Author: Scott Teal
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781940391090
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 228
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Book Description
In 2012, three friends -- Dan Lambert, Robert Mitchell and John Menhennet -- decided to invite one of the legends of professional wrestling to dinner, where they could talk to him about his experiences both inside and out of the squared circle. They enjoyed themselves so much that they invited other friends -- Jeff Bowdren, Bob McKeon, Greg Goode, and Duane Long -- to join them for what would turn out to be a series of dinners with the wrestlers they idolized during the '70s and '80s. The group members, all of whom lived in South Florida and came from all walks of life, began referring to themselves as "The South Florida Marks." One of the members, Jeff Bowdren, had been a wrestling fan since the early '70s. His fascination with the wrestling business led him to visit arenas all over the Southeast, and in 1987, across the Pacific Ocean to Tokyo, Japan, where the wrestling bug bit him hard. In 1991, Jeff became the first (and only) person to write a regular column for the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, one of the first publications to pull back the curtain that hid the behind-the-scenes manipulations of the professional wrestling business. Since then, Jeff has been known by everyone as "The Booker." Since the first dinner he attended, he has taken notes and recorded 24 interviews filled with anecdotes, tales of the road, and wrestling history. This book is the product of his efforts.Interviews with: Arn Anderson, Barry Windham, Bob Backlund, Dutch Mantell, Gerry Brisco, J.J. Dillon, Jerry Lawler, Kevin Sullivan, Larry Zbyszko, Masked Superstar, Paul Jones, Paul Orndorff, Ric Flair, Ricky Steamboat, Ron Bass, Stan Hansen, Steve Keirn, Ted DiBiase, Terry (Magnum TA) Allen, Terry Funk, Terry Taylor, Tommy Rich, Tully BlanchardAlso included are interviews with Karl Gotch, Great Malenko & Tom Nash
Author: Dru Jeffries
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253044936
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 218
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Book Description
The millions of fans who watch World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) programs each year are well aware of their role in building the narrative of the sport. #WWE: Professional Wrestling in the Digital Age explores the intersections between media, technology, and fandom in WWE's contemporary programming and business practices. In the Reality Era of WWE (2011 to the present), wrestling narratives have increasingly drawn on real-life personalities and events that stretch beyond the story-world created and maintained by WWE. At the same time, the internet and fandom have a greater influence on the company than ever before. By examining various sites of struggle and negotiation between WWE executives and in-ring performers, between the product and its fans, and between the company and the rest of the wrestling industry, the contributors to this volume highlight the role of various media platforms in shaping and disseminating WWE narratives. Treating the company and its product not merely as sports entertainment, but also as a brand, an employer, a company, a content producer, and an object of fandom, #WWE conceptualizes the evolution of professional wrestling's most successful company in the digital era.
Author: Kevin Sullivan
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1465427767
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 227
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Book Description
From the creators of the official WWE Encyclopedia, WWE 50 gives you the behind-the-scenes knowledge to become the ultimate WWE fan! Learn the Real Story Behind Key Events in WWE History: The split from the National Wrestling Alliance. Controversial figures and events from all eras. National expansion and the perilous risk involved. The legal and financial strife that nearly devastated WWE. Triumph in the Monday Night Wars. Innovations of WrestleMania, Raw, SmackDown, Survivor Series, and more! With Stunning Visuals and Insider Commentary.
Author: Aubrey Sitterson
Publisher: Ten Speed Graphic
ISBN: 0399580506
Category : Comics & Graphic Novels
Languages : en
Pages : 186
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Book Description
From the host of the critically acclaimed pro wrestling podcast Straight Shoot, this graphic novel history of wrestling features the key grapplers, matches, and promotions that shaped this beloved sport and form of entertainment. As a pop culture phenomenon, professional wrestling--with its heroic babyfaces and villainous heels performing suplexes and powerbombs in pursuit of championship gold--has conquered audiences in the United States and around the world. Now, writer/podcaster Aubrey Sitterson and illustrator Chris Moreno form a graphic novel tag team to present wrestling's complete illustrated history. Featuring legendary wrestlers like Bruno Sammartino, Hulk Hogan, and The Rock, and modern-day favorites like John Cena, Kenny Omega, and Sasha Banks, the book covers wrestling's progress from the carnival days of the Gold Dust Trio to the dominance of the WWF/WWE to today's diverse independent wrestling scene, and it spotlights wrestling's reach into Mexico/Puerto Rico (lucha libre), the U.K. (all-in), and Japan (puroresu).
Author: Neal Karlen
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250135257
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 268
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Book Description
A warm and surprisingly real-life biography, featuring never-before-seen photos, of one of rock’s greatest talents: Prince. Neal Karlen was the only journalist Prince granted in-depth press interviews to for over a dozen years, from before Purple Rain to when the artist changed his name to an unpronounceable glyph. Karlen interviewed Prince for three Rolling Stone cover stories, wrote “3 Chains o’ Gold,” Prince’s “rock video opera,” as well as the star’s last testament, which may be buried with Prince’s will underneath Prince’s vast and private compound, Paisley Park. According to Prince's former fiancée Susannah Melvoin, Karlen was “the only reporter who made Prince sound like what he really sounded like.” Karlen quit writing about Prince a quarter-century before the mega-star died, but he never quit Prince, and the two remained friends for the last thirty-one years of the superstar’s life. Well before they met as writer and subject, Prince and Karlen knew each other as two of the gang of kids who biked around Minneapolis’s mostly-segregated Northside. (They played basketball at the Dairy Queen next door to Karlen’s grandparents, two blocks from the budding musician.) He asserts that Prince can’t be understood without first understanding ‘70s Minneapolis, and that even Prince’s best friends knew only 15 percent of him: that was all he was willing and able to give, no matter how much he cared for them. Going back to Prince Rogers Nelson's roots, especially his contradictory, often tortured, and sometimes violent relationship with his father, This Thing Called Life profoundly changes what we know about Prince, and explains him as no biography has: a superstar who calls in the middle of the night to talk, who loved The Wire and could quote from every episode of The Office, who frequented libraries and jammed spontaneously for local crowds (and fed everyone pancakes afterward), who was lonely but craved being alone. Readers will drive around Minneapolis with Prince in a convertible, talk about movies and music and life, and watch as he tries not to curse, instead dishing a healthy dose of “mamma jammas.”
