BROTHERS FROM A DIFFERENT MOTHER
Pro wrestling tragic, Gold Coaster Wayne Hickson, explores the separated-at-birth connection between the most flamboyant professional wrestler of all time and the president of the United States
MEET the man to blame for the man Donald Trump is today.
This is George Wagner, born in Nebraska in 1915 during the Great War, the son of a house painter and a disabled mum and who would become the world’s most famous loud-mouthed, flamboyant and cartoonish professional wrestler and self-professed “most beautiful man in the world”.
It all started when Wagner read a Vanity Fair magazine article about a wrestler who bestowed upon himself the title of ‘Lord’ Patrick Lansdowne – ostensibly a British aristocrat – who would enter the ring to fight all American boys wearing a velvet robe, accompanied by two valets and the boos and catcalls of the audience.
Wagner was hugely impressed with the bravado and outrageousness of the Lansdowne character and was convinced that he was the man to take the theatre of it all to a much, much higher level.
So, one night in the early 1940s the former carnival sideshow tent grappler morphed to become Gorgeous George – a largerthan-life, full of himself, perfectly coiffured, narcissistic wrestling phenomenon, burdened by his own genius.
He was also the world’s first cowardly baddie who good people paid good money – when good money was tight – to watch him squirm, connive and cheat his way out of trouble when things were not quite going his way in the ring.
And with television in its infancy in the US, and wrestling firmly on the TV networks’ radars as a cheap and easy form of content, the Gorgeous One was destined to become the sport’s first real superstar.
Turning Lord Lansdowne up to 11, Gorgeous George’s schtick was to leave his dressing room to booming orchestral music wearing a homemade bejewelled silk cape – led to the ring by his valet ‘Jeffries’ who would walk down the aisle carrying a silver-plated tray and dropping flower petals at the great man’s boots.
On the tray was a mirror and a silver atomiser filled with perfume-scented disinfectant, allegedly Chanel No.5.
Jeffries would set the tray in one corner of the ring before George would relieve the surprised announcer of his microphone to assure any doubters in the crowd of what a beautiful and perfect specimen of human being he was.
He certainly was not the biggest or the best wrestler God ever put breath into, but by God he knew how to put on a show to help his audience escape their everyday troubles for a few hours at least.
And in developing the Gorgeous George persona, he changed not only his own career but the entire goodie versus baddie narrative of professional wrestling.
If all this sounds familiar, there is a perfectly good reason.
Yes, it was Gorgeous George who gave sage advice to a brash 19-year-old boxer on the rise called Cassius Clay after a chance meeting at a radio station.
Clay took it all very seriously and it was not long before the Louisville Lip was born, just ahead of his famous world championship bout with Sonny Liston.
And no lesser lights than Elvis Presley and James Brown would openly credit Wagner for their hairstyles and capes and that winking, pouting chunk of their onstage personas that drove women crazy.
Gorgeous George also refined the magician’s art of misdirection – mostly behind the referee’s back – at a time when America desperately needed a serious post-war distraction of its own.
Seven decades later with the country floundering from a tragically mishandled pandemic response, Donald Trump, himself an embarrassing WWF Wrestlemania 23 punchline, seems to have taken a stage prompt from the Gorgeous One’s distraction theory playbook, but with a distinct absence of uplift.
In fact, it is just the opposite.
The showman’s bluster, the incessant bragging of being the best at everything, the flaunting of personal riches and the put downs of science, good people, ideas and reason, the embracing of self-serving and risky ways out of tight
fixes – the similarities are far too many to ignore.
Blind Freddie can see Trump’s attraction to a land of storytelling and makebelieve, populated by unhinged characters hurling school yard insults at each other.
So, let us take a moment to hold Gorgeous George’s famous mirror to both men, and wonder aloud what got so hopelessly lost in translation somewhere between the red corner and the Oval Office.
Gorgeous George ruled a world where his opponents were all unworthy and inferior and dumb.
And we’re away… Gorgeous George, as baddies do, claimed he was “robbed” whenever he lost a bout and routinely called for revenge ‘grudge’ matches.
Donald Trump is getting in early by repeatedly calling into question the validity of the result of the yet-to-be-held US election – already angling for a grudge match if he loses. No one expects him to give up the belt without a tantrum and reports this week already have him seriously considering a revenge bout tilt in 2024.
Gorgeous George’s flowing locks of dyed platinum blonde hair became his signature, so much so that he would throw gold-plated ‘Georgie’ pins that he had just taken from his ‘wing wave’ hair into the audiences.
Donald Trump sports similarly famous tresses, and he is adept at throwing things that have touched his hair into adoring audiences at his
rallies, such as his sweaty MAGA caps.
Gorgeous George would enter the ring to the strains of Elgar’s famous Pomp and Circumstance March.
Donald Trump’s coronavirus super spreader mosh pit rallies have become famous for the tunes belted out on his way to and from the stage, which are invariably followed not long after by cease and desist orders filed by the shocked performing artists.
