411’s Dark Side of The Ring Report: ‘The Many Faces of Luna Vachon’

-Back again with the latest from Dark Side of The Ring. This week it’s all about Luna Vachon. My first memories of seeing or hearing of Luna was when she debuted for the WWE at WrestleMania IX. This should be an interesting one. Let’s get to it!

-As a reminder, Chris Jericho is the narrator for this season.

-Some of the notable talking heads from the opening: Mick Foley, Medusa, Luna’s son, and Gangrel. They touch on her mental health and substance abuse problems while fighting her way through a male dominated business.

-UWF 1991: Luna Vachon is cutting a promo with The Black Hearts. We meet her son, Van Hurd, who tells us he always thought wrestling was real. His mom has always been Luna to him. He only remembers the mohawk, bleached hair and she would show up to his elementary school with a snake. He was embarrassed, but that was his normal life and he laughs as he says “that was my mom.”

-David Heath (Gangrel) mentions he doesn’t know of anything that Luna loved more than pro-wrestling. He is also the former husband of Luna. We get some Gangrel WWF footage. The first time he met Luna was at a Florida show and he was terrified of her. They became friends and stated they were such good friends they would never date each other and then one day they crossed that line.

-Van mentions his mom’s real name is Gertrude and her dad and uncles were hated pro-wrestlers. Mick Foley next as he mentions The Vachons were royalty in Canada wrestling. He goes through the family: Uncle Mad Dog Vachon, Aunt Vivian Vachon, and her Dad, Paul “Butcher” Vachon. “All of the Vachons were odd in a beautiful kind of way.”

-Oh man, they have The Butcher here and he looks rough, but he is still alive and with us. Dec 18, 1966 Butcher was wrestling in Atlanta and heard a gun shot outside his hotel room. He went back to sleep and the next morning a knock on the door and a woman tells him that the owner of the motel shot himself. She was his wife and she had a 4 year old daughter, who became Butcher’s daughter because he married the widow. Huh, I never heard that story.

-Luna talks about growing up on the road and all she wanted to do was be like her Aunt Vivian. Jeannine Mjoseth is next and she is pro-wrestler, Mad Maxine. She mentions the family tried to talk Luna out of becoming a wrestler, but she was dead set on doing it. Maxine gives a brief history of what got her into the business. She went out and got a mohawk and thinks Moolah saw money in her look. She puts over that you had to go train with Moolah and that is where she met Luna. It seems Luna had a sweet babyface and would get angry when people told her she should be a babyface. Maxine buries Moolah for taking advantage of the under age girls and Gangrel backs that up by saying Moolah was one of the few people Luna was afraid of. He has heard stories of Moolah telling Luna she was sleeping with her tonight. Maxine tells us that Luna was sent by Moolah to a get out West to get photographs. Luna just trusted her and the guy tried to rape her, but she was able to fight him off. She was sixteen at the time. They stayed with Moolah though as she was the only game in town and you had to train there if you wanted any chance in the business.

-Kim Sacks (Penelope Paradise) tells us that everyone has a Moolah story. She tells us that Luna wanted to be like Hulk Hogan. Real quick and just an observation, but this is the 3rd straight episode where Hogan gets name dropped by someone as the standard of what people wanted to be in wrestling. No real point I am trying to make, it just shows again that most people think Hulk Hogan when they think of making it as a pro-wrestler.

-Luna leaves Moolah and heads to Florida where Kevin Sullivan and his Army of Darkness are terrifying people. They worked in front of the same fans all the time so they used emotion and dark characters to get people upset. Tampa was scared to death of Kevin as fans thought he was really passing curses on people.

-Luna makes her debut as a “reporter” and Kevin hits her and turns her into a Lunatic or Luna as it were. She shaved her head as in the story she stripped herself of vanity for Sullivan. She carried on the gimmick at all times and that includes taking part in all the excesses of the 80s. “It snowed everyday in Miami.” Luna pushed every boundary and would take up to 100 pills a day. She tried to show that everything was all roses, but people knew it wasn’t. Gangrel brings up inappropriate family relations and it seems Luna was abused by her Aunt. He wasn’t there to see it, but he believes something happened. Butcher doesn’t think it happened and doesn’t believe it.

-Commercials!

