The Trademark Rants – The Brutus Beefcake Theorem

Hello again, wrestling fans, and welcome to The Trademark Rants. With WrestleMania now behind us, I guess I could talk about the future of John Cena, or maybe even rant about WWE may be going backwards with Mickie James’ character development (the LOGICAL step for Mickie after Trish’s “betrayal” is NOT to BECOME TRISH!!!! I wish the WWE Writers would actually RESEARCH Obsessive Personality Disorders and Celebrity Stalkers before they try to book them! Jeez! Mickie’s identity now needs to be centered on holding and retaining the Women’s Title, because without that, her entire self-image will be shattered. Her sexual confusion is also at the center of her derangement, so the WWE should exploit that at any and all given times. Yes, it’s actually THAT F*CKED UP, people! And, while you’re at it, read The Catcher In The Rye, too. Mickie should be carrying around a copy of that book, so just get it off of her if you can’t get it elsewhere. That is, if the WWE did their homework, instead of just watching Single White Female and ripping off the plot for her character), but unfortunately, I can’t get an entire column out of those subjects. At least, not yet. Mickie’s situation may be addressed in a couple weeks, when I get everything organized.

No, actually, I was FINALLY going to do “The Brutus Beefcake Theorem” (I’ve been meaning to write it up for weeks now, thus, the multiple Beefcake references lately). But, in the process, we had an AWESOME WrestleMania (personal opinion), and I decided to write up a review of that, which you can find on my MySpace Site at www.MySpace.com/MikeJohnsUSAW. I’m going to start adding more exclusive content to that site, so be sure to check it out. I’ll be posting some stories about my life and so-called career, as well as random stuff that just wouldn’t work for this column. People always whine about how I don’t write enough “positive” columns, so you better get over to www.MySpace.com/MikeJohnsUSAW when you’re done with this, because you might lose your one good opportunity to see me actually COMPLIMENT the likes of JBL and Triple H in a wrestling column.

And now, Brother Bruti…

In an attempt to have some sort of ACCURATE view of Edward Leslie’s career< I actually went to the trouble of looking up our favorite Barber (Note: I am NOT writing this with a straight face, by the way) on Wikipedia.org. Since Ed’s career beyond WWE was, at best, forgettable, I figured I could use the help. Unfortunately, Wikipedia uncovered yet another Leslie Fact that I never knew until now – Brutus was once billed as Hulk Hogan’s “Brother”, Dizzy (or, to go back even further, Ed Boulder, back when Hulk was simply known as Terry). Oh, jeez! Like I didn’t have enough ammo to begin with!

Dizzy Hogan. Hmmm…. I guess the cocaine abuse started early for Ed, didn’t it? Oh, you knew THAT was coming!

Anyway, Dizzy finally made his way to the World Wrestling Federation in 1985, where he was renamed “Brutus Beefcake” and given a Chippendale’s gimmick. Or, at least, that’s what it looks like to me. Brutus enjoyed some minor success as a midcard heel, while his former “brother” Terry became the biggest star in the history of professional wrestling. I guess you could say Ed was jealous, and, for whatever reason, thought it was a good idea to team with Greg “The Hammer” Valentine who now claims to be the reason MSG started selling out in the early 80’s. Yeah, sure, Greg. I could have sworn that was some OTHER blonde guy, but who am I to argue with “The Hammer”?

So, Greg Valentine and Brutus Beefcake, out of what appears to be mutual jealously over Hulk Hogan’s success, join forces and become the “Dream Team”. This also marks the first, last, and only time you will EVER hear me, Mike Johns, refer to Brutus Beefcake, in any way, as “cool”. Greg Valentine, despite his delusions of grandeur, actually was a damn good wrestler, and he worked very well with Beefcake. A testament to their work can be seen at WrestleMania 2, where the Dream Team dropped the WWF Tag Titles to what would become the Greatest Team in WWF History (According to WWF Magazine circa 1996, anyway), The British Bulldogs. As I have noted before, this was the match that pretty much saved WrestleMania 2 from being a complete waste of time. That, and seeing the Fabulous Moolah damn near kill Velvet McIntyre in under three minutes was pretty damn cool, but that was something I talked about in a column months ago, which you can read here!

After losing the only WWF Title he would ever hold, The Hammer and The Beefster continued to team for about another year or so, and had yet another strong showing at WrestleMania III against the Rougeau Brothers. With two good showings at WrestleMania, one putting over what would become the Greatest Team in WWF History (according to WWF Magazine circa 1996), and another against the Rougeaus, you would think the Dream Team would have had a rather lucrative future as a team. You would also have been severely wrong. See, earlier in the day, Beefcacke made up with his former “brother” Hulk, after years of bitterness and jealously towards him. Hulk then promised his former tag partner that he’d use his clout with Vince McMahon to get Brutus a singles push. Thus, why the Dream Team broke up after their match with the Rougeaus. The Hammer hooked up with Dino Bravo (who turned out to be one of the most disappointing talents ever to grace the WWE, right up there with Nathan Jones and Tyson Tomko), claiming that Brutus no longer shared his Anti-Hogan Visions, while The Beefster became a Barber.

