[dramatic music]
- Introducing the challenger,
the Iron Sheik.
- Wrestling fans believe that
the Iron Sheik was every despicable thing
that he presented himself to be.
- One of the perfect bad guys or heels in wrestling.
- And everybody wanted to come and see him,
hoping that he’d get beat up.
- The Iron Sheik!
Iran! Iran! Iran!
- His work was believable.
The way he talked was believable.
He was very easy to hate.
- Oh, look at that.
Oh, he’s gonna break his back.
- The whole package of being a wrestler in that era
was pretty dark.
- The use of cocaine was prevalent.
- He was developing a very serious drug problem.
- Instead of battling opponents,
they are fighting drug charges.
- This is undoubtedly the most painful part
of the Iron Sheik story.
- He screamed, he howled, he cried.
♪ ♪
- I cried for her so much. I miss her so much.
[crowd booing]
- Sheik gave them maybe the highest element of a heel.
- The biggest box office attraction
that the industry had really ever seen.
- Capacity crowd on the case of the Iron Sheik.
[crowd shouting, chanting]
- People were throwing stuff at him, you know.
That’s how much heat--that people just didn’t like him.
- Sheik now going to work. - Oh!
- It was easy to not like him. He was so different.
- The Sheik loved being hated.
- The Hulk’s gotta come out of it.
If not, it’s over.
- Oh! Oh! - OK!
- USA. [hawks, spits]
- Indeed, the Camel Clutch applied
and I’m sure that’s all she wrote.
- Khosrow did the right thing at the right time
and became larger than life.
♪ ♪
[soft resonant music]
♪ ♪
- Iron Sheik not wasting any time going to work
on that back area.
Look at the pain Backlund’s in.
- He’s now going for the Camel Clutch.
Backlund not so good!
Arnold Skaaland threw something in the ring!
- The new world champion,
the Iron Sheik!
♪ ♪
- Khosrow Vaziri was born in Damghan,
which was a town about 215 miles
outside of Tehran, Iran.
[soft determined music]
After the family lived in the country for a few years,
they made a decision to move to the city, Tehran.
And what the parents did
was they opened up a wrestling gym.
♪ ♪
- Wrestling in Iran was like religion.
If you knew how to wrestle,
that got you in places.
- Wrestling is [speaks Farsi], as they would call it in Farsi.
Iranian men love to wrestle.
And they’re pretty badass at it and good at it.
- He achieved success very quickly.
I mean, he was just so driven.
♪ ♪
- Khosrow Vaziri was, legitimately,
the Iranian army champion, which is saying a lot
in a country where everyone is mad for amateur wrestling.
- After the army, Khosrow had a very sweet job.
He was given a job as an assistant cameraman
at Iranian National Television.
And he worked directly for the Shah’s cousin.
- At the time that the Shah was in power,
the Sheik, who was literally a lethal weapon,
was handpicked by the Shah of Iran and his family
to protect him.
- Later on, you’d hear stories about
the Iron Sheik used to be a bodyguard for the Shah
and everyone thought it was wrestling hype.
It wasn’t wrestling hype. It was legit.
[soft dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- Above all,
the one guy you can say was
the pinnacle of athletics and wrestling
was Gholamreza Takhti.
He was a multi-time Olympic champion gold medalist
and was the pride and joy of the Iranian people.
♪ ♪
So just like all the Iranians growing up,
the Sheik idolized Takhti.
- The Sheik really looked up to Takhti
because Takhti was the kind of wrestler,
the kind of athlete,
the kind of human being he wanted to be.
And at a certain stage,
Takhti began mentoring a young Khosrow Vaziri.
- He was his mentor, he was his idol,
and the Sheik just wanted to be exactly like him.
There was no one else. He had his sights set.
Takhti was the man and Sheik was gonna be
the one to follow in his footsteps.
[soft dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- The problem with Takhti was
he was not that deferential to the Shah.
And the Shah was an absolute ruler.
- The Shah was a brutal dictator.
And Takhti was kind of a man of the people,
a very progressive figure.
- One day, there was a massive soccer match.
And the Shah of Iran was sitting in the stands.
And the fans started to get really disgruntled
and boo him.
And Takhti entered the arena
and everyone started cheering him.
- Now in addition to that, Takhti was not afraid
to speak out about flaws he saw in the Iranian government.
And ultimately, I believe
that led to Takhti’s undoing.
- The death of Takhti is still one of
the country of Iran’s most unsolved mysteries.
Some people said that he was killed
for opposing the government,
while others said that he had committed suicide.
- This seemed very curious to a young Khosrow Vaziri
because he knew Takhti and Takhti was not a man
to take his own life
and became convinced that Takhti was not
the victim of suicide, he was the victim of homicide.
And he drew the conclusion,
if the government can kill Takhti,
who knows what can happen to me.
♪ ♪
- Here’s a cat that was a bodyguard for the Shah,
that if he hadn’t have gotten out of there,
they’d have killed him, man, chopped him up to pieces.
- At that time, Khosrow had been
Princess Farah’s bodyguard in the royal palace.
And he fled.
And he only knew two words in English,
which were "Alan" and "rice."
And when he landed at Minneapolis Saint Paul
International Airport,
he just kept saying "Alan Rice, Alan Rice,"
’cause no one at the airport spoke Farsi.
And Alan Rice was eventually reached.
[soft dramatic music]
♪ ♪
- At the Pan American Games,
Khos had met Alan Rice.
Alan Rice was an American Olympic wrestler
and later the coach of the US Olympic wrestling team.
