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Wrestling with reality

With the pandemic putting a stop to live events the world over, it's been slim pickings for sports fans looking for some much-needed distraction on the TV dial.
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Photo courtesy of WWE

With the pandemic putting a stop to live events the world over, it's been slim pickings for sports fans looking for some much-needed distraction on the TV dial. But while the major sports leagues navigate the path towards an eventual return to live action, there's been at least one sports-adjacent offering that has continued chugging along, undeterred: Pro wrestling.

You can be forgiven if you've missed this particular news item in the deluge of headlines that has flooded our feeds over these past few strange weeks, so let me bring you up to speed. Both major American wrestling promotions, the multibillion-dollar World Wrestling Entertainment and its upstart rival, All Elite Wrestling, have continued with their TV contracts, airing weekly events (three in the case of WWE) for a live audience of exactly zero.

Without crowds, it's given the broadcasts a markedly surreal quality, more akin to Beckettian theatre than the bombastic, interactive spectacle that wrestling usually is. Sadly, I'm not here to critique the finer points of men and women pretend-fighting in spandex (don't think my editor would go for that), but to answer the question that I'm sure has already popped into your head: How exactly has an entertainment product involving dozens of performers clutching, grappling, flipping and pinning each other in close quarters been allowed to carry on in the face of a global pandemic?

Well, it's kind of a funny story, if it weren't so troubling.

Early in the outbreak, both WWE and AEW pre-taped shows on a closed set with a skeleton crew. But even with limited personnel, it was clear the promotions weren't exactly following the physical distancing and stay-at-home measures the rest of society was beholden to. Then came the announcement, earlier this month, that WWE would be resuming broadcasting shows live to air, even flying talent in weekly to its Orlando training facility, where the shows are taped. Then the State of Florida made the baffling decision to deem wrestling an essential business—roughly two weeks after a WWE employee tested positive for the virus. (AEW, for its part, has continued to air pre-taped shows from a closed Georgia set, but plans to resume live events next month.)

State politicians were left fumbling trying to explain how wrestling could be considered "essential," while WWE put out a statement that was apocryphal even by its deluded standards.

"As a brand that has been woven into the fabric of society, WWE and its Superstars bring families together and deliver a sense of hope, determination and perseverance," said the company that once simulated an octogenarian woman giving birth to a human hand on national TV.

The joke among wrestling fans after the news broke was that WWE Hall of Famer Donald Trump—who, to my knowledge, remains the only global leader to ever find himself on the business end of a Stone Cold Stunner—had pulled some strings for his ol' pal, WWE owner Vince McMahon.

As it turned out, those rumours proved to be more believable than anyone thought. You see, Vince's wife, Linda, stepped down from her role as head of Trump's Small Business Administration last year to take over as chairwoman of America First Action, a pro-Trump Super PAC. And, in a move that would seem too convenient for even the most outlandish Hollywood script, the Super PAC committed to spending $18.5 million in Florida on the very same day the state deemed wrestling an essential business.

To put a cherry on top of this absurdist sundae, WWE—a company that stands to make record profits this year and counts more than half a billion dollars in reserve—laid off scores of staff the week after it was deemed essential while other (much) less profitable wrestling companies have kept their personnel on and, in some cases, continue to pay them their full salaries.

To anyone who's followed WWE over the years, McMahon's stubborn refusal to sacrifice his bottom line shouldn't come as a surprise. After all, if WWE can continue running shows for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia—another reason the company's profits have soared of late—in spite of the public backlash after Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi was tortured and executed by Saudi agents in a Turkish consulate, then some measly virus wasn't going to stop him now.

As a wrestling fanatic, I often find myself having to explain to my more sophisticated adult friends what all the fuss is about. For me, the appeal has always been the way it manages to blur the lines between fiction and reality, but even I think this all-too-real plotline has jumped the shark. (The distinction between real and not seems a bit tougher for ol' Donny Boy: When McMahon's limo exploded as part of a storyline on a 2007 episode of Monday Night Raw, Trump called the company's headquarters to make sure he hadn't actually died. Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States of America!)

COVID-19 has exposed the cravenness and cruelty that capitalism is capable of in a lot of different ways, but you're much more prescient than I if you had "Indirectly bribing a reality TV president to allow his billionaire buddy to continue putting on rasslin' shows for the masses" on your pandemic scorecard.