Okay, let’s rewind here. Brutus Beefcake, whose gimmick was that of, well, a beefcake, then became a barber at WrestleMania III. It turns out that Brutus, when he wasn’t working for WWE, was going to Barber College. Who knew? Hogan found out about this and told Vince, who then thought that a Wrestling Barber would be an interesting character. Pat Patterson then reminded Vince McMahon that there already was a Wrestling Barber in one of the competing territories (I guess Jim Crockett’s Mid-Atlantic had one, but I’m not entirely sure about that). Hogan then suggested that maybe, they should just combine the barber gimmick with Brutus’ current beefcake gimmick. Vince thought it was brilliant, and decided to go with that.

Now, you would think that if a man with one gimmick could get over, a man with TWO gimmicks would be a guaranteed money maker. You’d also be wrong. Not only was Brutus NOT making money, but Brutus couldn’t pay people to care about him. Hell, TED DIBIASE couldn’t have paid people to care about Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake, and Ted claims that he can find a price for anyone. Vince was going nuts, but Hogan, being the ever-loyal friend, kept going to bat for the Barber and insisted that Ed Leslie was a future superstar in the making. Vince believed him. Keep in mind, this was about the time the WWE was pushing The Ultimate Warrior to the moon, and turned the One Man Gang into a black man named Akeem. Drugs were definitely involved here.

So, here I am, circa 1989 now, watching the WWF on a regular basis, and seeing this complete dumbass named Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake on my TV every week. Even at 8 years old, I knew this guy sucked. He would come out to the ring with hedge clippers and cut all the jobbers’ hair, and afterwards, I would wonder why anyone would pay this idiot to cut their hair. Yet, I can look back at WrestleMania IV and see Bob Uecker (God Bless him) actually say, publicly, that Brutus was his barber. Wow. This goes to show you that Bob Uecker ought to be in the WWE Hall of Fame. Anyway, at 8 years old, at a time in my life where I began to realize that I was more into the bad guys than the good guys (when I was getting sick of Hogan and embracing the Macho Man going into WrestleMania V), I would see the Barber and immediately return to a match between my Paul Orndorff figure and my JYD figure, where Roddy Piper did a run-in. In MY world, Roddy Piper never retired or turned face. He was always cool, unlike Brutus.

I never liked Brutus. Even now, it’s hard for me to like him. I’ll say that his work with Greg Valentine was pretty cool, and I’ll even give him credit for carrying David Sammartino (David was pretty much the WWF’s version of Greg Gagne). Honestly, looking at him now, I could see the potential Ed Leslie actually had. At the same time, I can see him as The Barber and still wonder how this guy ever got a push, let alone TV time. The Barber was just lame. I don’t know how else to say it. It was just lame. It was lame when I was a kid, and I was a kid in the 80’s, people! We had Michael Jackson, and M.A.S.K. and the Fake Ghostbusters, and the Jayce & The Wheeled Warriors… my God! What were people smoking when they came up with that crap! We even had Teddy freakin’ Ruxpin for crying out loud! There is NO WAY the Transformers can possibly make up for all of the crap that came out for kids in the 1980’s. So, for me, a kid of the 1980’s, to say that I found something to be lame as a kid, now that’s saying something. And people, believe me, nothing was lamer in the 80’s than Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake! Not even Starship’s “We Built This City”.

And, just to add to the utter lame-osity of the Barber gimmick, the WWF even came up with what may be, by far, one of the dumbest entrance themes for a wrestler ever. At first, it lulls you in by sounding kinda cool. The opening drums, while sounding like they came from a cheap Casio Keyboard you could find at any garage sale nowadays, was pretty interesting, considering that in 1989, that was the most the WWF could afford as far as instrumentation was concerned. Then, the bass line that would inadvertently inspire the Seinfeld theme pops in. Still going good, for a midcarder theme in 1989, anyway. And then, the Casio goes into high gear, and all the utter lameness of 1980’s pop music is instantaneously thrown into the mix. The Casio Horns and the Handclaps and the Bells and the Whistles and… you get the idea. Even now, I have nightmares about that theme playing in arenas all around the country, followed by the entrance of Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake, hedge clippers and all.

