French catch

[David Mantell]

8 hours ago, Phil Lions said:

The 2005-2010 period was interesting in Europe, because WWE got good TV deals in Italy, France and Spain, which resulted in wrestling's popularity going way up in those countries for a few years and a bunch of promotions reaped the benefits of this. Particularly those promotions who relied on ex-WWE stars and/or targeted family audiences.

The difference is that Italy and Spain's Old School scenes had died out in 1965 and 1975 respectively whereas (International) Wrestling Stars (Federation) has roots going back to 1979 and its top headliners were not ex -WWFers but Trad French old timers who first made their name on terrestrial TV- Monsieur Jacky (TV debut 1971) Flesh Gordon (TV debut 1979) Prince Zefy (TV debut 1985-1987). About their next biggest stars at that time were Scott Rider (around by the 1990s) and masked men Cybernic Machine and Bad Mask who followed in the Delaportesque tradition of Les Piranhas, Mambo Le Primitiv and Les Maniaks (and whose names were broken English). Survivors of the old days or else new stars built in the tradition of that later period.

It was the same in old school Britain by the late Noughties - the biggest stars of All Star, RBW and Premier were ITV 1980s veterans Robbie Brookside, Drew McDonald, Karl Kramer, Blondie Barrett, Keith Myatt, Steve Prince, Steve Grey, Mal Sanders and Johnny Kidd were still sporadically around) early 90s wonderkid James Mason and the Hanley crowd (Dean Allmark, Robbie Dynamite, Mikey Whiplash etc) who had started with the dubious GBH in 2000 before being retrained from scratch by All Star's veteran crew and going on to dyed in the wool neo Old School careers.

All Star in the UK and WS/IWSF in France are fairly similar companies except the French one (or its Belgian affiliate) seems to have had some more TV post-1980s along the way, although details are sketchy. (But apart from my memory of seeing it advertised online, Marc Mercier mentions them getting TV in that feature article on the French scene I posted on here months back.)

 

[David Mantell]

On 8/5/2024 at 12:24 AM, David Mantell said:

Quote

On 8/5/2024 at 12:24 AM, David Mantell said:

On 9/7/2023 at 4:58 PM, David Mantell said:

(if that embed doesn't work, the link is https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xsbju5 )

 

One slight snag with the above. This also had a decent if not gigantic crowd and it's from 2003 (FFCP, starring an older Marc Mercier.)

Correction, it was IWSF. The FFCP was not revived until 2006, Marc Mercier was still buddies with Flesh and Jacky back then.  I assume IWSF also promoted Le Petit Prince's retirement match in 2001 against Claude Rocas.

[David Mantell]

Apparently this was Flesh Gordon's TV debut, (broadcast the same month as Hulk Hogan's first WWF match. funnily enough.) Herve is anything but flash here, plain mint green trunks and pudding bowl haircut, working down on the mat despite his lunch background, very little escaping other than one nice cartwheel.  Ramirez wears a matador's jacket to the ring which marks him as the heel - if Tito Santana ever wore his El Matador getup on an FFCP Catch show, it would massive heat for him.  Herve gets a second public warning for stomping a fallen opponent and pleads his case to the audience - if this was England, the crowd would be booing him and Kent Walton would be excusing him for not knowing the British rules. Lots of arguments between Herve and referee Saulnier. It ends on a countout but even then Saulnier seems to change his mind and the audience give him heat.

[David Mantell]

On 5/15/2020 at 2:48 PM, ohtani's jacket said:

Walter Bordes vs. Zarak (aired 3/1/80)

Bordes brought a strap to the ring, and for a second I thought we'd be getting a strap match, but it was a challenge that Zarak keep refusing, apparently. This was a solid bout, but formulaic. It was one of those bouts where the babyface wants to go after the heel, but the ref keeps stopping him. The ref and the babyface start to beef, and the worse it gets, the easier it is for the heel to cheat. It all comes to a head, and the ref screws over the babyface. From what I've seen, the refs get involved far too much in 80s catch. I wanted to see Zarak and Bordes take the gloves off, but the ref spoiled it. The highlight of the bout was a big lucha style bump into the second or third row. Afterward, Bordes had his strap ready for Zarak to accept the challenge. I'd like to think that match happened. I'd also like to think that Bordes was still one of the best wrestlers in Europe if he can cut through the bullshit.

