Kayfabe Era- What be your thoughts on it?

[Promoter 0]

What were the pros and cons of the kayfabe era? The era of wrestling before Vince Mcmahon told the courts that pro wrestling was more performance than competition?

 

Some may say it can be broken down into two.

 

I believe it was just before WrestleMania V.

 

Also, in terms of it being smashed on television I would say it may have been Survivor Series '97.

 

What are/were the pros and cons of kayfabe(I mean the real kayfabe heavy era*oxymoron yes )

[Hasbeen2 0]

The fans were more into it. Even those who knew the outcome was planned in advance weren't ashamed to scream and yell and boo. Not because a wrestler may have used backstage influence to get a higher spot on the card or because they feel the wrestler is over exposed, but because the wrestler pulled the tights to win a belt, insulted the crowd by calling them a bunch of egg sucking dogs, or tried to pull the mask off of one of their heroes. Those fans could be counted on to keep coming back to the shows and to stay tuned.

[TMC1982 0]

I accept the post-kayfabe era as like watching a movie or television program. What I mean is that I'm aware that what I'm watching is fictionalized, with actors and such, but you still expect to be entertained (as if I'm paying my money's worth for quality entertainment) and enthrilled. I mean, at the end of the day, I don't want to come to the conclusion that what I'm watching is crap or insulting to my intelligence.

[The Buzz 0]

I miss it because I feel it has hurt the actual matches, as people want more and more from the wrestlers which has caused the need for all the high flying, chain wrestling stuff without rhyme or reason that seems to flood the business. It also seems that anyone younger than the age of 35 is apparently more deserving than someone whos older, but in reality knows what they are doing more. Those are the things that are most annoying to me.

[Promoter 0]

What I find lacking with today's product is the actual emphasis of pro wrestling being an exhibition. The attention to detail because of the attempt to make the viewer believe in what they are watching. Also, coherent storytelling that applies to real life.

 

The post-kayfabe era(more so 1999) direction of using different elements of other tv shows and so on to make an action adventure has opened the envelope for creative license, but I think this has caused less emotional attachment and involvement by the fans. That is why certain things such as Austin turning heel did not have the same effect as Hulk Hogan turning heel.

 

I also think that is another reason why the wwf did not do as much business a year later after breaking kayfabe in courts. I don't think it's a coincidence the business had a steady decline.

 

This is not to say that all fans thought the show was real, but there was significant doubt of it being completely a work to the untrained eye.

 

Another example is Steve Austin's character. I think one big reason he got so over was that fans were more likely to believe in the character in 1996-97 than in 2000 as the same with evil Vince. The nWo angle also worked to some degree because of how it actually felt like the new generation wwf guys Diesel(Nash) and Razor Ramone(Hall) entered wcw. There was less of a "program" feel to it than an exhibition feel.

 

I think that is what has hurt guys like John Cena and HHH(who are being booked like Hogan and Flair in the 80's somewhat). It has also became more hip as a fan to judge the show differently than in the past. It was more cool to be a critic than an actual fan and most of those fans have seemed to faded away or at least not caring about the current product.

 

I say the differences can be seen in what many consider to be the greatest Mania of this era WM X-7 compared to what many would say the greatest of the kayfabe era(actually greatest of all-time imo). One show seems a lot more hollywood and slick and the other is more like a supercard for a pro wrestling sporting type event. I actually believe WM 3 has the crowd's attention and emotion much more than the WM X-7 crowd for the duration of the show. Look at the pops Piper got when he put on the sleeper hold on Adonis(today that would not be the same), the pin dropping for upset wins for HTM and HF/Danny Davis, eruption for Steamboat winning, and of course Hogan slamming Andre.

 

Now, the fan interaction and attachment at Mania X-7 is fewer and far between with perhaps ONLY Austin/Rock getting anything like the reaction as those mentioned for the spots in the matches for WM 3. This is not to say the fans weren't into the other matches at WM X-7, but clearly to me they weren't AS into it for the simple reason that the other match outcomes and how things are ranked nowadays fans don't care for the other matches. UT/HHH was the only other match that came close and that was for the very reason people thought HHH could beat UT due to his reign as champ the year prior. The conditioning of putting on a good show has hurt the actual investment of seeing who wins and loses imo.