Alan Rice had made it clear
that he would love for Khos to come to the US
and train with the Minnesota Wrestling Club.
- Mr. Alan Rice was quite a life saver to Khos
in the fact that he took him under his wing.
He treated him like his own son.
♪ ♪
- He was so skilled and so knowledgeable
that Alan Rice, when he became the coach
of the US Olympic team,
he asked Khos to be his assistant coach.
And in 1972 and 1976,
Khosrow Vaziri was an assistant coach
to the US Olympic team.
And this led to his early character in pro wrestling.
Everyone thought he started out as the Iron Sheik.
No, he started out as, basically, an All-American
who would come to the ring with a singlet
with the Olympic rings around it.
And he was depicted as an American hero.
He had the Iranian accent,
he had a full head of hair;
very different character than we saw later on.
♪ ♪
- What a suplex!
- Devastating suplex.
- Oh, well done job by the Sheik.
- Sheik now going to work.
- Iran number one! Iran number one!
[soft serious music]
♪ ♪
- Alan Rice was the head of
the US Amateur Wrestling in Minnesota.
And he was the one that met Khosrow Vaziri,
better known as the Iron Sheik.
My father Verne was the sponsor
for the 1972 Olympic wrestling team.
So that’s how him and Alan Rice got together.
And Alan is the one that eventually asked Verne
if he would take Khosrow
and turn him into a professional wrestler.
- At that time, Minneapolis was Verne Gagne’s
AWA headquarters.
He controlled wrestling
all the way from Chicago to the West Coast.
- It was in an old barn out in Chanhassen, Minnesota.
It was pretty--
[chuckles] It was rough looking.
- Verne Gagne was a little bit on the thrifty side.
They trained in this old barn
under really trying circumstances.
Apparently, it was freezing in the wintertime.
- You know, Verne was not big on
any kind of personal comforts.
- You guys get back in the ring.
Come on, come on, dig, dig, dig, dig!
- It was six days a week.
And it was like almost six hours a day.
- Verne Gagne would beat you and work you like a dog
and stretch you and make you scream in the ring
and make you work on his farm.
- The guys that had been amateur wrestlers
would come in and they could do a really hard workout
that Verne would put them through.
But the other guys,
he would just completely destroy them.
- Two hundred and...thirty.
- That’s kind of how Verne weeded out
those who didn’t belong there.
- He had such high expectations
that only the toughest and the strongest
and the most athletic got through his program.
- Remember, falling is basic. You gotta know how to fall.
If you don’t know how to fall, you’re gonna get hurt.
And if you’re hurt, you can’t wrestle.
And if you can’t wrestle, you don’t eat.
It’s that simple.
- My father actually turned out 133 wrestlers
throughout his career.
And only 1% didn’t make it as a main eventer.
- And this was a really blue chip class.
Ric Flair was in the class,
Jumping Jim Brunzell.
- We got Ken Patera from the Olympics
and then Greg and then Khosrow.
- Drop kick by Gagne.
- Uh-oh, hang on, they’re outside the ring.
- Well, look at that.
- Flair chopping TA to down.
- Ric Flair is in the conversation
for greatest of all time,
alongside the Iron Sheik.
It’s an incredible lineup.
[gentle piano music]
- Well, he was a natural, as far as stamina.
He was in great shape.
The hardest thing that Khosrow had to learn
about pro wrestling was
the fact that he had been indoctrinated so long
by the amateur wrestling and rules.
It was hard to, you know, teach somebody a new trick.
- Dive over the arm. Dive over it.
- If you made it through the 14 weeks of training camp,
you earned the right to become a professional wrestler.
And then Verne would come to you personally
and tell you whether you made it or not.
- From that class, the Sheik got a job,
his first job in America, as a professional wrestler.
But not just a professional wrestler,
he had to be the referee first and he had to drive the truck.
- Myself and Khosrow, we were the two that were picked to--
we had to drive the ring truck around.
- It was hard for him at first
because he had to travel around
to all the small matches around the Midwest.
He had to learn the whole business.
And you know, he’s starting out in his--
probably his mid-30s.
- I mean, this was a man that was coming from
being the bodyguard of the Shah of Iran
to now living this simpler life
and started from scratch.
He wasn’t the Iron Sheik then.
I mean, this was just Khosrow Vaziri.
[soft emotional music]
♪ ♪
- Khosrow Vaziri realized he wasn’t going back to Iran.
And he was enjoying the life of an American.
♪ ♪
So he’s living in Minnesota.
Why not go out with a nice, sweet-natured,
pretty Scandinavian girl? And that’s how he met his wife.
- I met my future husband on a nice summer evening.
And we just hit it off immediately
like we’d known each other forever.
- He was living in Minnesota and he had met his wife.
And so every Saturday night,
as soon as we were done wrestling,
he would drive to Minnesota,
no matter where we were, to visit Caryl
and then would come back for the Monday show.
- Khos doesn’t do anything halfway.
We saw each other, if he was in town, every night.
He was quite intense.
We had Marissa in August, 1976.
And it was an easy birth
compared to the later ones that I had.
- He loved his wife and his family.
And he did everything he could
to be Khosrow Vaziri for them.
[determined music]
♪ ♪
- My understanding is that when the Sheik
first started professional wrestling,
it was more about his history as an athlete,
his Olympic wrestling.
He wore a singlet. He had hair.
He was handsome. He was in shape.
But he wasn’t getting anywhere.
He wasn’t getting where he wanted to go.
- When the Sheik broke into wrestling,
there was no character.
And his entire game was very dry.
- You know, my mother, we were having dinner.