This reminds me a lot of masked wrestlers in Joint Promotions in the mid 80s like The Emperor (Bill Bromley), Battle Star (Barry Douglas) or El Diablo (Tony Francis). He's a fellow Brit so it makes sense.  Bigger dominant masked man brutalises clean wrestler to get a win and heat. If this was Britain, they be warrming him up nicely for Big Daddy. But it isn't, Zarak was a well established masked man and it wasn't even the first time Bordes had faced him.

Chants for Bordes "Mama-doux mais mais" and for an unmasking "Hey hey la Cagoule" merge and become inseperable.

 

We've discussed already the role of the heel ref in French Catch from the late 70s onwards, suffice to say almost all refs except Delaporte were basically Dangerous Danny Davis, especially Michel Saulnier and Otto Weiss.

[David Mantell]

On 4/2/2020 at 11:59 AM, ohtani's jacket said:

Zarak vs. Walter Bordes (aired 3/12/77)

Zarak was one of the many alter-egos of British wrestler, Dave Larsen. Larsen was part of the Lincoln stable of wrestlers, and if you've been following my posts you'll know that the Lincoln wrestlers (Hayes, Hunter, Anthony, Larsen) had a direct pathway to Paris. This was well after the Lincoln merger with Joint Promotions, and Larsen had apparently disappeared from the British scene at this point. Zarak was, without a doubt, the cockiest masked wrestler I have ever seen. The swagger was amazing. He actually made Bordes crack up during the intros. The match played out exactly as you'd expect. It wasn't bad but it wasn't the most authentic catch. You may notice the chant "Mamadou Meme" during Bordes' matches. Mamaodu Meme was a popular song by Nino Ferrer. I'm not sure how it became a rallying fall for Bordes but you hear it a lot.

Billy Catanzaro & Gilbert Lemagouroux vs. Albert Sanniez & Bob Remy (aired 3/12/71)

 

re

Interestingly both these bouts were were on Channel 1. The 1971 bout you can see from the listing above. In the case of the December 1977 Zarak Bordes match the female continuity announcer is in front of a backdrop covered in old school TF1 logos,

I still reckon TF1 wrestling was rare as the channel was in b/w  until 1977 so one would expect at least a few B/W bouts for 1975-1977 unless this was a rarity.   It's filmed in a very different style from normal, overhead from a balcony looking down on the ring. The ORTF was broken up at the start of 1975 and channels 1, 2 and 3 became TF1, Antenne 2 and FR3, each run independently of each other, so perhaps this is a one off.

I've already reviewed the 1971 bout three pages back. If it was in b/w that's a pity, I hope as many as possible of the 1967-1974 bouts were on Channel 2 in colour with recoverable chroma dots.  Rewatching the 1971 bout it too is shot in an unusual style with a lot of use of a camera angle corner-wise on to the ring, so maybe this was a rarity too.

Zarak was in a simpler red/orange costume/mask in 77 but still the same strutting arrogant masked man The commentator admits that he is a British living in Paris because he likes the air of the place.  Fast action packed bout suddenly ends in a draw. For some reason  the audience and Bordes think he's won it and get stroppy when it is indeed a draw.

[David Mantell]

Nice Andre docu interview. Backing music is dodgy Eurovision song, written by Serge Gainsborg, sung by France Gall about being a singing Dolly. (They later did a song together about lollipops. You work it out.)

[David Mantell]

By the way, that's an awfully large amount of page space that one half hour solitary tag bout gets in that TV listings magazine. Half a page. About the same as the size of the panel in TVTimes's listings for a Saturday afternoon for a full five hour edition of World Of Sport (not just the wrestling slot but the On The Ball football analysis, the horse racing, the International Sports Special, any oddball sports features and the football results/pools numbers).  All this for a wrestling show in the same length and timeslot as ITV's midweek late evening wrestling show, except that would typically have two bouts in the same amount of time.  In fact the level of printed hype mostly resembles a major championship boxing match on 1990s ITV on a Saturday night in the same timeslot ("The Big Fight Live" with Gary Newbon.) Which seems to suggest to me that a wrestling TV broadcast certainly at this point was still a big deal in France.

[David Mantell]

I've just remembered I have this on my wall, which I bought from Camden Market in London some years ago. Anyone know the back story?

[Phil Lions]

It's a poster for a Greco-Roman tournament in Paris in 1899. Illustrated by Jean de Paleologue.

[David Mantell]

10 hours ago, Phil Lions said:

It's a poster for a Greco-Roman tournament in Paris in 1899. Illustrated by Jean de Paleologue.

