reporter for the ABC newsmagazine 20/20, got a rounder basting when he told...
Ebert: "And at the end of the month, we wrap it up with Part 13: Wrestlemania II, where Jason teams up with Hulk Hogan and Mr. T against the Iron Sheik, Nikolai Volkoff, and other of this country's enemies in "The Final War To Settle The Score...