-Luna’s crazy antics captivate audiences, but fans didn’t know she was diagnosed with being bipolar and anxiety disorders from a very young age. She would change her personality at the drop of the hat. It seems in her day to day live she was “Angel,” and then when angered she would switch into “Luna.” Penelope mentions they were in Tampa sharing a room and Luna snapped which lead to a fight between the two. Lamps were being tossed around and then they had to go wrestle each other that night.

-Dirty Dick Slater next as Van says that was his first step-dad and heard the stories that Slater beat his mom, but he never saw them fight. Penelope says the same, but she would see Luna with bruises after the fact.

-Next Gangrel talks about being one of The Black Hearts and he wanted nothing to do with Luna, but she ended up being put with them. On a road trip she started hitting Gangrel asking him why he didn’t like her. In a sign of true love, she bites Gangrel in the middle of the back during a training session and he held her up against a tree in anger, but was told to back off as it was Dick Slater’s wife. He mentions before the scar healed they became best friends. The other Black Heart, Tom Nash, loved Luna and they ended up married. Van: “Tom Nash and my mom were married. Tom used to go to work and Dave used to show up. That is some shady shit right there.” Tom and Dave got into a fist fight and Gangrel mentions he puked the next day over what happened. A note on the screen lets us know that Tom Nash disputes the description of the altercation.

-Gangrel calls her a wild flower that was misunderstood. They ended up getting married on Halloween and instead of rings they got vampire marks tattooed on their necks. Gangrel also has a picture of Luna tattooed on his drinking arm to remind him not to drink too much.

-Their goal was to get to the WWF and Luna gets their first. She debuts at WrestleMania IX with Shawn Michaels and immediately gets put into an angle with Sherri. Van was blown away seeing this as a kid and mentions his mom made it. He notes she was the first female in a video game (WWF RAW and I have that game for my SNES). They bought a console just so they could play the game.

-Commercials!

-Van would see her maybe 1-2 times a year because she was grinding on the road, so he stayed with his grandma. The women talk about how you either had kids later in your career or didn’t have them. She didn’t talk about her kids most and a lot of the women didn’t even know she had kids.

-Luna gets paired with Bam Bam Bigelow, but doesn’t get to showcase her wrestling skills. Foley mentions there wasn’t much in terms of wrestling for women in not only the WWE, but all of North America. Debrah Miceli (Madusa) mentions they only had 5-7 girls on the roster to wrestle and you can’t really do anything with that. She mentions it was a men’s committee circle jerking about what to do with the women. 90% of the guys were perfect gentleman, but you always had those few. Medusa told Luna she was going to drop the belt to her in Canada and if she got fired she didn’t care. Luna lost it crying and told Medusa she wouldn’t let her get fired over something like that. Medusa stayed down for the cover, but Luna pulled her up and wouldn’t let it happen.

-Luna formed a friendship with Sherri and Gangrel mentions they were thick as thieves. It seems Luna would be out cold for three days and it was from taking pills with Sherri. The mental issues and substance abuse kept her from getting hire on the card. The WWF had her go to rehab for drinking and they fired her saying it was for her own good. Van says he learned “don’t do drugs…for real.” Medusa feels she got into the drugs because she just wanted to get lost. Van mentions she tried to kill herself many times and if you looked at her wrists, there are scars. “Why would you do that?”

-Commercials!

-After getting fired by WWF, she ends up heading to ECW thanks to her friend, Nancy Sullivan (Woman). She was a natural fit in ECW because Luna could fight the guys and be believable. Van calls her The Queen of Extreme as she was in her element. She had a cage match with Stevie Richards and got the win. Foley loved teaming with her and reiterates that she could hold her own with anyone including the men.

-Luna rejoins the WWF as part of The Attitude Era. She is again just a side show as she is paired with Goldust. She clashes with The WWF’s new approach to women in wrestling and is annoyed they want her losing to someone like Sable. Luna audio speaking of Sable: “She said “I don’t have to take bumps because Vince has told me I am going to be the Women’s Champion,” The way my psyche felt at that point, knowing the dues I had paid. How my family had stopped talking to me because I wanted to be a lady in this business. My children were growing up without me. I was growing up without them. All for wrestling. It tore me apart.” Penelope mentions Sable was non a wrestler, but was a beautiful woman and probably still is, but she doesn’t know.

