Scripted promos in WWE

[tim]

This has been a pretty hot button issue and a top complaint online for years now. The story goes WWE promos have declined in quality because they've become far too scripted. So, how true is this? How scripted were the promos throughout the 80s and 90s? Were they always just as scripted as they supposedly are now? When did the ramp up in explicit scripting start? Do we have good info about this stuff?

 

The reaction I'm seeing some places to Undertaker's Main Event promo last night got me thinking about this. A lot of people felt it was too scripted and cheesy. For me this has really seemed like a problem for Daniel Bryan. Talk about a guy who sounds like he's reading off cue cards all the time, very vacant and artificial. Sometimes his fire shows through and it can be great but since the Authority angle started whenever he goes out there with Trips and Steph to do a long promo segment I think he often sounds very bad. I don't remember top guys of the past sounding like they were reading off cue cards, even when they were very catchphrase-heavy.

 

JR on his recent podcast with Mick mentions that their famous sit down interview wasn't scripted at all? Didn't sound like BS from them. Could such a segment be done today without being meticulously scripted by guys who never get in front of the camera?

[NintendoLogic]

I believe Meltzer has said that promos in the WWF weren't scripted until 2001.

[tim]

Do we have good ideas as to why that changed? WWE hit a boom in the late 90s pretty much entirely on the back of the promos and lots and lots of talking. Why would they want to drastically change something that brought them so much success?

[sek69]

My working theory is it was a combination of them bringing in a lot of former TV writers (who probably see heavy scripting as job security) and them going hard on wanting guys with the same body type regardless of athletic/speaking ability.

 

It seems hard to stop something in WWE once it gets rolling, so writers looking to secure their place + guys hired for looks who can't talk for shit = word for word scripting.

[Dooley]

It does seem odd that everything became so tight after one of the keys to the last boom was shifting a lot of character development responsibility back to the wrestlers (remember the Vince speech to the crew after Pillman's death?). You would think after that showed results, they would have kept running with it.

[tim]

 

 

(remember the Vince speech to the crew after Pillman's death?)

 

What's this story? I didn't start following stuff on the net til 2004 so there's probably a lot of well known dirtsheet stories from around this time I have no idea of.

[Jimmy Redman]

An aspect of over-scripting these days might be a fear of someone going off the reservation and creating a PR/sponsors/TVPG/Senate campaign nightmare.

 

Something like the Titus Kobe Bryant joke, but on a bigger scale.

 

But yes, I think most of it is simply "we employ a dozen writers, they have to write something".

[victory]

I think certain guys it helps especially with the lack of managers. I hated it for a long time, now I kind of see the need for it since not everybody can talk. An obvious scripted promo is better in some case than a bland awkward one.

[fakeplastictrees]

It started after the buy outs? I believe this also happened in part because all three promotions had their own promo styles and some people still goes massively over by being bad promos. Perhaps Vince felt the stakes were way to high being the only game in town and everyone needed to be as sharp as possible. Vince moving from wrestling to entertainment (before the name change there were reports that WWE wanted to change their name and eventually get rid of 'federation' to help expand their brand) definitely played a part, but I can't help but feel it also had to do with Vince not believing that the WCW or ECW guys had the chops needed to make money. Having 1 or 2 guys on the roster staring into the camera and doing their best Roderick Strong impressionation is bad. Having 20 guys do that can be even worse.

 

Looking at the 2001 roster I see 11 guys who were completely suspect when it came to promo ability. I am sure the thinking was that work doesn't get you over in WWE (look at Dean Malenko's crowd reactions in WCW vs. WWE) and everyone has to have some character.

[Loss]

I suspect it may have been more of a Stephanie thing. I remember the story in the bonus chapter of the paperback of Have A Nice Day where she thought Mick Foley hated her because he kept veering away from the point during their dueling promos. Foley claims it wasn't that at all - he just didn't remember everything he was supposed to say sometimes so he ad-libbed. It's possible Stephanie feels stronger about scripting than Vince and Vince just never cared enough to overrule her.

[Russellmania]

The sad thing about it is that Bryan can be really great on the mic when he is allowed to just do his thing. In ROH I always thought he was one of the best promo guys and his heel stuff in WWE was tremendous. Granted most of his best work is as a heel, but I think he's a pretty witty guy and would have no problem giving good face promos if they just let him go out there and riff.

[Johnny Sorrow]

The sad thing about it is that Bryan can be really great on the mic when he is allowed to just do his thing. In ROH I always thought he was one of the best promo guys and his heel stuff in WWE was tremendous. Granted most of his best work is as a heel, but I think he's a pretty witty guy and would have no problem giving good face promos if they just let him go out there and riff.

Bryan as a face in ROH was amazingly awful on the mic. He was always good as a heel.