[Diamonddust 0]

Jim Cornette had a good analogy about the matter (He used it on Jim Herd to try and justify why some of Herd's decisions were dumb as dirt):

 

-Do you like going to a Chicago Bulls game (He thought it was Herd's favorite sports team) where you are genuinely invested in the outcome, and you don't really know what's going to happen... thus increasing your interest and wanting to see it again and again

 

OR

 

-Do you like going to the circus, where you know it's a show, and after you see the elephants, clowns, etc. - there's nothing left because it tends to be the same every time you go, even when it comes back to town ever so often.

[HarleyQuinn 0]

I think part of the issue is the alteration in format...

 

Back then, you had WWF Superstars (largely squashes), Wrestling Challenge (largely squashes), and Prime Time Wrestling, which featured high end matches. Nowadays, we have three shows in and of themselves that would show "PPV" level matches.

 

We'd never see a Hogan vs. Piper on WWF Superstars back then but it became commonplace to see The Rock vs. Triple H or Steve Austin vs. Undertaker on a given Monday Night Raw. After seeing Rock/HHH for the 4th time in 3 months, the "impact" of seeing them square off on a PPV is not nearly as significant as it was seeing Hogan vs. Andre at WM3 or Steamboat vs. Savage then.

 

Hasbeen2's comment about the backstage pull/overexposure is largely Smark talk and BS for most garden variety average fans. They may know that, as TMC said, it's no longer as "fake" in terms of being able to suspend belief but they don't care if Triple H runs the booking team or not. The fans want a good product, same as the kayfabe era. A guy like Cena got over, period because of his mic skills and solid ring act. It didn't matter to the fans whether he could throw out 4* matches or was a Smark darling or not. He entertained and that's all that matters.

 

As good as Russo's stuff was... it also took away the concept of the "big match" IMO. There's a reason people talk about dream matches like Hogan/Austin, because they've never wrestled each other 1-1 on a Raw/Smackdown show. You see Batista vs. Cena or Orton vs. Jericho on a Raw and when they put that same match on a PPV, it's ho hum because you've already seen it before so it's lost that luster of knowing it's such a big match that it can only be seen on PPV.

 

Why pay the $35 or invest yourself extra as a fan at a PPV, when you can largely catch the same match for free at a cheaper live show?

[Hasbeen2 0]

You don't think HHH gets boos from those who think they're in the know, and Cena gets boos because some fans think it's hip to boo the overexposed face?

[HarleyQuinn 0]

You don't think HHH gets boos from those who think they're in the know, and Cena gets boos because some fans think it's hip to boo the overexposed face?

 

I'm actually agreeing with your remarks except the idea that those fans are gone today.

 

Watch an old school ECW show and really watch it. Watch a match. See how often the fans "boo" or "cheer" as opposed to starting self serving chants for themselves. That chant of "ECW! ECW!" is telling the wrestlers... we don't really care enough to split you up as a face/heel and cheer/boo for the duration of the match. We just want to cheer the company name and get ourselves over as smarter than the average fan with intelligent, meaningless chants. That stigma is now with the ROH crowds.

 

You're giving too much credit to a minuscule number of fans in those arenas. The spirit of fans from the 60's, 70's, and 80's are still there in the fans of the 90's and 2000's. For every company that caters to the mutant smart mark crowds (ECW, ROH), there are companies like the WWE who cater to normal fans who want a reason to cheer/boo and most fans don't give a shit about anything backstage.

 

If anything, smart marks are the poison. Those wrestlers are giving you their livelihood and you cheer a heel to be "cool"? You boo a face because you don't like him based on rumors and gossip? That's moronic and takes away from the match. If you were really a smart mark, you'd boo and jeer the everloving shit out of that guy because it means he's getting over. It means you hate him and as a heel, that's his job. You'd cheer that face because it means he's getting over and he needs it. You want a certain guy to be "pushed" then get vocal and boo him if he's a heel or cheer him if he's a face.