But, the thing that made Brutus the lamest person in the universe wasn’t his gimmick, or his other gimmick, or the hedge clippers, or the tacky outfits, or the mullet, or even that horrible, horrible music that continues to be the fuel of my nightmares. It was the constant ass-kissing. See, sometime after the WWF realized that two gimmicks weren’t enough to get Brutus over, they concocted a third gimmick – “Hulk Hogan’s Best Friend” – and gave it to, who else, Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake! Surely THREE gimmicks could get him over! Nope. All it did was turn an utterly lame wrestler into an utterly lame wrestler who kissed Hulk Hogan’s ass on a regular basis. I’m assuming that Brutus was supposed to be the Robin to Hulk’s Batman, a character that kids can relate to and fantasize themselves being, teaming with their hero, Hulk Hogan. It didn’t quite work out that way, though. In reality, Brutus was just lame, and kids wanted nothing to do with him. I know I didn’t. I wanted the Macho Man to kill him, but that’s just me. All the other kids I know wanted the Ultimate Warrior to kill him. Either way, the only thing we wanted was Brutus gone.

Then, one day, he was. Brutus just disappeared. And, the best part? No one missed him! Not the fans, and certainly not me. I just noticed one day that Brutus was gone. I didn’t care. I was at the point where the Ultimate Warrior was getting my attention, so it really didn’t matter. I want to believe that I didn’t fall for the bullsh*t that was the Warrior, but at 9 years old, I doubt I was smart enough to see through the marketing yet, so I probably loved the idiot. He wasn’t the Macho Man, but by this point, Randy was with Sherri and calling himself a king. I think I lost the connection to him. I really don’t remember.

Unfortunately, Ed didn’t stay gone forever. He came back, and was just as lame as ever. Just now, he wasn’t wrestling. No, it was even worse. He was given Piper’s Pit. SACRILEGE!!! He renamed the Pit “The Barber Shop” and started doing his own interviews! Dammit! Where’s Roddy Piper when you need him?! Oh, he’s doing commentary. I think I remember why I stopped watching wrestling after my parents divorced in 1992 now. Damn you, Brutus Beefcake!

Thanks to old tapes, the Internet, and some good friends, I am now able to piece together the things I missed. For one, Ed got in a bad parasailing accident and broke his face. Allegedly, Bruti was helping a friend prepare for takeoff when the driver of the boat mistakenly took a cue to take off, sending the friend’s knees directly into his face. Brutus’ face had to be surgically repaired with metal plates and screws, and this was apparenlty why the Barber disappeared. I find it hard to believe drugs weren’t involved here, but I guess they weren’t. So the joke I made in The Ultimate Warrior Theorum II (which you can read here) about Ed breaking his face on a water-ski while trying to snort coke off of it was not only in bad taste (and I care because…?), but it was also horribly inacurate. And, the best part? NO ONE on the Internet called me on it! That goes to show just how much anyone cares about Brutus Beefcake, even now, 20 years after the height of his so-called “success”. That’s really sad.

Okay, so parasailing accident, metal plates in his face… you know, at some point, I’m probably going to say something about magnets, right? Yeah, but Bobby Heenan beat me to it in 1992, proving that Heenan may just be one of the coolest people on the planet. And with this, the WWF gave ol’ Dizzy a fourth gimmick – the Man with the Metal Face. So, let’s recap here – Brutus Beefcake was a wrestling beefcake who worked part-time as a barber, was best friends with Hulk Hogan, and he had a metal face you could stick magnets to, and he STILL couldn’t get over! Jesus Tap-Dancing Christ! What do you have to do to get this man to draw money?!

Simple – Team him up with Hogan, which is exactly what the WWF did. As the “Mega-Maniacs”, Hogan and Beefcake teamed up against Money Inc. (Ted DiBiase and “Irwin R. Schister” Mike Rotundo), the WWF Tag Team Champions, for a match at WrestleMania IX. You remember WrestleMania IX, don’t you? If you don’t, let me just remind you…

– There were TWO Doinks for the price of one. Fortunately, it was the EVIL Doink, so it was cool. You won’t hear me say “Doink” and “cool” in the same sentence too often, that’s for sure.

– Tito Santana actually won a match on the card, improving his WrestleMania record to 2-7. You’ll also never see it, because it wasn’t televised. Tito disappears soon afterwards.

– Tatanka actually beat Shawn Michaels. I almost cry when I see it. No, seriously…

– Hulk Hogan, too, had a water sports-related accident preceding the show. Unlike Brutus, though, Hulk didn’t wear a ridiculous face mask to exemplify the point.

– Undertaker defeated a man with an ass-crack painted on his tights.

– Curt Hennig dragged one of the better matches on this card out of Lex Luger. Take a moment to think about that before you think of this as a “good” thing.

