Down With The Brown: WWF’s Explosive TNT Show (1986)

Those of you who sat and watched RAW a few weeks missed out if you had Cinemax or at least the Cinemax package as while Shane McMahon got his gonads baked, a real drama was on. A film that is WAY better than it had any right to be: 1985’s Runaway Train. Granted, the film is a little outdated, and I admit, it’s hard to recommended a film starring Eric Roberts (aside from Star 80), but if you haven’t seen this movie, DO SO. An action film with a brain, and a final shot that will stay with you for years to come.

And yes, I know Kurosawa wrote it.

Well, now it’s time for the Coliseum title that nobody asked for: a retrospective of Tuesday Night Titans, aka the wrestling talk show. For two years and some change, Vince McMahon presided over an hour of WWF promos and “comedy.” Some of it good, some of it beyond bad. This tape promises the best. I’ll be the judge.

Here we go:

Fuji Vice

I think I can promise you now, this will be the highlight. Don Muraco and Mr. Fuji spent several weeks on TNT showing off their acting skills. Many have called this their finest hour. A takeoff of Miami Vice called Fuji Vice. The premise: A dead body is found by some kids playing volleyball. Don Muraco plays the Don Johnson character and Mr. Fuji plays Phillip Micheal Thomas. The opening credits show the two mugging for the camera.

The dead man’s sister identifies the body and Muraco and Fuji hit the scene wearing 80’s threads (though Fuji keeps the bowler on). Muraco’s acting is terribly stilted while Fuji looks DIRECTLY into the camera most of the time.

Basically the case gets solved in about thirty seconds with the sister offering to bed Muraco after he’s done. That gets a thumb up from Fuji. The sister who hasn’t seen her bro in years, somehow knows what he was doing in his final hours. But it leads to a man named the Seahawk.

It’s off to see Matty the Mouth, their informant. Then other informants, who are just homeless guys on the street.
They arrive at a boat, featuring one of the least attractive “hotties” you’ll see. Muraco shows up with a quarter million to invest for the Seahawk. But it turns out,

SPOILER ALERT

The Seahawk is the SISTER!!!!! Which is less than shocking considering she’s the only other character in the entire show. Muraco and Fuji get tied to the boat. Loosely tied. But the cops come and arrest the Seahawk. Meanwhile Muraco and Fuji remain tied up.

The End.

Seriously, the writing is no worse than the Kane angle. It got wrapped up a lot quicker too.

Bobby Heenan gets interviewed with a kid with a pet weasel.

The idea is to show how much the weasel is like Heenan. Heenan’s not appreciative: “What grade you in, kid? “Seventh.” “You wanna live to see the eighth?” Sadly, THAT’S the highlight as even Heenan can’t save this segment.

The Funk Barbeque

Well, this is probably what Jimmy Jack Funk is most famous for. Jimmy Hart invites McMahon and Alfred Hayes to the Double Cross Ranch for a BBQ. Dory arrives late. (Excuse me, “Hoss.”) Jimmy Jack has five horses: “One for every day of the week!” McMahon talks about Terry Funk who had already left the WWF at this point, and this was one of the few times a man left the WWF yet was still mentioned on TV. McMahon leaves for an interview leaving Hayes all alone. Hart offers Hayes a sandwich but he gets offended when Jimmy Jack eats the sandwich himself. So Jimmy Jack pours the BBQ sauce on Hayes head, then hangs him from a tree. If this aired today, Hayes would have a match at Unforgiven with Jimmy Jack, and he’d no doubt beat him too.

Baking Christmas Cookies with Lou Albano

Well, we just had food throwing. Kinda curious what they do with this. Albano suggests not smoking cigars while you cook. George Steele comes out from the back to help. Albano seems a tad, oh, what’s the word…..blotto. Albano mixes random amounts of eggs, flour, sugar, and green food coloring. McMahon tells Albano that they’re running short on time. Albano says okay, and he dumps the contents on Hayes’ head. Wow, the same joke, two segments in a row. Can’t you see why TNT was so loved?

This is Your Life, Nikolai Volkoff

Volkoff’s mad because he was hoping to play The Dating Game instead. And Volkoff’s wearing the red pinstripe suit. (One of the few classic WWF bits. From 1985-1995, Volkoff ALWAYS wore the same damn suit.)

Mystery guest #1 is Fred Blassie. Volkoff “can’t believe it.” I don’t see how, he’s his freakin’ manager. Blassie calls Volkoff an Olympic gold medalist. Vince: “Which one?” Blassie: “It doesn’t matter. He DID!”

Mystery guest #2 is Nikolai’s sister, Olga. Volkoff can’t even remember her name. Olga boasts of Nikolai’s performance in Peter and the Wolf. “You’ll never guess who he played? The CAT!!!!” Then Olga does the fastest heel turn in history as she threatens to beat Nikolai up, and even worse, she trashes his suit.

And to keep with tradition, Fred Blassie returns and hits Alfred Hayes with a pie just for the hell of it.

Not really.

Adrian Adonis gets a facial

Adrian: “Vince, I have to tell you. You make the sun shine brighter than Doris Day!” Words can’t describe this segment.

Magnificent Muraco gets a massage

This is off Wrestlenet’s Greatest Interviews. Muraco totally loses it as two women rub oil all over him. Fuji basically squirts the entire bottle on him.

Baffle the Brain

Hayes challenges Heenan to a trivia quiz: (and just for fun, answers appear at the end of the column)

#1 The I-C title changed hands once in 1985. What city and who won the title?

#2 Lou Albano is a fomer tag champion. Who was his partner and what were they called?

#3 Fred Blassie only managed one Heavyweight champion. Who was he and who beat him?