-At WrestleMania XIV Luna does the job and makes Sable look good in the mixed tag match. Luna again, “I was told by Vince if I bruised or scratched her, I would be fired.” Mick mentions that when you work with someone new in the business and you are a veteran they are saying they trust you to take care of things. Gangrel says that after the match Vince and company were clapping for Sable and looking right past Luna. Mick tried talking to her and she broke down as she felt nobody appreciated what she did. It hurt her that she wasn’t noticed for what she did in that match. Sunny tried to console her and Luna wanted nothing to do with her and put her on a production box, but promised she wasn’t punching her in the face as she knew they would fire her for it.

-They discuss mental illness and how nobody ever spoke of it. People just saw it and would move on.

-Commercials!

-The Attitude Era is all about treating their women as sex objects and Medusa is shocked Luna put up with any of it as she is old school like her. Gangrel informs us that they wanted her to take her top off and she bitched at them for wanting her to be ugly for years. She stood up to them and after several incidents and weird behavior she is released from the WWF for the final time. Luna audio again as he talks about caring so much about the business and says at one point she would have taken a bullet or been hit by a train for Vince.

-Now more drugs as she did a bunch of cocaine that spelled out “FUCK VINCE.” Gangrel says her drug use is what drove them apart. Medusa says Gangrel was smart enough to get out otherwise they would both be dead. He admits he ran away to California and got married which wasn’t the right thing to do.

-Luna was trying to be normal and became a waitress. She shows up to Penelope’s house with a gun and is ranting. She got the gun from her and to this day has no clue what the issue was. Penelope had kids and told Luna she couldn’t come around like this.

-Mick talks about the power of being in control when in a ring and then not feeling that when it is taken away from you. He doesn’t think Luna ever found that thing to replace wrestling. Van says he was in Texas and his mom was in Florida, so they didn’t talk much. She never even met his daughter as he thinks she didn’t think she was good enough. “That’s that mental illness.”

-Commercials!

-Next week it’s XPW. Oh boy! New Jack!

-Mick mentions he talked to Luna one final time a few weeks before she left us and she told him she was in a good place. Van got the call from his grandma that his mom had passed away. He heard she choked, but also heard it was an accidental overdose and he doesn’t care. “She is not here anymore and that sucks.”

-Aug 27, 2010: Luna passes! The Butcher mentions nobody survives this world. Medusa believes there could have been a lot of help for a lot of talent in this business and they need to do better. Mick tells us that he adored her and wants to read part of his eulogy. He reads a bit of it and you can tell it is crushing him. “Maybe Luna was perfect just as she was. Maybe she was exactly who she was supposed to be.” Gangrel mentions her believe green eyes and nobody ever saw Angel or Trudy. He loves her and knows they were self destructive. He feels like he wasn’t there to take care of her, but knew they would both end up in a dark place and he is sorry for being selfish.

-Penelope is sad there was never a funeral. She knows Luna would have wanted her casket being pulled by Harleys with fireworks going off. Van says she wouldn’t have wanted that as she would want is to be left alone.

-Luna audio to close as she wishes she would have changed things for women more. She regrets missing out on time with her family and she didn’t get what she wanted the most, the WWF Women’s Title, which wasn’t what she thought it would be.

-Mick mentions Luna would be happy to see how far women’s wrestling has come and she would love the physicality of today’s matches. Penelope cuts a Luna promo telling us that she would be pissed they waited until she was dead to do this show about her.

-As usual a strong show with a lot of great stuff from the talking heads. Another cautionary tale and another case of mental issues being ignored or seen as weakness which hopefully people are starting to wake up to. Luna was ahead of her time and Mick mentioned would do well with today’s crop of women. Gangrel was very open and honest here and Luna’s son Van was a needed voice. Foley and Medusa added a lot as well and I am sure there will be more debate about the can of worms about Moolah and what she did or didn’t do being opened again. There was no outright smearing of the WWE here as they did mention Luna was having drug and alcohol issues when she was fired the first time and whether right or wrong, Luna didn’t fit in what they wanted out of their women in the Attitude Era other then being used as a heel to get Sable over. While I understand Luna’s frustration for all the work she put it, the crowds were also going insane for Sable and given her looks, there was no way Vince wasn’t going to push her to the moon. The ending was sad as you would expect anytime someone loses a mother, daughter, or friend. It always sucks when someone seems to come to peace with their demons on the surface, but then either slip or hide it. Another strong show from this series and it was a story that I am glad was told. Thanks for reading!