MEXICO CITY — I covered WrestleMania III for The Detroit News in the ’80s, and no event I’ve ever written about excited me more. The Randy Savage-Ricky Steamboat match was as good as wrestling gets, and it wasn’t even the marquee event.
I’m jaded.
Pro wrestling was big back then, and I suppose it still is, particularly south of the border.
Before I headed back to The States, I figured I shouldn’t leave without sampling lucha libre, the Spanish words for “freestyle writing.” It’s WWE infused with Red Bull.
So, here I was on a Friday evening, in an arena where the crowd ramped up the decibels, watching pro wrestling with two friends: actor Nick Creegan and marketing maven Ramon Diaz. We looked to be entertained, and we were, although I wasn’t necessarily wooed.
Maybe my expectations were bigger than the reality.
Lucha libre wasn’t subtle either; it looked much like the acrobatic wrestling in America during the star-studded days of the World Wrestling Federation. Let’s get real: Could anything be subtle, during the Reagan era, about a Sgt. Slaughter/Iron Sheik match? What could be subtle about a Hulk Hogan/Andre the Giant match?
Pro wrestling has never been about subtlety. Not here, not in Japan, not elsewhere. It’s always been in your face — pomp under the gaudiest of circumstances? Pro wrestling in Mexico was no different. It has its megastars.
On this early-fall card, I’d have liked to have seen the stars of stars — El Hijo del Vikingo, Volandor Jr. or Mistico — wrestle. None did. Instead, what Nick, Ramon and I saw were a lot of three-person tag team matches. Three of those in total.
The fans in the stands loved it.
Me, well … not so much.
What I did like was the high-voltage atmosphere. Now, I wasn’t in an arena with 90,000-plus people, who made the Pontiac Silverdome shake like an earthquake March 29, 1987. No arena could mimic the sounds I heard that night. I don’t expect anyplace ever will.
Pro wrestling is about fancy … about impossible dreams that seem real. Men (and women) enter the ring to entertain. They bounce each other off turnbuckles. They slam each other to the floors. They pin their opponent’s shoulders to the mat and await a referee’s one, two, three … the universal side of entertaining the masses.
I’m not sure what Ramon and Nick expected. Both held cold beers in their hands, and I think the beer occupied their minds more than what was happening inside the ring. They didn’t know the performers any more than I knew them.
Yet was that supposed to matter?
No, I suspect not. What did matter was the excitement and the anticipation wrestlers generated. Lucha libre did for a Mexican audience what every Wrestlemania or Monday Night Raw does for Americans.
When I was younger, I loved how pro wrestling, USA style, made me feel. Good and evil proved unambiguous, which accounts for the joy it brought me. At its best, lucha libre seems like the same feel-good sport.
Would I go to see it again?
Heck yeah … and if you’re ever in Mexico City, you ought to set aside time for a carefree night of scripted madness, of inexpensive thrills. Lucha libre will jumpstart your emotions.
Just don’t blame me if you dislike it!