 

Smart marks thought Cena was cool as a heel and he was cheered. He turned face. Now you want to disown him because he's exactly how you made him? Triple H was finally "selling" in 2000 and you think the fans cared that he was up top backstage? They wanted to see him get beat and lose that title. They hated him because he kept just barely winning. The Chris Jericho phantom title win said it all. Those fans didn't care that a workrate guy won... they cared that somebody beat Triple H.

 

Imagine the Jake Roberts/Randy Savage angle taking place today in ROH... there would be company chants. Chants of "Holy Shit" but you would never hear a boo directed at Jake Roberts just because he's a nasty bastard to Savage and Elizabeth. That wouldn't have been cool. That would've been a mark reaction.

 

Now imagine it in the WWE. It'd be very similar to the way it happened back in the WWF. Sure there'd be a handful cheering Jake, booing Savage but they wouldn't be heard because most fans would rightly boo Jake and cheer Savage. Those fans exist today. Those are the fans who cheered Cena and turned him face and keep cheering while he's a face. Those are the fans who cheered Randy Orton as he ran through Evolution and boo'd Vince McMahon when he went up against a reformed DX. Those are the fans who cheered Jeff Hardy when he won the WWE Title.

[Promoter 0]

That last post was on the money man

[King Cucaracha 0]

Imagine the Jake Roberts/Randy Savage angle taking place today in ROH... there would be company chants. Chants of "Holy Shit" but you would never hear a boo directed at Jake Roberts just because he's a nasty bastard to Savage and Elizabeth. That wouldn't have been cool. That would've been a mark reaction.

 

Plus the moment Liz hit the mat from the slap, there'd be a "Bobby Dempsey" chant.

 

But, yeah, I'd say that post is right on the money. I think the kind of wrestling fans we're talking about are every bit as emotionally invested in professional wrestling as the fans that preceeded them. The problem is how they're invested. Instead of being good-guys and bad-guys based on storyline, too often wrestlers are pegged good-guys and bad-guys based on their wrestling ability or backstage politics or how entertaining their character is. Wrestlers still get the same kind of heat or the same kind of adulation. The fans will still react at huge extremes at both ends of the spectrum. It's just for different reasons.

 

I think that's the big impact of the unmasking of kayfabe from wrestling. Fans are fans. They react to what they like and don't like. The difference is where they're drawing those reactions from, the emotion of the product or the inner workings of the product.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

Watch an old school ECW show and really watch it. Watch a match. See how often the fans "boo" or "cheer" as opposed to starting self serving chants for themselves. That chant of "ECW! ECW!" is telling the wrestlers... we don't really care enough to split you up as a face/heel and cheer/boo for the duration of the match. We just want to cheer the company name and get ourselves over as smarter than the average fan with intelligent, meaningless chants. That stigma is now with the ROH crowds.

Eh, yes and no. I'd say that the ECW fans became self-serving after ECW started actually gaining national exposure, somewhere in '97-'99. Before that, such as when they boo'd Foley for not wanting to wrestle hardcore, or when they cheered Tommy Dreamer for actually getting one over on Raven, or when they witnessed their poster-boy Mikey Whipwreck finally get a win? Those were times of pure emotion, occurring when the big 2 had nothing emotonally attaching. How many times do you remember seeing fans at a WWF/WCW show in the 90's legitimately happy because a wrestler won? The emotion that came with Dreamer sending Brian Lee off of the scaffolding can't be described, nor can the fans chanting "please don't go" to Shane Douglas and Tommy Dreamer during their respective "retirement" speeches (Shane in January '99, Dreamer at Heat Wave '99). Cheering the company name during other times isn't just to show "hey, we're so smart we're cheering for the COMPANY rather than the WRESTLERS," it's more to show "hey, this COMPANY gives us this QUALITY WRESTLING time and time again, so let's give them some respect."