Thanks. Interesting.

Why are they wearing Catch-style trunks instead of double arm leotards like a GR wrestler normally would?

[David Mantell]

On 8/3/2024 at 5:34 PM, Phil Lions said:

Was looking for something else and randomly found a TV listing for Kader Hassouni/Petit Prince vs. Anton Tejero/Bob Remy 1/7/77. According to the TV schedule for that day, the match was to air live on TF1 on January 8, not January 7.

 

Just noticed you mention this was on TF1 also!. When exactly in 1977 did the channel go full colour?

It may be once it did go colour promoters were happier to have matches on there.

[ohtani's jacket]

@Phil Lions

Slightly off topic, but regarding your thread about Pre-1940 European matches that were filmed, but the footage seems to no longer exist, is August 3, 1932: Jack Pye vs. Ben Sherman (London, England) different from the video that's available from Getty? 

https://www.gettyimages.co.jp/detail/動画/bell-rings-and-two-wrestlers-canadian-ben-sherman-and-briton-ニュース動画/539142450

The British Universities Film & Video Council appears to have more Pye footage, including the Stoeff bout you listed.

http://bufvc.ac.uk/allbufvc/search.php?q=Pye&components[bund]=1&facet_media_type=moving_image&facet_genre[cinema]=1&sort=relevance

[Phil Lions]

42 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

@Phil Lions

Slightly off topic, but regarding your thread about Pre-1940 European matches that were filmed, but the footage seems to no longer exist, is August 3, 1932: Jack Pye vs. Ben Sherman (London, England) different from the video that's available from Getty? 

https://www.gettyimages.co.jp/detail/動画/bell-rings-and-two-wrestlers-canadian-ben-sherman-and-briton-ニュース動画/539142450

The British Universities Film & Video Council appears to have more Pye footage, including the Stoeff bout you listed.

http://bufvc.ac.uk/allbufvc/search.php?q=Pye&components[bund]=1&facet_media_type=moving_image&facet_genre[cinema]=1&sort=relevance

Thank you for that. I must've missed the Pye/Sherman match last time I was checking Getty (or they uploaded it after that).

I had reached out about the Pye/Stoeff match years ago and they told me they couldn't find the film. One of their theories was that the film might've been taken offsite to secure storage for nitrate film, but either way I was told it's not available. It's possible something may have changed since then, I suppose. I may check in with them again. I was left with the impression that anything mentioned on their list that hasn't been digitized yet is either in too bad of a condition to be digitized or lost altogether. There's always a possibility something might pop up though. You never know.

[David Mantell]

https://web.archive.org/web/20030303192121/http://www.catch.fr/cgi-bin/merchant/merchant.cgi?cart_id=1422569.11747&itemnumber=93

My first attempt to get my hands on classic French Catch.

I remember seeing this on sale on Wrestling Stars' website in the early/Mid Noughties. I'm not sure if I tried ordering it- it would have been  in SECAM anyway so I don't know if my TV and video could have coped.

[David Mantell]

On 4/6/2020 at 3:18 PM, ohtani's jacket said:

Jack de Lasartesse vs. Gaby Calderon (aired 2/1/70)

It feels like an age since I've seen a good Lasartesse performance. I still have the bitter taste of that swimming pool match in my mouth. But this was vintage Lasartesse. He only executed the most basic of holds and he wasn't a great wrestler, but the swagger, the arrogance... Few wrestlers have played the arrogant heel better than Lasartesse. The judoka, Calderon, was looking a bit worse for wear in this match, but Lasartesse was golden. He was a giant of a man in this era and his long legs made his knee drops seem devastating. This was a nice reminder of why I used to rave about Lasartesse so much. 

 

@Matt D has this down on the YouTube page as being 21st Feb, not 2nd Jan

@ohtani's jacket @Phil Lions see, the French also know how to do a three public warnings DQ that gradually builds to the climax of the referee throwing out the heel for Trop Lutte Irreguliere. Lasartesse is a great heel, like what Sid might have been if he'd come to Britain and learned to wrestle technically. I would love to have seen a Lasartesse/Robert Duranton tag team- did they ever do one?

Incidentally the fatal third Avertisement (for the exact move Ivan Koloff would use to bag the WWWF World Heavyweight Championship in MSG just eleven months later) is not  for jumping of the top but for landing on a fallen opponent (so a flying bodypress or a Randy Savage-style flying axe handle onto a standing opponent would be clean wrestling in France, the UK and any other European territories that had the no follow down rule). In the late 1980s as I mentioned on the German Catch thread, Rollerball Rocco would take care to use his off the top rope jump he brought back from Japan earlier in the bout so he only got a first or second Public Warning.  