And that’s when she said,
"A good name for you would be ’The Iron Sheik.’"
- The Iron Sheik completely changed
his physical appearance.
And he became the Iron Sheik.
And it was almost this symbol, this foreign menace
that was what so many Americans feared at the time.
- Right now. it’s all one way,
The Sheik is definitely carrying it to him.
- As he developed and personality came out of him,
all of a sudden, the light went on
and he was the Iron Sheik.
- Introducing the challenger, the Iron Sheik!
- Some 60 Americans are now beginning
their sixth day of captivity
inside the US Embassy in Tehran.
- The Iranian students took Americans hostage
at the American embassy.
Lasted for 444 days.
It was broadcast nightly on television.
- This flag was burned Tuesday evening
outside the embassy’s gates.
- When we had conflict with Iran,
all of a sudden that became, "Well, here’s a heel."
And the rest, you know, as they say, is history.
- The Iron Sheik, along with Freddie Blassie,
and they are thick as thieves.
- All of a sudden, he was the Iron Sheik from Tehran.
And he brought a lot of heat.
- The Iron Sheik!
Iran! Iran! Iran!
- And everybody wanted to come and see him
and hoping that he’d get beat up. [chuckles]
- "Iran number one," that’s what he would say.
- Iran number one! Iran!
- He wanted to find an antagonist
to the American protagonist.
What better antagonist than an Iranian?
- Bunch of stupid American here.
They are terrible.
They are sick people. [audience shouting]
- When the Iron Sheik realized
everybody is against this country,
he ramped it up by 11
and realized that this could make him
the biggest villain in wrestling.
Between the accent and the look...
- [speaking Farsi]
- And the way he looked down on the audience and spit.
- Oh, disgusting!
- And the physicality of the way
he brutalized opponents.
- Ramming down across the back.
- Every territory in the United States
wanted the Iron Sheik to be their top bad guy.
- USA. [hawks, spits]
- He would say, "Iran number one. America."
[hawks, spits]
He acted like he was spitting on America.
And he just-- he knew how to press buttons.
- Now in the ring, we have the Iron Sheik.
[crowd booing]
- Every single night, you could turn on the news
and you saw Americans being paraded blindfolded
by Iranian militants.
- This morning for the first time since the hostages
were put under lock and key,
one of the captives, blindfolded,
was brought out into the open.
- So there was not a lot of love for the Iranian people
in the United States at the time.
Sadly, there was also a lot of racism completely unwarranted.
- Back then, they used to call you "effing Iranian."
That was the thing.
They call you "effing Iranian," they beat you up.
- We were made fun of.
We were even tied to a tree once at school.
- If you said "I’m Iranian" or "I was born in Iran,"
you were basically saying, "I’m a hostage taker
"and I support what Iran has done
to your American people."
- So for anyone growing up at that time who was Iranian,
seeing the Sheik on TV was thrilling.
- Here is the winner, the Iron Sheik.
- Though hated and though used as a heel,
it allowed them to have something to cheer for.
- Very, very painful hold.
He’s really pulling back on that man’s skin.
- What made the Sheik such a good villain?
I think it’s real simple.
What you see is what you get.
- He understood the politics of the moment very well.
[crowd chanting] USA! USA!
- Oh, USA.
- In the fans’ eyes, they thought
he was best friends with the Ayatollah.
And in their mind, they could just envision
the Iron Sheik and the Ayatollah
having drinks at the end of the day, right,
and spitting on the American flag.
All of those things helped to solidify
his image of one of the perfect villains,
bad guys, or heels in wrestling.
- So someone sitting at home is going, "Yeah, you know what?
"That guy, he’s probably still working
for those people over there."
And the Iron Sheik played up to everyone’s internal fears
of that foreign menace.
- Wrestling fans believed that the Iron Sheik
was every despicable thing
that he presented himself to be.
[crowd booing]
- One of the rather unusual methods
that you use in your training is
the use of some sort of Persian clubs.
Correct? - Exactly.
Jamilla, leave me alone. Leave me alone.
[speaking Farsi]
- Now that is very difficult.
- He had these things called the Persian clubs
which looked like two enormous bowling pins or something.
He picked those two Persian clubs up
and he just started twirling them over his head
just so gracefully.
It was as if they weighed ten pounds at the most.
- Lifts those 75-pound clubs
and begins to twirl them about.
- Not to use this term lightly,
but unbelievable strength.
Because he could pick ’em up and twirl ’em
like you would a knife and a fork.
- He’s trying to work ’em.
I would think it’s quite easy to get hurt with those clubs,
Bruno, if you don’t know what you’re doing.
- A lot of big, strong, powerful men couldn’t do ’em.
But the Sheik, man, he could use those clubs
like nobody’s business.
- None of us could do it. We all tried.
The damn things were so heavy. And I tried a couple of times,
I thought I was gonna break my wrist.
- I used to watch Sheik doing them freakin’ clubs
inside the locker room.
And then I could see him go over there
and just start twisting his mustache
and start slapping his chest.
- What the Iron Sheik wanted to do was
make his character bigger.
- As you look at the controversial foot gear.
- And the way to do that was add little touches
to his ring attire.
- Make note of the shoes and notice those hooks.
- These are presumably or ostensibly decorations.
- What he would do is, when times got tough,
he would turn his back to the guy he was wrestling.
- He’s loading that boot up now
as we’ve seen him do so many, many times.
- He’d more or less kick his toe into the mat
and supposedly loaded the toe.
- Ron whips into the foot gear.
- Oh, my.
