7 Things You Didn’t Know About the First-Ever Wrestlemania

Gerry Strauss April 18, 4:41 pm

Hulk Hogan, ca. 1986. — Will Hart / TV Guide / courtesy Everett Collection

Nowadays, televised pro wrestling on a grand scale is pretty darn common: World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) has weekly live shows on Netflix and the USA Network (with bigger events broadcasting on NBC and Peacock), while All-Elite Wrestling broadcasts weekly on TNT and TBS. Even with all that content to watch, wrestling fans still salivate for the one annual event that they consider the biggest broadcast of the year: Wrestlemania, which presents its 41st iteration on April 19th and 20th (yep, it’s grown into a two-night show these days).

The brainchild of WWE (then known as the World Wrestling Federation, or WWF) owner Vince McMahon, Jr. (who was ousted from the company in recent years amidst a variety of legal allegations), Wrestlemania was a defining moment in the move to take pro wrestling from dark, smoke-filled rooms to family-friendly stadiums, prime time television and toy stores. A lot has changed since 1985, when the very first Wrestlemania changed pro wrestling and pop culture forever. Now in its 40th anniversary year, let’s look back at seven little-known facts about the very first Wrestlemania!

1Instead of a championship match, the event Was headlined by… Mr T?

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In boxing, most major fight cards are centered around a Heavyweight Title Fight. But in pro wrestling (especially Vince McMahon’s new vision for it), entertainment was equally as important as in-ring action, opening up the door for plenty of collaboration with Hollywood. With that strategy in mind, the WWF chose to base their most important show ever around a tag-team challenge match, as uber-popular WWF Champion Hulk Hogan teamed up with A-Team star Mr. T to face the obnoxious villainy of “Rowdy” Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorf. The gamble paid off with a sold-out attendance of 19,121 and major buzz throughout the entertainment industry, setting a course for bigger and better things in the future.

2It wasn’t available to watch live at home

While the World Wrestling Federation (now known as World Wrestling Entertainment) is often considered a founding father of the pay-per-view industry, the first Wrestlemania wasn’t actually available on home PPV for a very good reason – the service wasn’t widely available yet. Instead, the event was simulcast and made available in theaters and arenas across the country on big screens via closed-circuit television, selling over one million tickets in the process.

3Celebrities galore attended

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While Mr. T’s involvement in the show’s main event garnered the most press, plenty of other celebrities appeared at Wrestlemania. Grammy award-winner Cyndi Lauper (deep into her “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” heyday) seconded Wendi Richter to the ring to help her win the WWF Women’s Championship from Leilani Kai, boxing legend Muhammad Ali served as a special guest referee, and New York Yankees manager Billy Martin, Liberace and the Rockettes all joined in on the fun throughout the night.

4Wrestling goes MTV

This new era of pro wrestling would no longer primarily be watched by middle-aged men who came to the arenas to smoke, drink beer, and cheer on their favorites. To capture the attention of younger fans and families, the WWF began building a new fanbase via strategically scheduled events broadcast on MTV: The Brawl to End it All and The War to Settle the Score, featuring matches and moments with the WWF’s key players, intermingled with pop-culture megastars like Mr. T. and Cyndi Lauper. It was all designed to capture the attention of the MTV generation and build anticipation for Wrestlemania.

5The Hulkster and Mr T hosted Saturday Night Live less than 24 hours before belltime

How big was Wrestlemania? It was so huge that Hogan and Mr. T got the invitation to host SNL while they were in New York City for the big event. Sure, it was a last-minute fill-in for comedian Steve Landesberg, who dropped out due to a family emergency, but it was still quite a PR accomplishment for a sport that had never been considered quite so cool before. And seeing the WWF champ holding his own with Mr. T and Billy Crystal at the same time definitely positioned pro wrestling in a new light for TV viewers.

6Hogan and Mr T. were almost body-slammed by a lawsuit ahead of the event

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During a promotional appearance on cable talk show Hot Properties, Hogan and Mr. T  got themselves in hot water after being egged on by host Richard Belzer. After some encouragement from Mr. T, Hogan agreed to demonstrate a chokehold on the future Law & Order star, but ended up applying too much pressure and rendering him temporarily unconscious. Belzer recovered quickly enough to send the show to a commercial break but officially filed a $5 million lawsuit against both guests in 1987. The case was settled quietly in 1990.

7Wrestlemania was a make-or-break moment for the company

While many assumed that WWF was coming into Wrestlemania with plenty of momentum, that wasn’t the case at all. While relatively new owner Vince McMahon Jr. (who took over the promotion from his father) harbored huge aspirations for expansion from a regional business to a global powerhouse, many of his formative moves cost the organization a lot of money. With the heightened expense of promoting an event of this magnitude, the WWF was flirting with bankruptcy (some say that Vince had to take a second or third mortgage on his house just to free up the funds he needed). The execution of Wrestlemania became a huge gamble, and failure could have easily spelled the end of the company as we knew it. Luckily for pro wrestling fans, that gamble became the industry’s ultimate success story, eventually allowing the WWE to attain that global footprint they dreamt of.