Lasartesse doesn't throw a strop though, in an interview afterwards he is quite philosophical about his DQ, satisfied that he beat up Calderon and saying that the other guy is welcome to the win. He then does a Hulk Hogan/Superstar Graham posedown with a bit of Buddy Rogers strut thrown in for good measure (he probably saw Rogers in America, the commentator tells us at the start how well travelled he is) to the disgust of the crowd.

Calderon was known in Britain as the Professor Adi Wasser. Wasser wassa heel over here. His last visit to the UK was in 1980 when he wore a mask because he was paranoid about how "they" would get him, or something, and got himself disqualified for using a sleeper/choke. We were out somewhere that Sat afternoon but my grandad saw it and told me afterwards about this masked wrestler from France whose big move was putting his thumb on his opponent's throat.

There's another bout at the start of the clip but it's a squash, big bald German villain Kurt Kaiser taking out Remy Beyle in three minutes and then soaking up the heat. Since this is France 1970 and not early eighties Britain, Big Daddy does not come down to challenge the big bully.

[David Mantell]

On 4/29/2020 at 4:02 AM, ohtani's jacket said:

Gilbert Cesca & Bruno Asquini vs. Les Blousons Noirs (aired 1/25/71)

Asquini is a name I've seen pop up a lot in match records. He was reportedly an Italian wrestler based in France, but it's safer to assume he was French-Italian since he had a successful amateur career in France and was a French military champion. Unfortunately, we don't have a strong singles showcase for him, but Bob ALPRA says he was one of the finest technicians of his era. This wasn't an ideal match to showcase that technique, but he did bust out a couple of fun spots. Everyone looked a bit long in the tooth, however.

Alessio's playlist on YouTube has Bob ALPRA's copy of this sorted to January 1970 and Matt D's copy in the correct place. Commentator says it's Le Cirque and it does look like the Cirque d'Hiver as it looks in the first INA colour off air tapes from 1975/1976.

The picture on Bob's copy looks odd, almost like video rather than a kinescope.

There's a camera with a big 2 on it so either that was camera number 2 or this is channel 2 which is why the commentator mentions what colour trunks everyone has on. I think this is the Cirque d'Hiver too as I seem to recognise the tasseled (red)  velvet curtains.

Nice French headscissors counter to armbar early in the match and quite a lot of out of the ring stuff. Commentator says Asquini is getting done over by the BNs as retribution for something someone said about the director's hair.  One BN neatly escapes a headscissor by turning levBon over and lifting the scissor off, then turning it into a Frank Gotch toehold. A BN fishhooks a Bon with both hands in both corners of the mouth, turning him away from L'Arbitre to make it look like a standing full nelson.

Crowd shots include a granny eating sweets and some young Parisians dressed in fab groovy swinging 60s gear possibly brought back from a cross channel ferry visit to Carnaby Street. One of the BNs apparently gets into some argy with a fan on the way out but it's over before the cameras can pick it up.

[David Mantell]

On 5/10/2014 at 1:50 PM, ohtani's jacket said:

I'm going to try to keep up with this French Catch at the same pace as Phil.

 

René Ben Chemoul/Gilbert Cesca vs. The Black Diamonds (2/28/65)

 

This was probably the best tag match I've seen from Europe, and I've seen my share of English and German tags. The fact that it wasn't one of the best tag matches of all-time tells you plenty about how good European tag wrestling was. They just weren't very good at it. This was kind of a one note match with the same schtick repeated throughout (to the sounds of an excitable French commentator), but I was stoked to see Ginsberg again, who was awesome in the one WoS bout we have of his. I know the Black Diamonds were quite famous, though I'm not sure whether it was this version or the one with Eric Cutler. At one point, they wore black masks. Here they were pretending to be Americans. Whether that was reflected in the cheating they did, I'm not sure, but it gave slightly more focus to what is usually a pretty loose style of tag wrestling in European countries. The French wrestlers were good without really being outstanding.

This is John Foley. JR Foley from Stampede teaming with the heel who sold antiques in his spare time in Granada TV's the Wrestlers. Ginsberg was the one with the lighter hair/beard. Billed as Americans - see discussion on German Catch thread. Nice stroppy Ginsberg throws at the end over the French ref and French fans.

