Grad school of hard knocks, continued

by Andrew Weiner

STAGE COACH: "Mean" Mike Hollow (with the Boston Brawler in a headlock) wrestles as both hero and villain. "Wrestling," he says, "is a soap opera."

At the end of a year, students typically "graduate" to the independent wrestling circuit, where they perform at fundraisers, high schools, and small venues like Salisbury Beach. From there, it's a matter of catching a scout's eye. Although three-quarters of IPW students go on to wrestle at the semi-pro level, only a handful actually make the big time. The most successful to date have been the she-Heel Chyna and her off-stage consort Triple H, whose latest story line finds him "married" to WWF heir Stephanie McMahon.

When I finally meet Kowalski, he greets me gruffly with an open palm roughly the size of a hubcap. A stooped posture only slightly diminishes the presence of a 6-foot-7 man who wrestled at 275 pounds. Shuffling past the ring, he stops to correct a student who's body-slamming a dummy. As we sit down to speak, he reaches for a jar of rust-colored liquid, which he tells me is an "herbal Viagra" home-brewed from vinegar, honey, and cayenne pepper.

It's not easy to follow his story, what with the grunts, crashes, and whoops constantly echoing through the building, but he does gain my undivided attention when he offers to put me in a headlock. Having competed since 1950, Kowalski has seen pro wrestling expand from something like regional vaudeville into an international "sports entertainment" empire run by marketing execs who tout brand synergy.

Today wrestling's undisputed success story, the WWF, is a publicly held company valued at more than $1.2 billion. Its events routinely sell out arenas in seconds, and its weekly TV programs are the highest-rated shows on cable. Wrestlers turned memoirists Mankind and the Rock have joined Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura on the bestseller racks, and the WWF recently commemorated its success with the ultimate symbol of cultural hegemony: a theme restaurant cum studio on an acre plot in Times Square.

It's safe to say that stock options were the last thing on Kowalski's mind when he got his start in Windsor, Ontario, in the late 1940s. His pay wasn't much, but it was enough to make him quit his factory job and start barnstorming the independent leagues of the Midwest as Wladek Kowalski (his given name, he says, wasn't "ethnic" enough for a bad guy).

He took enough hazing from veterans to cauliflower both ears, but it wasn't long before Wrestling magazine dubbed him "the roughest hombre in the game." The name Killer, and Kowalski's status as a lifelong Heel, were forever established the night he severed -- yes, actually severed -- Yukon Eric's ear with an errant knee drop. (For years after, fans would throw sow's ears at him whenever he appeared on stage.)

Today, Kowalski commands respect not only as an elder statesman and a WWF Hall of Famer, but also for his presence in the community, where he gives motivational speeches about love and self-respect. As our interview proceeds, students and visitors file past; none is without a wink or an air-punch for the old wrestler. Then two children inch forward to ask for an autograph. He beckons them forward, only to rake the air before them with an ornery snarl. The kids leap back shrieking, both terrified and delighted.

Something like two hours pass, during which time I say maybe 30 words. Each question uncorks a new set of yarns, which tend to begin, "This is a true story." Kowalski tells me that he's feared on three continents. He tells me how he learned interview skills by shouting down talk-show hosts on his car radio. He tells me how he became a devout vegetarian after reading about Roger Bannister, the first man to run a four-minute mile. He tells me how, as a newborn, he punched his mother's obstetrician in the face, and how his villainy so enraged fans that he was actually stabbed on two occasions.

The one question I make sure not to ask is the obvious one, the one using the four-letter word that rhymes with "cake." This isn't for fear of being clouted, though I'm sure Kowalski could trephine me with a finger if he wanted to. It's not because the whole reason wrestling has blown up in recent years is that its redefinition as "sports entertainment" allowed it to celebrate its own implausibility. The reason I don't ask the question is that it doesn't mean anything, and it shouldn't.

The autograph-seeking kids might have known Kowalski was playing make-believe with them, but that didn't make them any less scared. And though it's true what they say -- the outcome of every match is predetermined -- those 300-pound men, their tights, and the bruises they take home are all real. But most of all, the wanna-be wrestlers are competing in a very real sense as they vie for success and celebrity.

When Jimmy Cash told me, "This is the biggest competition of your life," his voice cracked. And he wasn't faking that.

Page | 1 | 2

Andrew Weiner still has a Hacksaw Jim Duggan foam two-by-four somewhere in his basement. His e-mail address is weimar99@yahoo.com.