Latest news with #RandySavage
San Francisco Chronicle
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Hulk Hogan, icon in professional wrestling, dies at age 71
CLEARWATER, Fla. (AP) — Hulk Hogan, a mustachioed, headscarf-wearing icon in professional wrestling who turned the sport into a massive business and cultural touchstone, died Thursday at age 71, Florida police said. In Clearwater, Florida, authorities responded to a morning call about a cardiac arrest. Hogan was pronounced dead at a hospital, police said in a statement on Facebook. Hogan, whose real name was Terry Bollea, was perhaps the biggest star in WWE's long history. He was the main draw for the first WrestleMania in 1985 and was a fixture for years, facing everyone from Andre The Giant and Randy Savage to The Rock and even company chairman Vince McMahon. He won at least six WWE championships and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2005. 'One of pop culture's most recognizable figures, Hogan helped WWE achieve global recognition in the 1980s. WWE extends its condolences to Hogan's family, friends, and fans,' WWE said. 'Hulkamania,' as the energy he created was called, started running wild in the mid-1980s and pushed professional wrestling into the mainstream. He was a flag-waving American hero with the horseshoe mustache, red and yellow gear and massive arms he called his '24-inch pythons.' In recent years, Hogan has waded further into politics. At the 2024 Republican National Convention, Hogan merged classic WWE maneuvers with President Donald Trump's rhetoric to vociferously endorse his longtime acquaintance. 'Let Trumpamania run wild! Let Trumpamania rule again! Let Trumpamania make America Great Again!' Hogan shouted into the crowd. He ripped off a t-shirt emblazoned with a picture of himself on a motorcycle to reveal a bright red Trump-Vance campaign shirt underneath. Then-presidential candidate Trump stood to applaud the move. In 2016, a Florida jury awarded Hogan $115 million in his sex tape lawsuit against Gawker Media and then added $25 million in punitive damages. Hogan sued after Gawker in 2012 posted a video of him having sex with his former best friend's wife. He contended the post violated his privacy. Hogan smiled and wore black throughout the three-week trial. 'Everywhere I show up, people treat me like I'm still the champ,' he said of the support from fans. Hogan first became champion in what was then the World Wrestling Federation in 1984, and pro wrestling took off from there. His popularity helped lead to the creation of the annual WrestleMania event in 1985, when he teamed up with Mr. T to beat 'Rowdy' Roddy Piper and 'Mr. Wonderful' Paul Orndorff in the main event. He slammed and beat Andre the Giant at WrestleMania III in 1987, and the WWF gained momentum. His feud with the late 'Macho Man' Randy Savage – perhaps his greatest rival -- carried pro wrestling even further. Hogan was a central figure in what is known as the Monday Night Wars. The WWE and World Championship Wrestling were battling for ratings supremacy in 1996. Hogan tilted things in WCW's favor with the birth of the Hollywood Hogan character and the formation of the New World Order, a villainous stable that put WCW ahead in the ratings. He returned to the WWE in 2002 and became a champion again. His match with The Rock at WrestleMania X8, a loss during which fans cheered for his 'bad guy' character, was seen as a passing of the torch. He was perhaps as known for his larger-than-life personality as he was his in-ring exploits. He was beloved for his 'promos,' hype sessions he used to draw fans into matches. He often would play off his interviewer, 'Mean' Gene Okerlund, starting his interviews off with, 'Well, lemme tell ya something, Mean Gene!' —-
Winnipeg Free Press
18-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Savage love story will have you wrestling with all the feels
Geoffrey Owen Hughes has more than 30 years of experience dressing up as wrestling superstar Macho Man Randy Savage, attending his first event as the 'Macho Manitoban' at a screening of Wrestlemania 8 at a restaurant in 1992. A wrestling ring had been set up in the parking lot; while in the ring with a group of other kids, Hughes attempted Macho's trademark vault exit over the top rope to the ground. 'But I had never done it before,' the Macho Manitoban says prior to the start of his fringe show Randy and Elizabeth: A Savage Love Story. Geoff Hughes plays Macho Man Randy Savage in Randy and Elizabeth: A Savage Love Story. Hughes' foot caught on the top rope, but 'the wrestling gods were merciful on that day and I stuck the landing — oh yeah, dig it!,' he says in his pitch-perfect Savage impression. The 52-year-old Winnipeg-born 'theatre kid' has been a wrestling fan since the 1970s, when his mom left him in front of a cluster of televisions showing a wrestling match while she was shopping at a department store. 'I had glue in my shoes. I was transfixed by my first-ever look at wrestling on TV,' he says. Hughes' imagination was captured by the archetypes present at the core of professional wrestling — specifically, the way good will always overcome evil. 'We don't get to see good guys prevail in real life. We seek that in culture, and wrestling offered that,' he says. One would not expect a lot of emotional vulnerability from professional wrestlers, specifically the Macho Man Randy Savage. So can macho men cry? Hughes thinks so, attributing the emotional vulnerability of his generation of men to the 1974 Marlo Thomas record Free to Be You and Me, which featured the song It's All Right to Cry. 'Macho Man was once asked by Arsenio Hall if macho men can cry and his answer will bring you to tears,' Hughes says, referring to a 1992 appearance on Hall's late-night talk show. 'On the show, Savage, in his trademark gravelly voice, said, 'It's all right for macho men to show every emotion. I've cried a thousand times, I'm going to cry some more. There's one guarantee in life and that is there are no guarantees. So if you get knocked down, get back up and fight again.'' MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS Geoff Hughes plays Macho Man Randy Savage in Randy and Elizabeth: A Savage Love Story. Tears abounded during the five-year-long World Wrestling Federation storyline involving Randy Savage and his onscreen manager and real-life wife Miss Elizabeth, the focus of Hughes' show. The WWF saga concluded with a wedding at Summerslam 1991 that saw Miss Elizabeth in a Princess Diana-esque dress and a wedding gift of a cobra from the evil Jake (the Snake) Roberts that ended the night. But the true heart of Hughes' show is Randy Savage's loss at Wrestlemania 7 in 1991, where, in true Rocky fashion, our hero loses the match but gains the love of his life. 'I love that moment more than any comic book, any song. It was just so romantic and life-affirming. I hope I can make (my audience) feel even a fraction of what I felt when I watched it,' Hughes says. Randy and Elizabeth: A Savage Love Story runs to July 27 at One88 (Venue 23). Sonya Ballantyne is a Cree writer-director whose credits include the Chris Jericho-produced wrestling documentary The Death Tour and writing the Acting Good episode Battle in the Bush.
