WASHINGTON — After 16 years hosting “The Daily Show,” political pundits scratched their heads wondering what Jon Stewart would do next.
Anticipation was high for this generation’s Johnny Carson, a guy who’s interviewed presidents, hosted rallies on the National Mall, directed a feature film and got Martin Scorsese to do a cameo in a single-take homage to “Goodfellas.” Surely his next business move would be profound — and it was.
He hosted WWE SummerSlam.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4goGsIXCXLo
WTOP embarked on a nine-hour round-trip road trip to Brooklyn, New York, to cover the historic night. For a business they call “Sports Entertainment,” this was a two-reporter job with Chris Cichon representing our sports department and yours truly representing the entertainment section. Whether you’re a WWE diehard or pro-wrestling skeptic, we invite you to come along for the ride.
The Ride Up
Call it an insane last-minute road trip. Or, if you want to get philosophical, a full-circle pilgrimage to rediscover our youth. It was exactly 10 years ago that I attended SummerSlam at Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. to watch Hulk Hogan vs. Shawn Michaels in Summer 2005. A decade older, my car radio still blared the Beastie Boys’ “No Sleep Til Brooklyn” as it left a Washington political class that rolled its eyes at Stewart’s involvement as if to say, “Really, Jon? This is what you picked?”
Ironically, our car pulled into Manhattan to find a New York political class just as skeptical of Stewart’s decision. One cable news anchor in New York City held a cup of morning joe as she said: “Wait, that’s actually a show?” It was the same judgmental tone that wrestling fans have deflected for years, always along these lines: “You know it’s staged, right?” Yeah, kind of like cable news.
Let’s face it, we live in a “mad as hell” age. What the haters don’t get is that Stewart is once again ahead of the curve. He knows the power of blurring reality and entertainment. After all, it was pro wrestling that pioneered the concept — breaking the “illusion” on five dates in particular:
- (1) May 19, 1996: WWF backstage friends The Kliq (Shawn Michaels, Triple H, Scott Hall, Kevin Nash) broke character after a Madison Square Garden cage match. Hall and Nash were leaving for WCW, so the group embraced in a public “Curtain Call,” angering WWF management.
- (2) July 22, 1996: The nWo (Scott Hall, Kevin Nash) exposed the backstage television truck for the first time on WCW Monday Nitro, giving audiences a rare behind-the-scenes look.
- (3) November 9, 1997: Dubbed the infamous Montreal Screwjob, Bret Hart planned to leave the WWF for WCW, but he was still WWF Champ. So, WWF head Vince McMahon rang the bell during a title match with Shawn Michaels, even though it was clear Hart never tapped out.
- (4) April 27, 1998: D-Generation X (Triple H, Chyna, Road Dogg, Billy Gunn, X-Pac) invaded Ted Turner’s WCW headquarters at CNN Center live on WWF Monday Night Raw.
- (5) Jan. 3, 1999: WCW tried giving away WWF results on live television, only to backfire with record ratings for the WWF as Stone Cold helped Mick Foley beat The Rock for the title — and got the loudest crowd pop I’ve ever heard. WCW never defeated WWF in the ratings again.
This is the juicy crossover that non-fans miss when they refuse to look deeper into a product that has half-a-billion social media followers and draws 14 million weekly viewers across 175 countries in 35 languages, including 38 percent women — more than any other pro sport, says “CBS This Morning.”
That’s right, “His Girl Friday” has passed the torch to a new master of screwball entertainment — and her name is Kay Fabe (click the link if you don’t get the reference). In reality, wrestling is more real than any movie you watch or any TV series you binge. Just like baseball players disappearing into a cornfield or twisters dropping a house in Munchkinland, it’s all about suspension of disbelief.
WWE is a sports broadcast, soap opera and reality show all rolled into one. No one stops you before entering a Bond movie and says, “You know it’s staged right? Those are stuntmen on a Hollywood studio lot. They’re taught how to fall.” So why do it with professional wrestling?
I invite any remaining doubters to get in on the fun. Instead of disproving Kris Kringle, it’s much more rewarding to wear the Santa Claus cap — John Cena just granted a record 500th Make-A-Wish — only this time the miracle isn’t at Macy’s on 34th Street; it’s at Barclays Center on Flatbush Avenue.
Pre-Match Excitement
After stashing the car outside the brownstone home of some film school friends in Crown Heights, I caught up with some die-hard WWE fans at Alchemy Bar about a block from Barclays Center.
Brian and Charlie flew all the way from Phoenix, Arizona to Brooklyn for the event.
Brian also went to WrestleMania this year in Santa Clara, California, while Charlie donned a wrestling shirt with palpable enthusiasm.
“I married into this,” she joked.
The Event
As 7 p.m. approached, I closed our bar tab and headed for the arena. No sooner had I entered the doors of the Barclays Center before I saw ESPN’s Jonathan Coachman interviewing the legendary Ric Flair shouting his signature “woooooo!” Turns out, it was foreshadowing of events to come.
The show kicked off with a bang as Stewart took to the ring with the aforementioned Foley, who reduced Stewart to the role of giddy fanboy recounting Foley’s legendary Hell in a Cell matches.
Not only did Stewart host the show, he later interrupted the title match by hitting John Cena with a steel chair to help Seth Rollins. He returned the next night on Monday Night Raw to explain his actions: he’s such a huge WWE fan that he didn’t want Cena to tie Flair’s record as a 16-time champ.
