The cartoonish faux-violence of pro wrestling and the cartoonish
faux sexuality of burlesque make such an obvious combo, it's a cultural
travesty that there aren't hundreds of traveling variety-show extravaganzas
like LAs' Lucha Vavoom. In theory, such an all-wrestling, all-dancing
spectacular would turn fans away at the door in every city they visited. And
yet, Royale was only around two-thirds full Monday night. Perhaps some
burlesque aficionados get squeamish watching guys in masks pretending to hit
each other. Meanwhile, less-adventurous wrestling fans maybe stayed home to
watch Monday Night RAW.
Nuts to those people. Those who braved the rain for Lucha Vavoom
likely enjoyed themselves, even if they weren't always sure what they were seeing,
what lucha libre is, or which wrestlers portrayed the "tecnico," or good guy,
and which played the "rudo," or bad guy.
READ: Spongebob Grabass: Tom Kenny on masked-wrestling melee Lucha Vavoom
Sometimes the distinction was crystal clear, like when the
Crazy Chickens somehow prevailed over Dirty Sanchez and Li'l Cholo. The
Chickens flapped their arm-wings at wildly unadvisable intervals, and their repertoire
consisted mainly of acrobatic modifications of the arm drag takedown - the
least damaging maneuver in all of pro wrestling. Their opponents utilized a
more practical fighting style which emphasized dropping their adversaries on
their heads. The ruthless Sanchez even used his own poop as a foreign object,
but his self-degradation proved futile.
After getting trounced by two guys dressed like chickens, an
enraged Sanchez tossed his poo-soaked undies into the crowd. To my horror, an
onlooker actually PICKED UP THE POO PANTS as if she intended to keep them as a souvenir,
and let her friend TAKE A PICTURE OF HER HOLDING THE POO PANTS. People are disgusting.
In the main event, the tandem of Chupacabra and Mini Chupacabra
fell to Lil' Chicken and probable former male-stripper, El Bombero. The minis seem
amusing, until you realize they both probably outweigh most of us by about 20
pounds of muscle, and would make perilous foes in any legit fist fight. It's
only a matter of time before Lil' Chicken, the most impressive wrestler on this
card, wises up, turns heel, renames himself Death Chicken, and embarks on a
quest for vindication against his former Chicken comrades.
Minor gripe: When comedian Blaine Capatch described an especially
spectacular spot as a "Nice backward whatever that was" deep down, I screamed, "IT'S
CALLED A REVERSE HURRICANRANA, gawddamnit!!! Furthermore, a superplex is NOT
called a ‘back flop!'There is no such move as the ‘back flop!'" Apart from his
failure to know the names of things, he did an alright job, and he paid his
respects to Billy Ruane, which was nice.
The burlesque portion of the show failed to inspire any such
ire. Lux La Croix did the robot to the tune of Kanye West's "Stronger," in
homage to proto-Sci Fi classic Metropolis.
Accomplished Baltimore duo Trixie Little and the Evil Hate Monkey combined swing
dancing and stripping for a routine that straddled the line between humorously erotic
and just kind of weird. At the onset of hula hoop master Karis's act, I thought
to myself, "Hmm, the hula hoop dancer girl isn't wearing pasties, but she's
reeeeally poorly endowed boob-wise. Hey, waitasec...."
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