I love “sports entertainment”. The term “sports entertainment” was coined in the 1980s by the World Wrestling Federation (now known as WWE) as a term referring professional wrestling. Understanding this term is important for those getting into professional wrestling and much more for those transitioning from the independent wrestling circuits to the nationwide televised wrestling companies like WWE and Impact Wrestling. In the Indy circuit, the wrestling character may or may not be depictive of a person being heel or face. The entertainment value in the indy circuit deals more with in-ring skill and psychology on how one person was able to triumph over the other person. Many independent shows are not done frequently so building a story-line arc between shows is not that important. In contrast, being on television shows on either WWE or Impact Wrestling, the audience remembers the last acts that were done in the previous show, so continuity of the characters in the storyline is vitally important. Sad to say, though some wrestlers have been put into storyline, their character is so dry that the story does not get over, and much more, the wrestler never ascends to the next level.
If we are to look at the most popular wrestlers from the 1980’s until now, the great ones with great wrestling characters are usually never 100% opposite from their real out-of-ring personality. Only a few have been able to pull off the “Dr. Jeckyll-Mr. Hyde” personality as a wrestler, like George “The Animal” Steele. In-ring, he’s the wild, crazy, missing link type of character, but out-of-ring, he’s a normal, nice, educated guy. But for the rest of the big name stars, their character is an amplified version of a persona that’s already within them. For example, Hulk Hogan’s out-of-the ring persona is a dialed down version of the character he is inside the ring. Because of this, his in-ring character comes off real and is accepted by the audience. Unless you’re at the skill level of a professional actor who is able to switch characters like turning on-and-off a light switch, it’s the most real character that’s close to their true personality that get’s over with the audience. You can dress for a character that you may want to try to portray on-camera, but if you can’t act like that character, then you’ll never get over with audience. For example, John Cena was a good wrestler with no character. As the story goes, someone noticed Cena and Rikishi freestyle rapping backstage. With the rise of Eminem, the writers wrote a segment of Cena dressed like Vanilla Ice in Halloween edition of Raw, which was the start of him doing a rapper character which led to him being more the mic and finding his voice, leading to the John Cena we know now. But, prior to the rap segment, he was just a promising talent with no relatable character.
Once wrestlers are able create a character that’s a part of their inner person, there are two things that must be done for them to get over with the audience. The first is to act-and-react will with their opponent and the second is to act-and-react well with the audience.
Act-and-React with their Opponent. If a wrestler doesn’t know his character when doing a promo in confronting his opponent, then it doesn’t matter how good the storyline is, the audience will hate it. Like in life when you’re in an argument with someone, you can feel the emotions in the tone of voice. Your conviction is seen in your eyes and is felt in your voice. Every promo has a purpose and it must feel real in order for people to buy it. One of the worst things a wrestler can do when doing a promo is not to instigate a scenario in the discussion or not react to the scenario in set-up in the discussion. Conversation is a give-and-take process, and the promo/conversation flow is based on the character the wrestlers established.
Act-and-React with the Audience. Though wrestling is between two people in a ring, you cannot ignore the power of the audience. As a heel, if you hate your opponent, you have to hate on the audience who supports that opponent. As a face, you have to acknowledge the existence of the audience who are supporting you. The worst thing a wrestler can do is come out, walk into the ring, wrestle his match, and then go back behind the curtain, with minimal interaction with the audience. Old school jobbers like the Brooklyn Brawler would come out and still hate on the audience to generate heat though everyone knew he was going to lose. Acknowledging and interacting with the audience is key in getting your character over.
As of this writing, there are two wrestlers in the WWE with amazing talent who got a push earlier this year, but are having two different results, and they are R-Truth and John Morrison. In April of 2011, we could see the start of a major feud between R-Truth and John Morrison. Prior to April, both were fan favorites, but after a turn of events, R-Truth turned heel. As a face, R-Truth was over with the audience, but his character was going nowhere. He was like every other face that appealed to the joy of the audience but no real opponent to work against. Once he turned heel, he found a deeper range to his character. Working promos against John Morrison (who eventually took time off for surgery) John Cena, and Rey Mysterio, just to name a few, he now had an opponent to act-and-react with, and as a result, the heel character is way over with the audience. When he walks in the arena and talks, he is greeted with boos and continues to do and say thing that generate louder boos.
Though John Morrison had to take time off due to surgery which put his feud with R-Truth on hold, he was always been a face. Now that he’s return, he’s still a face, but his character is still going nowhere. First of all, there really isn’t much real dialogue between him and R-Truth, and I believe it’s because Morrison doesn’t know his character. He may look like Jim Morrison of The Doors, but it all stops at the look. We only know he’s a good guy because he wrestles bad guys. His in-ring talent is great, but he has no character that directs his action nor his reaction, so when he’s in a promo, the only hint of a character we get is the “I’m going to beat you up, because you beat me up last time” attitude. Secondly, he doesn’t act-and-react with the audience. He comes out, does his arm thing, gives a kid glasses, and then goes into the ring and wrestles. If he wins the match, he goes to the corner, climbs the rope, does the arm thing again, and then goes back behind the curtain. It’s mechanical. There’s no character in the interaction of the audience. They cheer for the win, but not necessarily for the character.
Sports Entertainment makes for fun television viewing. There is faux-reality, on-going storylines, and athletic acrobats. But as time goes on, their roster will change due to injuries, retirements, and up-and-coming talents with potential. For the next set of wrestlers/superstars/divas to take over the reigns of the company, it’s important for them to develop their on-screen characters as well as their wrestling abilities. Though the wrestling match will always be the culmination of a story-line, it’s the characters in the story is what catches our attention to want to watch the wrestling match occur.
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