Author: Michael Chiappetta
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416507477
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 322
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Book Description
Kane has always been a dark, complex, and haunted man, and fans have always been drawn to him. They have wondered what caused his pain and suffering. What was his motivation?Instead of basking in the glow of the spotlight, Kane has shunned attention. Kane did not utter a single word for the first years of his career. In a time when Superstars scream for attention, he drew in the masses with onlyhis presence.Journey Into Darknessis the story of a boy who suffers an unspeakable childhood tragedy, losing his family in a fiery blaze. This left him aloneand at the mercy of strangers, who whispered about this friendless child who must be cursed.Follow Kane into a terrifying place that few would dare to go -- his life.
Author: Jim Cornette
Publisher: IDW Publishing
ISBN: 1684067677
Category : Comics & Graphic Novels
Languages : en
Pages : 83
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Book Description
Pro-Wrestling's secrets and greatest moments are immortalized in this graphic novel from legendary wrestling personality Jim Cornette. A true-story style anthology, these insider tales will show the lengths that wrestlers went to uphold "kayfabe" (the old carny term for the presentation of legitimate conflict), as well as the noteworthy cultural, racial, and economic effects these events and characters had on society. This is the graphic novel that old school wrestling fans have been waiting their entire lives for: a no-holds-barred representation of the moments that wrestling insiders couldn't talk about for years.
Author: Heather Von Bandenburg
Publisher: Unbound Publishing
ISBN: 1789650348
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 320
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Book Description
'One of the greatest wrestling memoirs I've had the pleasure to have read... Unladylike was a great reminder of why I fell in love with wrestling to begin with' Mick Foley{::}** ** Forget what you think you know about wrestling. In the world of Heather Honeybadger, aka Rana Venenosa, there are no steroids, no tans, no million-dollar contracts – there is only lycra, a sweaty underground club and an unbreakable resilience. From the day that Heather steps into the ring of the punk wrestling school Lucha Britannia, she finds herself transformed into a person she never knew she could be. How do you become a wrestler when you hate sports so much you can't do a press-up? What makes feminists and wrestlers both mortal enemies and unlikely best friends? For the first time, an independent female wrestler talks in depth about how she went from a sad, lost riot grrrl to an empowered, persevering fighter who has performed across the world. Unladylike is a feminist romp like no other – hard-hitting, life-affirming and funny, just like the women who find themselves in the ring.
Author: Rex Sorgatz
Publisher: Abrams
ISBN: 1683352343
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 422
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Book Description
“In an era of ‘alternative facts,’ Rex Sorgatz’s The Encyclopedia of Misinformation helps put things in perspective.” —Fast Company This compendium of misinformation, deception, and self-delusion throughout history examines fakery in the context of science and advertising, humor and law, sports and video games, and beyond. Entries span eclectic topics: Artificial Intelligence, Auto-Tune, Chilean Sea Bass, Clickbait, Cognitive Dissonance, Cryptids, False Flag Operations, Gaslighting, Gerrymandering, Kayfabe, Laugh Tracks, Milli Vanilli, P.T. Barnum, Photoshopping, Potemkin Villages, Ponzi Schemes, Rachel Dolezal, Strategery, Truthiness, and the Uncanny Valley. From A to Z, this is the definitive guide to how we are tricked, and how we trick ourselves. “Occasional salty language and pop-culture references make this compendium of 300 short entries a delightful mix of high- and lowbrow.” —Booklist
Author: Patterson, Pat
Publisher: ECW Press
ISBN: 1770908641
Category : Sports & Recreation
Languages : en
Pages : 321
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Book Description
“Pat is one of the greatest mentors I’ve ever had in the world of sports-entertainment.” — Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson When Pat Patterson was 17 years old, he was asked to leave his home after telling his parents he was in love . . . with a man. Moving from Montreal to the United States in the 1960s, barely knowing a word of English, he was determined to succeed in the squared circle. Back when homophobia was widespread, Pat lived in the super-macho world of pro wrestling. In this fascinating and revealing memoir of revolutionary talent, pioneer, and creative savant Patterson recalls the trials and tribulations of climbing to the upper ranks of sports-entertainment „ as a performer and, later, as a backstage creative force. Many in the WWE Universe know Pat Patterson as a ring legend, the prestigious first holder of WWEÍs Intercontinental Championship, a WWE Hall of Famer, and one of Vince McMahonÍs ñstoogesî during the Attitude Era. But Patterson is no stooge. He has long been one of Vince McMahonÍs trusted advisors. His impact and importance to the nascent stages of WWE are nearly comparable to that of the Chairman himself. Still active in WWE today, Pat delivers his no-holds-barred story of going from unknown to WWE luminary.
