Welcome to the world of professional wrestling.
Professional wrestling is one of television's fastest growing attractions. Every Monday night, the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and World Championship Wrestling (WCW), the two largest wrestling companies, compete for viewers. Together, the WWF and the WCW take up a three hour block of programming, which often draws in a Nielsen rating of 9.0, or about 9 million viewers.
Apparently many people are becoming fans of this phenomenon commonly known as wrestling. People are not only watching pro wrestling on televisions around the nation, but they are also forking out money to go to shows in person. Tickets can cost up to a couple hundred dollars. Recent gate figures show that the WWF sold out every arena and drew in, on average, $300,000 per show. What is fueling this coporate machine?
Professional wrestling of today is very much storyline based. The storylines of the WWF are written by television writers, who include former writers from MTV and "The Conan O'Brien Show."
The WWF's main storyline of 1999 involved the owner of the WWF's daughter turning her back on her father and marrying her father's nemesis leaving the her former fiancé at the altar. All this deceitfulness was caused by the daughter wanting to extract revenge on her father for attempting to marry her off to an evil undertaker months ago. Perhaps these unique storylines are what draw in viewers every week.
Vince McMahon, the owner of the WWF, has renamed his product "sports entertainment." He claims that the viewing audience craves the drama involved in the carnival-like atmosphere of pro wrestling.
Senior Amit Sharma attests to McMahon's opinion and says the storylines brought him back into watching pro wrestling three years ago.
"When I was 15, I started watching wrestling again," Sharma said, "because my friends were watching it and it soon became the talk of the school. It's more entertainment now because it is more like a soap opera."
Wrestlers' characters may also play a role in pro wrestling's recent popularity boom. The most popular characters of the '80s were superheroes who told kids to take their vitamins and say their prayers. Today, the most popular character is a profane-filled, beer swilling "rattlesnake" who strikes at anyone not only with fists, but with a wide assortment of weapons. He may not be a role model, but he is ratings-getter.
Junior Danielle Fuller, who tries to never miss an episode of pro wrestling, says the characters are one of the main reasons for pro wrestling's popularity.
"I like the characters a lot because some of them are cute and funny with their catch phrases," Fuller said. "I also think it's fun to watch pro wrestling because the characters can do stuff on TV that people at home cannot do."
Wrestlers are not only seen on pro wrestling shows, but are also all over the media. It is not unusual to see pro wrestlers on talk shows, movies, political shows, and even on financial programs. In October, the WWF went public by offering shares of its stock on the market. Pro wrestling of today is definitely a money making machine which is expanding its horizons.
Some audiences still do not bite into the glitz and glamour of pro wrestling. Junior Michael Jennings says he dislikes pro wrestling because it is scripted.
"Pro wrestling is dumb and fake," Jennings said. "It really annoys me when people talk about pro wrestling in class as if it were real. I tried to watch it once, but it just did not click for me. I wrestled for real before and people do not realize what traditional wrestling is anymore. I will never watch it."
Pro wrestling may have many enemies, but its popularity is evident. It offers over 15 hours of television programming, not including Internet broadcasts and monthly $30 pay per view shows. Pro wrestling's merchandise sale is at an all-time high.
"I see that pro wrestling's popularity has increased," Jennings said. "More people are wearing pro wrestling T-shirts and more people are having conversations over it."
Whether it is the storylines, characters or growth in television exposure, something has definitely revived pro wrestling and has brought it to new heights. How far can this runaway train go before it loses momentum? Stay tuned.