- No, I was never a victim of the Camel Clutch,
and I’m so friggin’ glad I wasn’t.
- Look at him now, setting it up,
pulling the arms back.
Once he gets him, he sets Brock’s back,
it’s give-up time. [bell ringing]
- He’s got him. Look at him pulling on that neck.
And that is painful. [bell ringing]
- The Camel Clutch. Hmm.
A move that you don’t want to be into.
- Oh, he sits back, goodbye, that’s it.
He’s got him cinched. This is undoubtedly it.
- The dreaded Camel Clutch.
- The only move that I still don’t know
how you can get out of, physically.
- It’s an extremely painful
and somewhat torturous maneuver.
- [groans] - He’s got him.
Look at him pulling on that neck.
- Oh, he’s gonna break his back!
- He just had a way of doing it that it was so infuriating.
- Oh, my.
- And he is really raring back. [bell ringing]
- Camel Clutch, fans, that move hurts.
- Perhaps one of the most sadistic men
in professional wrestling today.
[crowd shouting]
- One of the only matches that I actually got hurt
to the point where I had to have stitches
was with Khosrow.
So Khosrow holds a real dear spot in my heart.
[chuckles]
- A group of folks in the audience
with a large American flag
in retaliation to the flag brought in by the Iron Sheik.
- So at one point, Jerry "The King" Lawler
painted the face of the Ayatollah Khomeini
on the Iranian flag.
- We see the likeness of Ayatollah Khomeini
on the colors of Iran and the Iron Sheik.
- We were just talking in the locker room
and I said something about,
"Hey, Sheik, you know, I’m an artist."
I said, I would just think that it would look great
if in the middle of that just empty white space
of that flag,
if I did a portrait of the Ayatollah.
And I’m telling you, immediately his eyes went...
♪ ♪
He said, "Oh, Jerry Lawler, make me famous with this flag."
- He is indeed one of the great
World Wrestling Entertainment athletes.
However, again, a lot of people do not like the Iron Sheik.
- Heat is the power that you have
that’s measured in the way the audience reacts to you.
Heat means they’re booing you.
Heat means that they hate you.
When you really have heat,
people are going to the arena not only wanting you to lose,
but they themselves want to kill you.
That’s the heat that the Iron Sheik had.
- You people shut up.
And don’t cry USA, USA.
USA is a sick country.
- The Sheik had a sense that you go, as a fan,
"I know this guy’s not gonna play fair."
And that type of heat is lasting.
- Go back to your country!
- The heat that the Sheik had,
the word I like to use is blistering.
- Walking out to the ring, the fans started booing him.
He didn’t even have to do anything.
[crowd changing] Iran sucks!
- I know what they’re saying, but I’m not saying it.
- Capacity crowd on the case of the Iron Sheik.
- People were throwing stuff at him, you know.
That’s how much heat--that people just didn’t like him.
- The Iron Sheik!
- Because he was so brash and bold and braggadocio,
it was opposite our views,
it was easy to not like him. He was so different.
- The Sheik loved being hated.
- Camel Clutch. - Oh, look at that!
Oh, he’s gonna break his back!
- And loved doing whatever he could do
to tap into you to get you to hate him.
- Got to release that.
Oh, he’s gonna break his back right in two.
- From Iran,
the Iron Sheik.
- Ooh, devastating suplex.
- Prior to the early 1980s,
wrestling was not a national thing.
It was divided up into territories.
There was no one singular base.
- The country was split up into regional territories.
And the means of distribution were local TV stations.
That’s prior to cable television
and prior to Vince McMahon’s national expansion.
- When Vince Jr. purchased WWE from his father,
he decided that he wanted to take that company national.
- Hello, everyone, welcome to Championship Wrestling.
This is Vince McMahon here at ringside
standing next to wrestling’s living legend,
Bruno Sammartino.
- Vince McMahon came along and had a vision
that I’m gonna go into these local markets
and I’m gonna pay these television stations
to be on the air.
That was the transition, from a business perspective,
that took the WWE from a regional northeast promotion
to a national promotion.
- So we shall return here with the festivities beginning
in just a few moments.
- I think that when Vince McMahon decided
to take WWE national, he knew he wanted a product
that would penetrate pop culture.
And he knew he wanted to show that it was about
these over-the-top, marketable characters.
- The ultimate in sports entertainment,
it’s "Saturday Night’s Main Event."
- That was the vision that transitioned
from professional wrestling to sports entertainment.
And Sheik was a huge part of that.
[crowd booing]
- When Vince took over and
made the WWE what it is today,
he decided that Bob was no longer to be the champion.
- Well, the place needed to be shaken up.
And you had five years of plain white milk toast.
You know, Backlund’s a great wrestler,
but not an attraction.
- By golly, one way or another,
whether he beats me or not,
I’m gonna go in there and fight to the last end.
- Bob was an incredible amateur wrestler.
But Bob didn’t have a whole lot of color.
He didn’t have a character that was very colorful.
- Apparently, Bob Backlund doesn’t think
that certain people should be able to beat him.
And if he was gonna lose a match,
he thought it was important that he lost a match
to somebody that could legitimately beat him.
- Introducing first, to my left, the challenger,
the Iron Sheik. [crowd booing]
- He knew he had the title match.
And he didn’t know how it was gonna end.
- Iron Sheik not wasting any time
going to work on that back area.
This match is underway.
- Bob came into the ring and it was obvious to me
that he was favoring his left arm.
- I was in the crowd at the Garden
the night the Iron Sheik defeated Bob Backlund.
And it was just stunning.
Because Bob Backlund had held the WWE title for five years.
