Wrestling Chaos in the 1980s

In the 1980s there were three cross over events that put professional wrestling on the newspaper headlines and in the national spotlight that were outside the wrestling ring.

First, in 1982 comedian Andy Kaufman, who was the big star of Taxi, crossed his comedy act into the world of wrestling and had a "real" feud with Jerry "The King" Lawler in a Memphis wrestling promotion. The feud was featured on NBC's Late Night with David Letterman where Kaufman was slapped by Lawler and Kaufman proceeded to drop S and F bombs on live TV:



The second event occurred in 1984 when reporter John Stossel was doing a story on professional wrestling and was interviewing Dr. D David Schultz. Schultz took exception to Stossel's implication that wrestling was fake and proceeded to slap him twice (UB saw this video on Barstool Sports, which prompted him to do this post):

The last moment occurred in 1985 when Hogan and Mr. T were were promoting the first Wrestlemania, appearing on a talk show called Hot Properties with host/comedian Richard Belzer. Belzer wanted Hulk to show everyone a wrestling hold during the show so Hogan put a front headlock on Belzer and apparently applied too much pressure. Belzer lost consciousness and fell out of Hulk's arms, hitting his head on the stage. Belzer later filed a lawsuit against the WWF and after a long time of putting off the case the WWF and Belzer settled the case out of court. (Accident occurs about 5 and a half minutes into the video):