You may be surprised to learn that someone of my supposed intelligence has on at least two time periods of my life, been sucked into the rough and tumble soap opera that is big time championship wrestling. My first go-around with the sport was back in the early 1980’s (from about 1982-84) when Georgia Championship Wrestling reigned supreme of the Superstation TBS. I watched it religiously, bought the magazines, and even went to some of the live matches.
One of the most hated wrestlers to grace the ring was a fellow known as The Iron Sheik (real name: Hossein Khosrow Ali Vaziri). When I first saw him, he was part of the NWA (National Wrestling Alliance) and later became a major player in the WWF (World Wrestling Federation), at one point defeating the incumbent champion Bob Backlund with his notorious camel clutch. I actually saw the Iron Sheik live on October 22, 1982, at the Hara Arena during his stint with the NWA. He took on Brad Armstrong that night.
The Iron Sheik had a $5000 challenge to the audience members on who could perform his exercise routine with his 70lb Persian clubs. One of our Dayton audience members almost succeeded in the challenge but was tackled by the Iron Sheik which later prompted this gentleman to file a real lawsuit against him.
While The Iron Sheik truly was from Iran, his eventual partner in the WWF Nikolai Volkoff (real name: Josip Nikolai Peruzović), who gained notoriety as a Russian, actually hailed from Croatia. The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff became the WWF Tag Team Champions in 1985.
No matter what you think of wrestling in general, I have always admired these guys’ bravery in portraying their ‘heel’ characters. These bad guys’ antics often roused such real emotion from the fans, as they did such things as sing the Russian National Anthem or carry the Iranian flag, that it would seem that they must have constantly feared for their safety.
I got the chance to meet both of these gentlemen at the Chiller Theatre Show in Parsippany, New Jersey, on April 18, 2009. Nikolai herded me in by offering to sell a signed photo of both of them for only $10 each, half price of their normal fee. I think that getting a picture with them (and the Iron Sheik’s belt) was also supposed to cost something, but I conveniently forgot to pay it.
Both of these ‘bad guys’ were actually pretty nice guys. In fact, the Iron Sheik’s ‘handler’ saw my Guatemala t-shirt and told me that the Iron Sheik was at one time an Iranian ambassador to Guatemala. I showed the Sheik some of my pictures that were on my camera from the trip to Guatemala that I had just taken a few weeks earlier.
I can honestly say that I never dreamed that I’d be having any sort of conversation with The Iron Sheik!
Celebrities of the Chiller Theatre Show will continue…
There is a “gimmick battle royal” on youtube (in two parts) that was done several years ago that features The Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff that is terribly funny. Bobby Heenan makes fun of these ‘old timers’ as they enter the ring. It’s worth a look for the nostalgia factor and a good laugh!
Dave Chasteen
August 23rd, 2009