- And he rips him. Look at the pain Backlund’s in.
- Come on! Come on! Sheik!
- You don’t think you’re going to see the title
change hands at the Garden. - Oh!
- Going for the roll up. He got him with the roll up.
There’s the bridge.
Sheik now going for the Camel Clutch.
- People bought tickets to watch the Iron Sheik get beat.
Nothing could upset them more than buying a ticket
to see the Iron Sheik win
the biggest match conceivable,
the WWE Championship match.
[dramatic music]
- Now he’s got it.
He hooked Backlund back.
He’s right in the center of the ring.
- And Backlund’s got a bad neck.
- Pull on it! - Whoa!
Backlund not so good!
Arnold Skaaland threw something in the ring!
[yelling]
- If I’m correct, it’s the same as a sedition.
We have a new champion in the World Wrestling Federation.
- When the Iron Sheik won the title,
I mean, it rocked the wrestling world.
- Threw the towel in-- I can’t believe it.
- I’m sure Backlund didn’t say a word.
- I was sitting in the front row.
And they said that he won and he put the hand in the air
and I was numb.
I was like, "No way."
- And the new World Wrestling Entertainment
Heavyweight Champion,
the Iron Sheik!
- It’s theater and drama at its highest.
Shakespeare would have been proud.
- It was stunning. Like, I kept thinking
there was gonna be some type of reversal.
- Iran number one! Iran!
- And Sheik walked out of there with that title.
And we basically ushered in a new era.
[crowd booing]
- The Iron Sheik from Tehran, Iran,
currently wears the gold.
- Sheik really had a recipe of what makes a great heel.
- Oh, what a boot.
- There was nothing really to like
about the Sheik in his prime.
He was a really, really good heel.
- Everything was believable about him.
His look was believable,
the way he talked was believable,
and so he was very easy to hate.
- Indeed, the Camel Clutch applied,
and I’m sure that’s all she wrote.
- The fans who loved to hate him
would also love to hurt him.
- Iran number one! Iran number one!
- They’re asking somebody to bear the brunt of this
and actually, you know, risk their life.
- I knew there were problems because
I was good friends with the Iron Sheik’s wife.
You know, the mail would come and,
"Oh, my gosh, there’s another death threat."
And I was like, "Oh, my God, you gotta be kidding me."
- I mean, the guy had to be escorted by police.
He had to go into the trunks of cars to leave the buildings.
- The fans were really out of control sometimes.
Sometimes he’d even be stabbed in the arm.
- I’m sure he’s been cut. We’ve all been cut.
That’s sort of your baptism of fire
when somebody cut you.
- No guy had bigger cojones than him.
He was walking around
at the height of people hating Iranians
and walking into stadiums,
stadiums with 70,000 people that all wanted to kill him.
I mean, you don’t have bigger balls than that.
♪ ♪
- When the Iron Sheik won the WWE Championship,
I think fans didn’t realize
that they were seeing the end of an era.
♪ ♪
- If you want to make a great hero
and you’re looking for a new hero
to lead your company,
he has to overcome something big.
And to beat someone like Bob Backlund
that had been a fan favorite for many years,
that’s not a way to make a hero.
Because you’re beating a hero doing that.
However, if you have an evil menace like the Iron Sheik
come in and beat your All-American hero
and make him throw in the towel,
then you need a larger-than-life hero
to come in and overtake that nemesis.
- What happened to Bob Backlund?
What happened to his arm? What happened to his shoulder?
Now they’re billing the Hulk Hogan,
the biggest American animal.
- When the Iron Sheik won the WWE Championship,
it signaled a change in how the business
would be presented.
The Iron Sheik was a supervillain.
He would go on to be defeated by a superhero, Hulk Hogan.
And the Hulkamania era would begin.
- There he is, Hulkamania.
[crowd cheering]
- Take a look at this.
- Back here at Madison Square Gardens,
history has just been made for the first time in five years,
the World Heavyweight Champion, or should I say ex-World
Heavyweight Champion, Bob Backlund
dethroned by the Iron Sheik.
- So I’m hanging out in this bar
after the match at Madison Square Garden
and fans are speculating
about what might happen next.
And one guy who’s standing at the bar says,
"I heard that Hulk Hogan is gonna come in
and win the title."
And I look at my friend and I go,
"Where’s this guy getting his information?
"Hulk Hogan’s working for Verne Gagne in Minnesota.
Never would happen in a million years."
- Vince’s vision of taking a company national,
he had to have a hood ornament.
He had to have a centerpiece.
- Wrestling, when it’s at its best,
has a good guy and a bad guy.
- Place hold that, my beautiful Iranian flag.
- To set that protagonist up, the equal antagonist
with the equal protagonist, Hulk versus Sheik,
it was a match made in heaven.
- You gonna bring that animal Hulk Hogan for no reason.
Because I don’t know the guy. I never met the guy.
- It doesn’t get any better than that.
I mean, that’s the perfect storyline,
the perfect reality-based storyline.
And it wasn’t something a writer wrote.
It was really happening.
- Verne Gagne, in particular, was very resentful of this.
Because until very recently,
Hulk Hogan had been working for him.
- So the story that the Iron Sheik has told,
that Verne Gagne called him and said, "Sheiky baby,
"do not lose the title to Hogan.
"Go out there, break his leg,
"and bring the title back to Minnesota.
I’ll give you $100,000."
- Now, he had trained Khosrow Vaziri.
His wife had given Khosrow the Iron Sheik name.
And so there was this mentality that
the Iron Sheik owes us a favor.