#4 Who was the first man to win all three WWF titles?
#5 Name two managers on the inside cover of The Wrestling Album.

(Hint: Heenan gets #5 wrong.) The crowd applauds for Heenan’s answers. Vince: “Well, some applause, but not a whole lot.” Heenan: “Well, there’s not a whole lot of audience here.”

Roddy Piper & Bob Orton

Piper takes a WWF jigsaw puzzle of Hulk Hogan and dumps all the pieces on the floor. “Looks like Hogan after the last time I wrestled him.” Vince shows some photos of Uncle Elmer on his honeymoon. Vince points out one of Elmer eating an ice cream cone. Piper: “Pfft, well, yeah.”

Clip of SNME feturing Piper, Orton, and Ventura beating The Hillbillies. I’ll save you a play-by-play, but when we go back to the set, the crowd is pretty favored towards Piper.

Vince: “Wasn’t that a cheap victory?”
Piper: “Uh, no. I got paid three times more than they did.”

Piper looks totally gone in this one. He can barely keep his eyes open and his voice is extremely raspy. Piper finishes with a lowblow on Vince: “I like your hair now. Now that it’s stopped receding.”

Muraco on Acting

Wow, three Muraco segments. Thankfully, the WWF knew what great mic skills the Magnificent one had, so here’s more from his venture into becoming an actor. Muraco (to Vince): “What you know about acting, what you know about talent……you could fit into Andre the Giant’s brain.” The totally confused look on Vince’s face seals the deal.

-Clip of Fuji General, the entire bit is reviewed on Best of the WWF Vol. 5.

-Clip of Fuji Bandito, where Muraco plays a cowboy, and Moolah is his lady love. Moolah gets shot and takes a pretty good bump as a result. Muraco kills the marshall, prompting an Indian to proclaim: “Big mess.” MUCH funnier than it sounds.

-Clip of Fuji Chan. Fuji actually gets to play the lead appropriately. Too short to really comment on.

Vince calls it the worst piece of acting either. A fan heckles Muraco calling his acting as good as his wrestling. I’m sure security kindly beat the guy up later. Muraco says he’s as good as Redford, it’s just so good, your brain can’t comprehend it. Hey, that’s one of my lines.

Muraco gets an Agent

ANOTHER Muraco piece. Fuji belts out this classic: “Confucious say ‘Man who patient while fishing will catch more fish until he catch the right agent!” Muraco is fighting to keep from smirking. He just nods. They get inside the office and the agent trashes their work. “You’ll never make it in Hollywood. You’d never make it in Cleveland.”

Muraco and Fuji fail at every big studio, so they make their way to CBS Studios where Hulk Hogan is taping his cartoon show. Muraco and Fuji talk their way into a segment which consists of Muraco being given a book about bad acting. Pretty bad.

The real irony is that Muraco really IS a bad actor, so these segments where Muraco is in the “real” world play off just as bad because he’s not even believable playing himself.

A Piper Christmas Carol

Vince: What does Christmas mean to you?

Piper: It’s spoiled little brats getting gifts for free.

We cut to a short film of Piper playing the role of Scrooge. He gets visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past. He shows Piper video of him beating up people as a kid. Piper: “How did you get video of THAT?”

The Ghost of Christmas Present is next. Piper: You’re from Haight / Ashbury, aren’t you? More video of his employees unhappy who couldn’t wrap their presents because they couldn’t afford Scotch tape. That’s so stupid, it’s clever.

The Ghost of Christmas Future is next, a man dressed in black with a hood. The Future shows a grave with no flowers on it. The hood gets lifted and…………………….

“IT WAS ME, PIPER!!!!! IT WAS ME ALL ALONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

I’m sorry, it was too easy. Piper chases the ghost away and Piper gives th impression that he’s wearing only a bedsheet. And that’s it. Piper’s ad-libbing is funny, but the premise just isn’t.

The Mating Game with The Hart Foundation

I read an article suggesting that Bret Hart wore sunglasses because he looked too nervous in hispromos without one. Take what you will from that, though I find it a little hard to believe. Here the Harts and Jimmy Hart play The Dating Game bachelors competing for a chick that is just not that attractive. Maybe if she waxed the eyebrows. Vince is sporting a terrific peach suit.

Question #1: How do you know when it’s proper to kiss a girl?

Jimmy Hart answers with AC/DC lyrics unintentionally. Bret Hart says he can last all night long. Neidhart likens his lovemaking to Chernobyl. Bret says he can lick his eyebrows with his tongue. Bret is vibing some Y2J body language, it’s pretty funny. You haven’t lived until you’ve heard Bret Hart say “I’m gonna ravish your body” with no emotion at all. The bachelorette picks none of them saying they’re all morons. So Vince pulls out a back-up woman. And since Mae Young wasn’t under contract yet, we get a rather homely chick with an afro and a mole. She picks Neidhart and he tries to leave.

End of tape.

Yikes.

Even what SHOULD have been funny really wasn’t all that great. The Muraco stuff’s okay, but it all just has that “school assembly funny” feel to it. You know, when you’d go to assemblies in high school, and the student council would perform stuff only THEY found funny. This tape REEKS of that.

And that’s not to say TNT didn’t have its moments because they did. It’s just the funny ones are on the Bloopers, Bleeps, and Bodyslams one. They certainly aren’t here. There are bits and pieces of funny but not enough for me to warrant a positive rating.

Thumbs down, not recommended, C-.

-Sydney Brown

Answers to Bobby Heenan Trivia:

1. Baltimore, Tito Santana beat Greg Valentine.

2. Tony Altimore & The Sicilians(I’ll admit, I didn’t know that either.)

3. The Iron Sheik and Hulk Hogan beat him.

4. Pedro Morales

5. Jimmy Hart & Lou Albano