Black Widow
08-01-2008, 09:40 PM
In World Wrestling Entertainment, names matter.
Monday night, that should translate into a midsummer's night of roaring, sweaty, body-slamming glory when WWE's traveling colony descends upon the Macon Coliseum.
The Georgia Street Fight is coming to town.
The wrestlers' names are powerful and revelatory, as integral to the WWE brand as its scrawled, primitive-looking logo.
Indeed, the championship match pushes deep-seated buttons. Billed as the Georgia Street Fight - a prima facie invitation to the blood sport instinct - the contest presents two colossal gladiators.
At one turnbuckle stands Triple H. In truth, Triple H is Hunter Hearst-Hemsley, a champion who maintains a narrative that parallels the Horatio Alger myth, the no-holds-barred equivalent to the classic rags-to-riches ascent.
According to WWE's official Web site, Hunter-Hemsley was once a gangly, weak-kneed teen until he adopted the body-builder's credo and later the wrestling manner of the famous Walter "Killer" Kowalski.
His mentor's influence obviously rubbed off: Triple H is also known as the "Cerebral Assassin."
Indeed, there is a productive methodology to his ring madness. He is WWE's most enduring success story. He holds 12 championship belts, garnered throughout his career, which began in 1995.
From his streetwise handle, Triple H, to his other sobriquet, the Game, this is wrestling's expression of the self-made man, brandishing almost as many appellations as WWE belts.
His opponent is the exotic Khali the Great. On sheer appearance alone, he is nightmarish, standing more than 7 feet tall and weighing more than 420 pounds.
His name is a throwback to the fabled conquerors of foreign lands and distant provinces. In his native India, he was dubbed the "pride of his country" by its president, introducing a touch of nationalism.
In actuality, Khali was born Dalip Singh Rana, whose biography has an Algeresque ring, too. He began humbly as a roadside day laborer who eventually enrolled in a police sponsored body-building program. He excelled as both a state police officer and a body-builder, eventually becoming Mr. India in 1997 and '98. He bounced onto Hollywood, not Bollywood, to appear in the movies "The Longest Yard" and this year's "Get Smart," becoming a celebrity on two fronts.
For some pop culture enthusiasts, he might remind them of Punjab, the gargantuan manservant/bodyguard to Daddy Warbucks in the "Little Orphan Annie" comic strip. Far from being a gentle giant, though, Khali is more Goliath, than the stoic Punjab. In fact, his ring name is the masculine derivative of Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, notes his Web site.
True, the wrestler's personas make wondrously outrageous talking points, not to mention their ring mat theatrics, sparking intense fan fascination and ticket-buying frenzies.
"Realistically, if we aren't sold out, we will come pretty close," said Dorsha Lee, the Macon Centreplex's public relations and marketing specialist. "It is a very good show. It sells very well."
Now, that's really entertainment.
Monday
What: The Georgia Street Fight and other matches
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Macon Coliseum, 200 Coliseum Drive
Cost: $22-$62
Phone: 751-9232
Monday night, that should translate into a midsummer's night of roaring, sweaty, body-slamming glory when WWE's traveling colony descends upon the Macon Coliseum.
The Georgia Street Fight is coming to town.
The wrestlers' names are powerful and revelatory, as integral to the WWE brand as its scrawled, primitive-looking logo.
Indeed, the championship match pushes deep-seated buttons. Billed as the Georgia Street Fight - a prima facie invitation to the blood sport instinct - the contest presents two colossal gladiators.
At one turnbuckle stands Triple H. In truth, Triple H is Hunter Hearst-Hemsley, a champion who maintains a narrative that parallels the Horatio Alger myth, the no-holds-barred equivalent to the classic rags-to-riches ascent.
According to WWE's official Web site, Hunter-Hemsley was once a gangly, weak-kneed teen until he adopted the body-builder's credo and later the wrestling manner of the famous Walter "Killer" Kowalski.
His mentor's influence obviously rubbed off: Triple H is also known as the "Cerebral Assassin."
Indeed, there is a productive methodology to his ring madness. He is WWE's most enduring success story. He holds 12 championship belts, garnered throughout his career, which began in 1995.
From his streetwise handle, Triple H, to his other sobriquet, the Game, this is wrestling's expression of the self-made man, brandishing almost as many appellations as WWE belts.
His opponent is the exotic Khali the Great. On sheer appearance alone, he is nightmarish, standing more than 7 feet tall and weighing more than 420 pounds.
His name is a throwback to the fabled conquerors of foreign lands and distant provinces. In his native India, he was dubbed the "pride of his country" by its president, introducing a touch of nationalism.
In actuality, Khali was born Dalip Singh Rana, whose biography has an Algeresque ring, too. He began humbly as a roadside day laborer who eventually enrolled in a police sponsored body-building program. He excelled as both a state police officer and a body-builder, eventually becoming Mr. India in 1997 and '98. He bounced onto Hollywood, not Bollywood, to appear in the movies "The Longest Yard" and this year's "Get Smart," becoming a celebrity on two fronts.
For some pop culture enthusiasts, he might remind them of Punjab, the gargantuan manservant/bodyguard to Daddy Warbucks in the "Little Orphan Annie" comic strip. Far from being a gentle giant, though, Khali is more Goliath, than the stoic Punjab. In fact, his ring name is the masculine derivative of Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction, notes his Web site.
True, the wrestler's personas make wondrously outrageous talking points, not to mention their ring mat theatrics, sparking intense fan fascination and ticket-buying frenzies.
"Realistically, if we aren't sold out, we will come pretty close," said Dorsha Lee, the Macon Centreplex's public relations and marketing specialist. "It is a very good show. It sells very well."
Now, that's really entertainment.
Monday
What: The Georgia Street Fight and other matches
When: 7 p.m.
Where: Macon Coliseum, 200 Coliseum Drive
Cost: $22-$62
Phone: 751-9232