[Matt Farmer]

I believe Meltzer has said that promos in the WWF weren't scripted until 2001.

Vince Russo started pushing the scripted promos more in 97' - 98'. However not everyone was using them, but they were used.

 

On some of the SNME episodes some scripted interviews were suggested and used, but more for an outline of the promo. And that's how it started and grew from there. Some guys still don't use them, except for suggestions.

[El-P]

The modern overscripted promos style of the WWE is one reason I find the product unwatchable as a whole. It doesn't comes off like bad pro-wrestling promos or cheesy badly acted pro-wrestling vignettes, it comes off like just terrible acting from a fourth rate TV show or old-school porn-movie (you know, when they used to have actual scripts and stories). The way they cut the scenes is awful too, with those awkward two seconds too many after each backstage skits. What is acceptable for pro-wrestling would just look downright embarrassing in any other entertainment business really. And don't get me started on their many attempts at doing comedy. To me it started with Russo, but really got settled with Stephy in the early 00's. 14 years later, it's the exact same thing and it's putrid. One huge turn-off of the modern WWE style for me.

[Russellmania]

part of the problem is that so few guys have the balls to go off-script. On Austin's podcast with Cena, Cena talked about how he thinks one problem with the business today is that all the top few guys are in fear for their jobs because there's no where else for them to go work so they just take whatever is handed to them and try not to rock the boat, but he (Cena) wants to see some of these guys just take some chances once in a while, be it in a match or during a promo or whatever.

[rovert]

I believe Meltzer has said that promos in the WWF weren't scripted until 2001.

 

A few times on his podcast Austin said he noticed a sea change after he returned from his neck injury in late 2000.

[Dooley]

 

(remember the Vince speech to the crew after Pillman's death?)

 

What's this story? I didn't start following stuff on the net til 2004 so there's probably a lot of well known dirtsheet stories from around this time I have no idea of.

 

 

After Pillman died, Vince addressed the troops and admitted that some of his ideas weren't working as well as he'd like and encouraged the talent to be more pro-active in their character development. That led to more "reality-based" characters/promos and less stuff like Thurman Sparky Plugg and TL Hopper.

[Johnny Sorrow]

 

 

 

(remember the Vince speech to the crew after Pillman's death?)

What's this story? I didn't start following stuff on the net til 2004 so there's probably a lot of well known dirtsheet stories from around this time I have no idea of.

After Pillman died, Vince addressed the troops and admitted that some of his ideas weren't working as well as he'd like and encouraged the talent to be more pro-active in their character development. That led to more "reality-based" characters/promos and less stuff like Thurman Sparky Plugg and TL Hopper.

I thought that was after that RAW with the European tourney final that got killed against Nitro.

[Loss]

That was not the RAW that got killed. I mean, it lost to Nitro like every other RAW did, but the RAW that got killed was in South Africa in April and was headlined by Savio Vega vs Crush. For some reason, people think it's the Owen/Davey Boy RAW. It's not.

[Dooley]

 

 

 

(remember the Vince speech to the crew after Pillman's death?)

What's this story? I didn't start following stuff on the net til 2004 so there's probably a lot of well known dirtsheet stories from around this time I have no idea of.

After Pillman died, Vince addressed the troops and admitted that some of his ideas weren't working as well as he'd like and encouraged the talent to be more pro-active in their character development. That led to more "reality-based" characters/promos and less stuff like Thurman Sparky Plugg and TL Hopper.

I thought that was after that RAW with the European tourney final that got killed against Nitro.

 

 

In Foley's book he mentions it was after Pillman died.

[Matt D]

Some book mentions the Owen match. I thought it was Foley's.

[Loss]

A correction ... it was Ahmed Johnson vs Crush. It was the 4/14/97 RAW. The show did a 2.2 rating.

 

The next week was Vince Russo's first week as RAW writer and featured the Bret/Austin ambulance angle.

[Gregor]

Are you sure about this? I remember skimming through Meltzer's WrestlingClassics' posts one day and reading one about how it was the Germany RAW that did it. I'll see if I can find it.

 

Okay:

 

 

It was the week after an early 1997 Raw that had Foley vs. Sid, which did a horrible rating. May have been the show with Owen vs. Davey having the great match in Germany (week after) but I'm not sure. I just remember Sid vs. Foley did an incredibly bad rating. Nitro tripled it, and Vince realized his direction was really wrong.

 

Sid vs. Foley was from the Germany RAW.

[Loss]

Vince Russo has always told the story about the South Africa RAW leading to a meeting the next morning where Vince handed everyone the RAW magazine and said this was the direction the company needed to go, and he was made the head writer at that point. The 3/3 show did a 1.9 rating, which is pretty bad too, but the timeline doesn't fit.

[Loss]

At no point did Nitro triple RAW's rating unless he's talking about a quarter hour.