#DownGoesStewart! #DownGoesStewart! @JohnCena just did what he HAD to do on Monday Night #Raw … @RicFlairNatrBoy http://t.co/dQNfzDrybx
— WWE (@WWE) August 25, 2015
Oddly enough, the Stewart-Cena-Rollins feud wasn’t the SummerSlam main event. That honor belonged to an intense grudge match, Brock Lesnar vs. The Undertaker, which WTOP previewed last week during a Q&A with Lesnar’s in-ring advocate Paul Heyman. It was a much anticipated rematch from last year’s WrestleMania, when Lesnar broke The Undertaker’s 21-0 undefeated streak — from Jimmy “Superfly” Snuka in 1991 to C.M. Punk in 2013 — which purists deemed untouchable.
After goosebump-inducing entrances, the match mostly lived up to the hype. Undertaker nailed a patented leg drop on the ringside apron to cheers of “you’ve still got it,” while Lesnar took Taker to “Suplex City” and hit his finishing move (the F-5) through the announcer’s table. The intentionally controversial finish involved the referee not seeing Undertaker tapping out to a submission hold, allowing Undertaker to come back with a submission win of his own. As Undertaker left victorious, Heyman took to the microphone insisting that Lesnar was robbed. It was a classic “everybody wins” because “nobody lost” ending. While the finish was unfortunately confusing for the live audience, it likely played better on television with the aid of play-by-play announcers.
“The video DOES NOT LIE!” – @HeymanHustle @BrockLesnar #BrockVsTaker #TakerTappedOut #RAW pic.twitter.com/jJ5Xd70yST — WWE Universe (@WWEUniverse) August 25, 2015
The Morning After
Still groggy from the late night before, I woke up to a cellphone call the next morning from WWE.
“Excuse me, Jason? Chris Jericho is on the line.”
That’s right, WTOP had a chance to speak with the man who will forever go down in the history books as the first ever undisputed champion after the WCW-WWF merger in 2001.
Listen above as Jericho discusses his storied career and his current role as host of WWE’s “Tough Enough,” a reality show competition which crowns its winner with a contract Tuesday night.
“When you have 25 years experience, it does put you on a different level because there are so many new guys now,” Jericho tells WTOP. “If you can still go and still move, that’s the secret right there. … I don’t think it’d be a very good idea for someone to play in the NFL and say, ‘I’m gonna only play in Denver and Detroit and San Diego but that’s it.’ If you’re smart about the match, look at Undertaker, he does very minimal match, so that the ones he can do, are very high impact.”
Yes, everything old is new again in the WWE. You can’t watch Joe Namath pass against Tom Brady at the Super Bowl, but you can watch The Undertaker vs. Brock Lesnar at SummerSlam, or Triple H vs. Sting at WrestleMania. Past and present collide as generations cheer their immortal heroes.
The Ride Back
As we loaded back into the car Monday morning, we grabbed a bite at the same restaurant where Tom Cruise filmed “Cocktail,” then grabbed a couple of slices of pizza on the Upper East Side (yes, Jon Stewart, we folded them — this wasn’t deep dish). The Lincoln Tunnel was surprisingly traffic free and the trip home only took four hours, compared to the five it took us to get up to Brooklyn.
As we continued to cruise, we looked at each other like two fans watching a no-hitter in baseball. You both know you aren’t hitting traffic, but you dare not say it so as not to jinx it.
The time flew as we discussed our girlfriends, our families, our career aspirations and, most importantly, the implications SummerSlam would have that night on Monday Night Raw.
I couldn’t help but feel “born again” in Austin 3:16 glory after a decade of waning passion. I suppose my decline was understandable: (1) WWE lost its healthy competition when it acquired WCW and ECW, (2) The product felt oversaturated by multiple TV shows and an extended, three-hour “Monday Night Raw;” (3) The titles became hard to follow with too many belts and too many champions across the Raw and Smackdown brands; (4) The business had shifted away from the “Attitude” era of my youth and toward “PG” family entertainment; (5) And bad publicity haunted WWE outside the ring, from recurring obituaries to concussions to tragic murder-suicides.
Of course, it’s still not perfect — SummerSlam was a bloated four hours with a cop-out finish and a title match booked fourth to last on the card (diluting your title, anyone?). But driving back from Brooklyn after a night of high-octane action, I thought of how much the good outweighed the bad.
The Rock is currently the highest grossing moviestar in Hollywood. Darren Aronofsky’s “The Wrestler” (2008) remains one of the most acclaimed films of the new millennium. John Cena stole the show as Amy Schumer’s boyfriend in Judd Apatow’s comedy “Trainwreck” (2015). And of course, Jon Stewart just hosted SummerSlam. So if there are any fans still embarrassed to admit they watch this soap opera, join the “millions … and millions” who can proudly say: it’s cool to be a wrestling fan.
As the wheels spun in our minds and rolled down the highway, I felt a new appreciation for what these wrestlers do all the time, traveling from city to city, from weight room to emergency room, from nationally televised programs to nontelevised house shows. Stone Cold Steve Austin summed up the lifestyle best: you’re part-athlete, part-rockstar, part-truck driver.
As our nine-hour round trip wrestling road trip came to a close, WTOP wasn’t any of these.
We were simply kids again.
Special thanks to WTOP fitness guru Fairfax “The Hackster” Hackley for scoring the tickets.