 

As for the original question at hand, I think that there are just as many people emotionally attached to the wrestlers of today as of yesteryear. The fans assaulting Jericho (assuming this is not a work) are proof. Those breaking down during Flair's retirement are. Each and every person that cheers for Shawn Michaels when he's facing down a heel is, in their own way, attached emotionally. I would say that it's harder to get the fans to give a fuck nowadays, but that's not necessarily due to the product itself being presented in a different way, but rather the way society is as a whole. Give a reason for people to give a shit, and they will. A big reason why people didn't care for too many workers following the end of the kayfabe-era? No reason to give a shit beyond "hey, this guy does a moonsault" or "this one has a funny catchphrase." Characters, not gimmicks, get people over beyond initial knee-jerk pops, which is why those who have been around just a bit longer than others, or who have developed interesting characters, are the ones people look to today with reverence. As a whole, those who wish to be entertained no longer want overblown caricatures or one-dimensional figures, but full 3D characters with depth and growth.

[jester 0]

Good discussion here.

 

I just wanted to add that we shouldn't forget that even before the kayfabe era died, it wasn't exactly news to post people the wrestling was fake. So when they stopped sticking to it so religiously, I have to wonder how much affect did it really have on the people who cheer or boo? For example, I never liked Hulk Hogan even as a mark, so I would boo him, even though he was clearly the overwhelmingly popular face that they wanted me to cheer. I didn't do it to be cool (thogh I admit pissing off the Hulkamaniacs was kinda fun), I just didn't like him. I used to cheer for guys like Bundy to take him out, and would pretty much cheer anyone when they were opposing Hogan (though I would switch allegiances if they went after people I liked).

 

The Internet era has made backstage gossip widespread and that has been show to affect the audience on occasion, but I think that would have happened even if WWE was still insisting that it's all real. So we would have had Brock & Goldberg booed out of the building anyway when it became known they were leaving.

 

I think if anything, the death of kayfabe has had a negative effect on the WRITERS. Too many writers feel that "well, they all know it's fake anyway," which is why we can have Jericho call out a fake wrestler who was in a movie that exposed the business (Mickey Rourke), or why we can have Tony Schiavone scream that Goldberg isn't following the script. That shit never would have been allowed in the kayfabe era.

[Corey_Lazarus 0]

That shit should never be allowed, period. Stretching kayfabe on-air is one thing, but breaking it is something entirely different. If an angle completely breaks kayfabe then it's a bad angle (see: most of Russo's stuff). But if an angle takes real-life events and turns them into kayfabe (see: nWo, DX's attack on WCW and admittance to the "curtain call," and Shane Douglas calling out Ric Flair in ECW) then it's effective. Jericho calling out Rourke was good in theory, but poor in execution simply due to the very nature of the film Rourke's in (ie. one that exposes the business). It would be akin to Dr. Gregory House challenging George Clooney a fake doctor during the next episode of House.

[BruiserKC 0]

I saw a bit of that in the 80s when there were fans like me who cheered like crazy for heels that we thought were cool. Wrestlers like the Freebirds, the Four Horsemen, the Road Warriors, and Bruiser Brody were supposed to be villains but were cheered every bit as much as they were booed. Not to mention wrestlers like Jerry Lawler that were face but did heel things and got over, remember Lawler was cheered like crazy in USWA shows in Memphis but he was booed out of the building in Dallas. It would set the stage for the NWO, Austin, the Rock, and even Goldberg later on.

 

To me, kayfabe was an exciting time then for wrestling. Yes, I knew that it was staged, but these events had a major tinge of realism to them. You could tell these wrestlers hated each other when they locked up, and as long as you were entertained it didn't matter what happened at the end of the night. When I got the Internet, I wanted to learn everything about wrestling so I dove right in. Eventually, it got to the point where wrestling wasn't as fun for me as I knew everything that was going on behind the scenes. Today, I still read some of the news on the Net but don't follow it as close as I did before. To me, it makes wrestling that much more fun again.

[Promoter 0]

I completely agree about stretching kayfabe, but not breaking it for the reasons stated.

 

Now, last night is an example of a way the wwe can still work knowledgeable fans. Everyone had Orton/Cena and Edge/HHH penned for Mania, but they shocked everyone last night with what went down.

 

Now the explanation needs to be done properly and kayfabe wise they could do it.