- Verne got to him and said,
"If you break Hulk Hogan’s leg, I’ll give you 100 grand."
- This is the main event.
It is for the World Wrestling Entertainment
Heavyweight Championship.
- Well, the reaction was insane.
I came out spinning and turning in 20 different directions.
And got up on the apron and I pointed at the Sheik.
The roof blew off the building.
And I came and I ripped the shirt off.
It was already there.
- Introducing first, the challenger,
from Venice Beach, California,
the Incredible Hulk Hogan!
- As I’m going through this, I’m going, "Oh, my gosh,
this is gonna be a huge lightning bolt to ride."
- As Hulkamania definitely has hit the Big Apple.
- Look how powerful that Hulk Hogan is.
- Into the ropes and he nails him right on the chin.
Look at him go, into the corner, nobody home.
Sheik now going to work.
- The Hulk’s gotta come out of it.
If not, it’s over for the Hulk.
- It had been so established,
the Camel Clutch with the Iron Sheik,
that once he put it on you, nobody got out of it.
- He’s got him.
No one has been able to escape it.
- I knew if I broke the hold, the place would erupt.
And it was already over.
Once I got out of the Camel Clutch
and backed him into the turnbuckle,
the only thing left to do was drop the leg on him.
- Look at, he’s powering his way up.
Hulk Hogan now stands up with the Sheik
and rams him into the corner turnbuckle.
And Hulk Hogan, he drops the big leg on him.
He’s down for the count after the leg.
One, two. He got him!
[crowd cheering]
[bell ringing]
- You couldn’t have had a better person
to take the strap off of Bob and then give it to Hulk.
- It changed the wrestling world, without a doubt.
I mean, it exploded. It just went wild.
- You have arrived, Hulk Hogan.
- I’ve never seen anything as beautiful as this, Mean Gene.
This belt is part yours, too.
- The fact that he had to lose the belt to Hulk Hogan,
it was like hemorrhaging a blood vessel.
It was so painful.
- The Iron Sheik was that key in transitioning
from the quote, unquote "real athlete"
to the quote, unquote "real superhero."
And part of that was because the Iron Sheik was both.
Hulk Hogan, I’m not done with you.
I touch you tonight from one of your people
and I’m gonna make him suffer so bad.
- You can say he passed the baton off to Hogan.
But it was a brand new baton
because our industry was about to go down a road
that had never been done before.
And the Sheik and the Hulk were your headliners,
the biggest box office attraction that the industry
had really ever seen.
- Fans, I’m telling you--
- People were so happy that that son of a bitch
no longer had that world title.
Taking it from the Sheik,
that was huge.
♪ ♪
- Had the Iron Sheik not been generous enough
and passed the torch,
WWE may have never become the juggernaut we know today.
- Now the Iron Sheik’s bleeding profusely.
- With all the heat and mad feelings
that the fans had for the Iron Sheik,
that just made that win by Hulk Hogan even greater.
And that’s how great of a villain he was
that he could pass that torch right on
in a way that it made Hulk Hogan
the biggest name in wrestling.
- Hulkamania is here!
♪ ♪
- I think Sheik gave them maybe the highest element of a heel.
- The fans are giving it to him.
- And Hulk gave them the highest element of a baby face
at a time where that really worked.
- The big leg drop!
Look out, Hulk!
- I think the Iron Sheik fit right in
with what the WWE had planned for its brand.
Was he gonna remain in the main event forever?
No.
But I think that WWE had long-term plans
to keep the Iron Sheik character
as part of their catalog.
- Now ladies and gentlemen, there it is,
the submission of the Camel Clutch.
[bell dinging] And enough is enough.
- Khosrow did the right thing at the right time
and became larger than life.
- Iran number one!
Look at USA. [hawks, spits]
- He spit. Oh, God, wait a minute!
- Hold on! Hold on! - Wait a minute! Wait a minute!
Sergeant Slaughter just came in!
Sergeant Slaughter, oh, he-- - Oh!
- Iron Sheik,
I declare war on you.
- Oh, my word.
- War!
[crowd cheering]
- And we have a new champion!
History made in Madison Square Garden
as Hulkamania has taken over.
- The thing that made the Sheik so unique
is that a loss in a big match
wasn’t gonna take away his heat.
- OK, the Iron Sheik,
he’ll head back to the dressing room
after taking another vicious pounding.
- After losing the title to Hulk Hogan,
while yes, he doesn’t maintain in the WWE title picture,
that doesn’t mean another American hero can’t come along.
- After the Sheik loses the title to Hulk Hogan,
he’s immediately put into another rivalry
with Sergeant Slaughter.
It’s natural, Sergeant Slaughter is a US Marine.
That’s his character.
And the Iron Sheik is an Iranian terrorist.
That’s the gimmick that he’s portraying.
- Do I look like a Gomer Pyle?
I can’t hear you, maggot.
- Sergeant Slaughter was not, like, a good guy.
He was a bad guy, Sergeant Slaughter.
He did a lot of bad things to other good wrestlers.
- People loved Sergeant Slaughter.
He was GI Joe.
And then the Iron Sheik’s this evil bastard
that has to be beaten.
- Listen to them chanting, "We want Slaughter."
- Everyone wants him but the Iron Sheik.
- Vince McMahon Senior invited me out for dinner.
So I started telling him, "Why don’t you let
Sergeant Slaughter declare war on the Iron Sheik?"
- Sergeant Slaughter just came in.
- And the people were so happy to see
Sergeant Slaughter go against the Iron Sheik.
Iron Sheik,
I declare war on you!