Gorgeous George perfected the wrestler’s art of appearing to be well beaten, before staging a miraculous recovery to pin his opponent when all looked lost.
Gorgeous George and Methuselah would both have struggled with Donald Trump’s “one minute he had it, the next minute he didn’t” coronavirus storyline.
Gorgeous George would blow ‘George kisses’ to the pretty girls in the audience.
“I feel so powerful. I’ll walk into that audience. I’ll walk in there; I’ll kiss everyone in that audience. I’ll kiss the guys, and the beautiful women, and everybody. I’ll just give ya a big, fat kiss.” – this is the recently coronavirus positive and suddenly recovered president of the United States at an October campaign rally in Florida, hardly promoting the ideals of good hygiene.
Gorgeous George pioneered the practice of wrestlers distracting the referee before producing concealed weapons from their trunks or boots to
whack their good guy opponents over the head with while backs are turned.
Donald Trump desperately implores Americans to “look over there” at things like stock market surges that only he can see, as an average of 700 good and honest US citizens die each day from his administration’s serious mishandling of the nation’s COVID-19 pandemic response.
Gorgeous George demanded absolute adoration from his audiences.
Words aren’t even needed here.
Way prior to hand sanitisation becoming our lives, Gorgeous George would have ‘Jeffries’ disinfect the referee’s hands before the wrestlers were padded down for concealed weapons. He is said to have pioneered the cry of “Get your filthy hands off me!”
According to The Independent on Friday, September 18, 2020, and attributed to a former top adviser to US vice president Mike Pence, the known germaphobe Donald Trump once said COVID-19 might be a “good thing” because it would stop him from having to shake hands with “disgusting people”.
Gorgeous George would aggravate audiences by arriving in the ring 10 minutes after his opponents, and then take a few more minutes to make sure his valet had folded his cape neatly and had disinfected
random parts of the ring that looked a bit germy.
Donald Trump NEVER fronted his farcical White House daily coronavirus press briefings on time, ostensibly to aggravate the ‘Fake News’ and put pressure on their reporting deadlines.
Gorgeous George would regularly fill Madison Square Garden on the strength of his name alone, easily setting wrestling box office records for the time.
Donald Trump strenuously denies supporters are paid $12 each to hold MAGA signs and wear MAGA T-shirts at his rallies.
During his career, George probably made close to $2 million, but lost it all to booze and a decent downhill slide in retirement.
Donald Trump didn’t deny at his Miami town hall earlier this month that he owed creditors $400 million, basically implying that sort of money was chump change to a wealthy Scrooge McDuck like him. His idea of retirement is playing golf several times a week and dabbling part time as the leader of the free world.
By all accurate accounts, when the bout was over and the lights had dimmed and he had left the changerooms, Gorgeous George instantly turned back into a normal human being, a wonderful dad and someone who his opponents and friends loved having a beer with…
Okay, this is probably a good place to move on and get about our days.
Gorgeous George demanded absolute adoration from his audiences
THE Queensland 2030 climate target would be scrapped if the LNP wins this election as our State’s emissions rise.
The recent Climate of the Nation report shows that currently four in five Australians agree climate change is occurring. The report shows Australians believe the post-pandemic economic recovery is not a time to further entrench fossil fuels.
The vast majority (83 per cent) want to see coal-fired power stations phased out. And 82 per cent of Australians are worried climate change will result in more bushfires.
Queensland’s emissions are not only the largest in the country, but they are strongly trending upwards.
It is simply irresponsible that
the LNP will scrap both the interim target and the net zero target by 2050 if elected.
IT would have easily been assumed that the standing down of Australia Post CEO Christine Holgate would have included an official letter to her, laying out the reason(s).
This has yet to occur and she is quite within her rights to engage a lawyer to seek out such a letter.
The amount in question is a trifling $20,000.
The federal government wastes more than that every nanosecond.
Do get real, Prime Minister, for sanity’s sake.
VOTERS wanting to support law reform in the area of voluntary assisted dying need to carefully consider their choice for their next state MP.
Party labels are of limited help as any vote on a VAD Bill would be a conscience vote.
The Labor Party’s official policy is to support VAD laws, the LNP’s platform is against VAD, but a conscience vote could see MPs in both parties vote either way.
The Premier has made it clear she will put a VAD Bill before the next Parliament while no such commitment has been made by LNP leader Deb Frecklington.
A conscience vote means nothing if a Bill is not on the table for debate.
Most LNP sitting members and candidates have not expressed a
view on VAD and appear to be trying to accommodate “religious Right” elements who spread all sorts of misinformation about VAD despite clear evidence that Queensland VAD laws are desperately needed, will come with proven safeguards and have 80 per cent community support including strong support among people of faith.
While many Gold Coast people may have already voted, for those who have not I urge them to ensure their next MP is a supporter of their right to have a better end-of-life choice through a legislated system of voluntary assisted dying.