– Even the WWF couldn’t make the Steiners’ “Michigan State Wrestlers” gimmick seem cool. Do keep in mind that I’m from OHIO, as in “Ohio State Buckeyes”.

– And, finally, Hulk Hogan defeated Yokozuna for the WWF Title minutes after Yoko beat Bret for the belt. Sadly enough, this moment actually qualifies as Hulk “saving the show,” despite the fact that it more or less buried Bret Hart.

– Oh, and the Mega-Maniacs lost.

You’re probably wondering if this was the big angle that finally got Ed Leslie over with the WWF fans, right? Of course, it wasn’t and just like everything else before it, it failed miserably. Soon afterwards, likely embarrassed by the fact that he was even associated with Brutus Beefcake, Hulk Hogan left the WWF and supposedly went into retirement. Well, that was until Eric Bischoff and Ted Turner’s Money changed Hulk’s mind. Way to go, Eric!

Shortly after Hogan shows up in WCW, look who else shows up. It’s none other than the professional ass-kisser Ed Leslie, who can no longer legally use the Brutus Beefcake name because, strangely enough, Vince McMahon owns it. Hell, if I were Vince, I’d have just let Ed have it. It’s not like Ed could get over with it anyway. Anyway, Ed Leslie shows up, and WCW dubs him Brother Bruti. WCW then decided to have Bruti kiss Hogan’s ass, just like in the WWF, because it worked so well up there (please note the sarcasm). Once they saw that the ass-kissing wasn’t working, WCW had Bruti turn on Hogan, and re-named him “The Butcher”. Hogan and The Butcher feuded into Starrcade 1994, and, because nobody gave a rat’s ass, the program was dropped soon afterwards. Once again, not even HULK HOGAN could get Ed Leslie over. And yet, this man still maintained a career in professional wrestling. After runs as The Man With No Name, The Zodiac and The Booty Man, it seemed like WCW finally wised up and dumped the bitch, but we were wrong.

In 1998, Leslie would show up again, this time, as Hogan’s “Disciple” in the nWo. After a couple months, my former stepdad, a WCW fan for as long as I’ve known him, asked me if I knew who the Disciple was. Naturally, I said, “no”. He kept digging for a while, and really, I didn’t know, nor really care, who the Disciple was. Finally, he told me who it was – Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake. My reaction to this news was, “oh.” That’s it. No excitement. No nothing. It was actually something of a disappointment. I should also note that my former stepdad is also the only person I have ever known in my entire life to mark out over Brutus “The Barber” Beefcake. Do I need to mention that I have, like, zero respect for this guy? I sure hope not. I mean, I could go into how badly this guy screwed over my mom or how much money this idiot owes me after everything I did to help keep my mom from going bankrupt, but I really shouldn’t have to. The very fact that he was a Brutus Beefcake fan should pretty much explain it all, don’t you think?

So, anyway, Ed becomes the Disciple, and once again, he’s kissing Hulk Hogan’s ass. Then, all of a sudden, The Ultimate Warrior shows up, and the lamest feud in wrestling history begins. Somewhere in all the lameness and stupidity, Ed is kidnapped and forced to submit to Warrior’s sexual advances, so much so that Ed eventually converts to Desrucity and joins the One Warrior Nation. Of course, no one in WCW ever bothers to point out that there were TWO GUYS in the One Warrior Nation, so I’m assuming that the Disciple was more or less the “Mr. Slave” to Warrior’s “Mr./Mrs. Garrison” (I’m not sure if Garrison is still with Mr. Slave since Garrison had the sex change or not. You did know I was a South Park fan, right?). So, it was still, in fact, a One Warrior Nation, because there was one Warrior, and one bitch. And Warrior says that queering doesn’t make the world work…

For the two people who are still wondering if Ed ever got over during his sexual escapades with the Warrior, the answer, obviously, is “no”. Once the Warrior disappeared, Ed’s purpose in life no longer existed, and Ed simply retired from wrestling altogether.

Many years later, working for minimum wage at a MBTA Station in Boston, Ed Leslie accidentally causes an Anthrax scare by bringing his cocaine to work with him. He supposedly goes into rehab, and everyone else in the world, at one point or another, has made at least one cocaine-related joke about the former Beefcake Barber Metal-Faced Suck-Up Butcher No-Named Zodiac Ass-Obsessed Disciple who, in the end, became the Warrior’s bitch. A man, who once made his living wrestling, is now nothing more than an average joe with a drug problem. And while common sense and decency says I should feel sorry for the guy, I just can’t. That probably makes me a bad person.

The Moral of Today’s Story: If you can’t get over working with HULK HOGAN, chances are, you shouldn’t be in Professional Wrestling. Period! Unfortunately, for Ed Leslie, he just never picked up on the hint.