[crowd cheering]
War!
So I declared war on him and off to the races we went.
♪ ♪
- In a return bout, it will be what they’re calling
a boot camp match.
- Everyone on their feet. USA, everyone.
- Now they’re having highly emotional matches.
They put the Iron Sheik and Sergeant Slaughter
in the main event in Madison Square Garden.
They have this very bloody match
called a boot camp match.
- Look out, Sergeant’s gonna explode.
- Oh! Oh! - OK!
Oh, he rammed his head right into that pointed boot.
Sarge is bleeding profusely! - Oh!
Oh, no.
- I’ll never forget watching that boot camp match
between the Sheik and Slaughter.
As a kid, I had never seen blood like that.
- Suplex!
Look at the Sheik fighting now.
- Oh, a big uppercut sends the Iranian down to the canvas.
- The Sheik didn’t need to win to win.
He did his job and he created a feeling.
♪ ♪
That’s the best win is when you get a reaction.
And it doesn’t matter who comes out on top.
- This bout a double disqualification.
[crowd booing]
- Because of the rivalry with Sergeant Slaughter,
the Iron Sheik was main eventing.
People wanted the Iron Sheik on every card.
So the Iron Sheik lost nothing
in sacrificing the title to Hulk Hogan.
- I’m gonna spit to your fat body, American.
[hawks, spits] Soldier!
- [speaks Farsi]
- Sheik obviously embraced his heritage.
And that made him nothing but money.
But it made him money because of his opponents
that were red, white, and blue
or stood for everything right in this world.
And Sheik didn’t mind standing
for everything wrong in this world.
- Oh, he just drove a knee right in the midsection.
Incredible.
♪ ♪
- At this point in time, the Sheik, financially,
had to be doing better than he ever thought he would do.
- I can’t help it if you’re too dumb
to watch where you’re going.
- That’s it.
That is straw that camel cannot carry.
From now on, I am through with you.
Pa-tooey.
- That cartoon, we thought was so cool.
I mean, we were really, really enamored by the cartoon.
- The cartoon made all us superheroes.
The cartoon just put extra gas on the fire.
- Anything that had Hulk Hogan or Sergeant Slaughter on it
would have to have the Iron Sheik on it.
The Iron Sheik became a household name.
- Oh, you make me sick.
Are you the Hulk Hogan? - [laughing]
- Are you really? - Stay here.
- You want to be like the Sheik?
- Get up you coward, you. [laughing]
- Khosrow made a lot of money on that action figure.
The very first dolls that came out,
one quarter he made $87,000.
- I remember he got his check in the dressing room.
I believe it was $100,000 check.
And I remember he thought it was $10,000.
- Thumb wrestle anywhere with Hulk and the Iron Sheik.
- OK, kids, back to class. [children yelling]
- Wrestle anywhere with
Wrestling Superstars Thumbwrestlers.
- The rewards were great.
But the sacrifices sometimes were even greater.
♪ ♪
It can be a very glamorous life.
But it can also be a very lonely and painful life.
- I think one of the hardest things to be
is a professional wrestler.
You’re gonna miss birthdays, big holidays, and all that.
- You’re away from your family.
You’re with other wrestlers
more than you are your children or your wife.
- My husband was usually gone like a month or two at a time.
- You know, when he got home,
he didn’t want to go out or be much in the public.
And he was with us all the time.
- When he came home,
they would run and hug and kiss him.
They adored their dad.
Nobody could touch their dad.
- He was such a great role model and father.
And all he wanted to do was
teach us how to be good people.
- As a father, he adores his kids.
He’d give ’em anything,
anything in his power that he could.
- The Iron Sheik’s family
suffered like everybody else’s family,
except he also was developing
a very serious drug problem.
So in some ways, it can be argued
that they even suffered more.
[crowd booing]
- The whole package of being a wrestler
in that era was pretty dark.
Outside of the 15 minutes you are in the match
and in the ring,
you have to live a very lonely life.
- I have the number one man right here.
- At times, the industry is our own worst enemy.
There is that transition from the high of the match
to coming back down.
And when the adrenaline wears off,
the pain steps in.
And the crutch enters the equation.
And it is a pathway to death.
[crowd shouting]
- Ladies and gentlemen, this is a tag team match
scheduled for one fall.
- You know, when I think about the combination
of the Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkoff, oh, my gosh.
We hated Iranians. We hated the country of Iran.
- From Tehran, Iran, the Iron Sheik!
- And then Nikolai Volkoff, we’ve always hated Russia.
How could you pile on any more heat?
- From the Soviet Union, Nikolai Volkoff!
- The thing about heat in wrestling is that
you really have to balance it.
And the Iron Sheik was at this place
where it was maybe time to freshen it up a little bit.
The Iran hostage crisis was over.
So what can we do to get the audience mad
at the Iron Sheik again?
Well, what about the Cold War?
- Look at this power display by the big Russian.
- One-armed choke!
- Look at that awesome back breaker.
- What if Russia and Iran combined forces?
How much would you hate that?
And the answer that the WWE fans gave is "a lot."
- Now you people shut up and don’t say "USA."
Iran number one!
Russia number one!
USA, Canada-- [hawks, spits]
- Naturally, anybody that they thought
could wave the American flag in the face
of Nikolai Volkoff and the Iron Sheik,
the fans would go crazy for.
- They wanted Nikolai to come out and go,
"Sheiky, baby, I’m gonna sing the Russian national anthem,"
[vocalizing], whatever.
- [singing in Russian]
- He came in and sang the Russian national anthem,
that actually wasn’t the Russian national anthem,
but that’s OK. No one knew that.
