I watched WrestleMania I for the first time in 6 or 7 years today and I was impressed with the performance of Mr T. Probably better than some of the actual wrestlers that were on the card, to be honest with you. With that in mind, and with Mark Madden's recent column on some of the worst aspects of celebrity involvement that was rife in the late 90s in WCW, I thought I'd make a thread asking these questions:
What has been the best ever performance by a celebrity in wrestling?
What makes for a successful celebrity performance in wrestling?
I'm not sure what the answer to the first question is, I'll have to have a think. As for the second question, the answer is in the level of involvement. Having people like Jay Leno squaring off with Hulk Hogan is completely unbelievable and doesn't do anything except make the wrestler look like a weakling.
I think the key is to let the celebrity be involved prominently, but not have them as the primary focus. If you look at Mr T's match at WrestleMania I, he slams the opponents a couple of times, even performing a much more fluid version of Wade Barrett's finisher than Barrett has ever attempted, with the commentators emphasising his amateur fighting credentials. This made the whole thing fit, and ultimately allowing Hogan to get the pin after something that Bob Orton did made the whole exercise more believable.
Of course, with people like Mr T, Lawrence Taylor and Mike Tyson, it's easy to make the fight look like it has real credentials, but what of weedier celebrities? There are two answers. One is to give them a small segment in a match where they are briefly on top before running scared as a bit of comic relief. This doesn't always work, but Drew Carey's appearance in the 2001 Royal Rumble is a pretty good example of how it can. The other alternative is to keep them out of the ring as managers or some other bull shit. WrestleMania I is famed for being star studded, but of the four celebrities involved, only Mr T was an in ring competitor. Would the Road Wild main event really have been any less of a draw if it had been DDP with Jay Leno as manager against Hulk Hogan with Eric Bischoff. This would still allow for a feel good moment of something like Leno twatting Bischoff, but would have prevented a farce.
The key then, in my mind, to a successful celebrity cameo is for it to be exactly that, a cameo. If it's believable that they could face a wrestler - i.e. if they are legitimately an athlete, then and only then does an in ring apearance make sense, and even then, any victory should be made to look like a fluke or be dirty, e.g. Floyd Mayweather's win over Big Show.
What has been the best ever performance by a celebrity in wrestling?
What makes for a successful celebrity performance in wrestling?
I'm not sure what the answer to the first question is, I'll have to have a think. As for the second question, the answer is in the level of involvement. Having people like Jay Leno squaring off with Hulk Hogan is completely unbelievable and doesn't do anything except make the wrestler look like a weakling.
I think the key is to let the celebrity be involved prominently, but not have them as the primary focus. If you look at Mr T's match at WrestleMania I, he slams the opponents a couple of times, even performing a much more fluid version of Wade Barrett's finisher than Barrett has ever attempted, with the commentators emphasising his amateur fighting credentials. This made the whole thing fit, and ultimately allowing Hogan to get the pin after something that Bob Orton did made the whole exercise more believable.
Of course, with people like Mr T, Lawrence Taylor and Mike Tyson, it's easy to make the fight look like it has real credentials, but what of weedier celebrities? There are two answers. One is to give them a small segment in a match where they are briefly on top before running scared as a bit of comic relief. This doesn't always work, but Drew Carey's appearance in the 2001 Royal Rumble is a pretty good example of how it can. The other alternative is to keep them out of the ring as managers or some other bull shit. WrestleMania I is famed for being star studded, but of the four celebrities involved, only Mr T was an in ring competitor. Would the Road Wild main event really have been any less of a draw if it had been DDP with Jay Leno as manager against Hulk Hogan with Eric Bischoff. This would still allow for a feel good moment of something like Leno twatting Bischoff, but would have prevented a farce.
The key then, in my mind, to a successful celebrity cameo is for it to be exactly that, a cameo. If it's believable that they could face a wrestler - i.e. if they are legitimately an athlete, then and only then does an in ring apearance make sense, and even then, any victory should be made to look like a fluke or be dirty, e.g. Floyd Mayweather's win over Big Show.