RBC reportedly had classic matches with George Kidd in the 50s. A Catch A Quatre maybe isn't the best shop window for his technical skills.

 

 

[Phil Lions]

When I first went through Jean Corne's book I didn't pay much attention to the photos, but earlier today I was going through the book again and noticed something. He's included a photo of a newspaper clipping with the TF1 schedule for the night of October 18, 1975, and it looks like catch was supposed to air that night. We don't have footage from that night so I don't know if and what actually aired, but the advertised line-up was Les Celtes (Jean Corne & Michel Falempin) vs. Zarak, and Jon Guil Don vs. Paco Ramirez.

P.S. And if anyone's wondering how it's possible for a book published in 1974 to have a clipping from 1975 - it's because my copy of the book is of the reprinted edition from 2012, which includes some extra content that wasn't in the original 1974 book.

[David Mantell]

22 hours ago, Phil Lions said:

When I first went through Jean Corne's book I didn't pay much attention to the photos, but earlier today I was going through the book again and noticed something. He's included a photo of a newspaper clipping with the TF1 schedule for the night of October 18, 1975, and it looks like catch was supposed to air that night. We don't have footage from that night so I don't know if and what actually aired, but the advertised line-up was Les Celtes (Jean Corne & Michel Falempin) vs. Zarak, and Jon Guil Don vs. Paco Ramirez.

P.S. And if anyone's wondering how it's possible for a book published in 1974 to have a clipping from 1975 - it's because my copy of the book is of the reprinted edition from 2012, which includes some extra content that wasn't in the original 1974 book.

According to the calendar on my tablet, 18th August 1975 was a Monday!

The nearest Saturday 18 August either way was 1973 (when TF1 was still 1er Chaine De l'ORTF and Zarak was still Le Batman) or 1979. Corne and Falempin teamed on TV quite a bit through the 70s but I don't think they became les Celts with the light green trunks ("Allez Les Verts!") until 1977 when they faced Jacky Richard and Jean Menard although I could be totally wrong about that . My guess is 1979, by which time TF1 was in full colour.

It does go to show that not every last remaining terrestrial wrestling broadcast 1975-1987 was taped by the INA and that what Matt D has on his channel was by no means the complete collection and that there was more French TV wrestling in those later years than can be assumed from just looking at his channel.

I see that 1975 date has been handwritten on. Perhaps the handwriter screwed up.

[ohtani's jacket]

We already knew that the INA doesn't have every match that was ever broadcast as there were 50s and 60s broadcasts missing from the archives.

[Matt D]

11 minutes ago, David Mantell said:

Matt D has on his channel

Have you still never gotten to the master list on the blog?

http://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2021/05/french-catch-tuesday-master-list.html?m=1
 

not that we have a Corne/Falempin vs Zarak match (which sounds great).

[David Mantell]

I know about that list but not how to sort it into date or any other searchable order.

Is that Michel Di Santo Vs Michel Chaisne match where Fred Magnier comes out in street clothes and gets his behind kicked or from the same taping where Magnier faces Bob Plantin where Fred and Delaporte get in a fight and Delaporte has to reluctantly declare Magnier winner by TKO or the snippet of two young lighter weights starting on a clean match on the list?

[David Mantell]

18 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

We already knew that the INA doesn't have every match that was ever broadcast as there were 50s and 60s broadcasts missing from the archives.

Indeed. Either not every live broadcast was kinescoped (or every tape delay match was kinescoped before the tape was wiped for reuse.) OR ELSE some bouts all 3 or 4 bicycled overseas sales prints were destroyed by the last TV station/destroyed by ORTF on return/taken home on return and now stashed in the garden shed of some elderly film collector in the rural Mediterranean South.

How do we sort the blog list and what other lists do we have?

[David Mantell]

Do you mean this list?

https://segundacaida.blogspot.com/2014/05/la-complete-et-exacte-french-catch.html

Cos that's a very threadbare list, only half a dozen post-1969 entries.

As I've said before, what is needed is either a French @JNLister or some old time French fans who noted TV details down at the time and pooled their records to put together an entire 1952-1987 chronicle of French TV wrestling.

[Phil Lions]

1 hour ago, David Mantell said:

According to the calendar on my tablet, 18th August 1975 was a Monday!

The clipping is for October 18 (a Saturday), not August 18.

That said, as you mentioned, the year is handwritten so there's a chance it might be off. The only other plausible option would be 1980.