Can you sing the Russian national anthem?
No. Neither can I,
but by God, I can sing Nikolai Volkoff’s version
of whatever it was he was singing.
- [singing in Russian]
- Those two equaled the ultimate heat.
- You take these two foreign, evil wrestlers,
put them in a team together,
you know that people are gonna come to see those guys.
- What a match up this is gonna be.
WrestleMania delivering everything it promised to be.
- WrestleMania I was the biggest wrestling show
that the United States had ever seen.
It was before pay-per-view existed.
- And Mike Rotunda picks him up,
holds him up and a big body slam.
- Now he’s going into the Sheik’s boot.
- Oh!
- Windham off the top with the big elbow.
Nikolai Volkoff dropped by the Iron Sheik!
- Both of those guys worked on top.
So now you put ’em together, and you get
a whole ’nother way to market the heat.
- And the champions are in trouble.
- Oh, sunset flip over the top.
Got the big guy! - Look it!
Big right hand by Windham, another right, another right,
a series of left and rights to the body.
He’s going for the Bulldog.
- Oh, he nailed him with it!
This could be it. And oh, the Sheik comes in.
- This is another notch for the Sheik.
Of all these unique moments that he’s been in,
that proves that you’re important in the business
when you win the title,
especially back then
when there’s only a handful of titles in the business.
- Referee now just admonishing Mike Rotunda.
Look at this! Oh, he nailed him with a cane!
The Iron Sheik got ahold of Blassie’s cane.
He’s gonna get counted out here, gents.
And new champions. New champions of the world.
- To hold a world title or a tag team world title,
you know, it had to make him feel like
all this was worth it.
- Iron Sheik, you finally have done it.
You’re now World Wrestling Entertainment
tag team champions. - You know, Gene Mean,
our country is the best.
We come to the America to prove it.
Look at us! - Number one! Number one!
[all shouting at once]
- Those two guys would argue with each other
so much before and after a match, it was unbelievable.
It was amazing that they could still remain
tag team partners because they were saying,
"You dumb son of a gun." And, "You’re dumb."
- They were always butting heads.
And if something happened in the ring,
they’d blame each other and it was hilarious.
- They’re all on their feet, I guarantee you that,
all 93,000.
- WrestleMania I was a huge success.
And public awareness for WWE only grew and grew and grew.
And the biggest example of that is probably
two years after the first WrestleMania,
when WrestleMania III happens in front of 93,000 people
in Pontiac, Michigan,
for a show like nobody in wrestling has seen before.
- Number one!
- Here are the Killer Bees!
- [singing in Russian]
- WrestleMania III was nothing more than
a background for the debut of Hacksaw Jim Duggan.
- Hacksaw Jim Duggan and his 2x4 enter into the ring.
- You’re not singing that Russian national anthem
because this is the land of the free
and the home of the brave!
- The finish of our match incorporated
a young Jim Duggan.
Jim Duggan comes running in
and takes his 2x4
and he’s wailing on Khosrow.
And we get disqualified.
- This match is over right now.
- Needless to say, that spun a program
between Jim Duggan and Khosrow.
- USA! USA! USA! USA!
- You can only imagine, a relatively young guy,
I got my 2x4 with a flag on it.
I go running out.
Whack, I hit Nikolai.
Whack, I hit the Sheik.
I chase everybody out of the ring.
I’m standing in front of 93,000 people
with a flag and 2x4 overhead.
Hair’s standing up now, brother,
it’s a moment I’ll remember my whole life,
it really was.
- Slams him down to the canvas.
Hacksaw coming off and rams the knee
right into the midsection.
- [shouts]
- At this time in the ’80s,
the use of cocaine was prevalent
in all areas of our society.
Entertainers, athletes, you name it.
- It’s a rock-and-roll lifestyle, brother.
I mean, there’s a lot of drugs and a lot of women.
A lot of people got caught up in that lifestyle.
And I can’t throw no stones.
- The number of people snorting cocaine
is rising steadily despite the steep price.
It is also increasingly popular with adults,
especially among the Sheik.
- Apparently, the Sheik liked his medicine,
and it was wrestling, drinking, drugs, wrestling.
- He was devout Muslim
when he was first, you know, in amateur wrestling.
And he didn’t drink, he didn’t smoke.
But the problem is that pro wrestling
offered so many doggone things to him that he--
you know, he got lost.
- Vince came in one day and said,
"Sheik, I need to talk to you."
He said, "You took the drug test, right?"
"Oh, yes, boss, I took the drug test. I took it."
He said, "Well, you came back positive."
"Oh, yes, sir.
I’m positive, boss. I’m always positive."
- You know, he tested positive for substances.
"Oh, I can’t believe. Very good, right? Right?"
I said, "No, bro, you tested positive.
That is very bad."
- You know, Sheik made headlines
for a lot of the right reasons through his career.
And then there were times during his career
he made them for the wrong reason.
- They are known to wrestling fans
as the Iron Sheik and Hacksaw.
Now, instead of battling opponents,
they are fighting drug charges together.
- I’m here to tell you right now.
I’m holding that Iranian Sheik hostage.
- So right around this time,
the Iron Sheik’s new American hero foe
is Hacksaw Jim Duggan.
- Everything, I’m on top of the world.
Things are going so good for me, I cannot believe it.
You know, and now we’re-- I’m getting ready,
we’re wrestling in Asbury Park, New Jersey.
- And the Iron Sheik and Hacksaw fly into
Newark Airport.
And the Iron Sheik sees Hacksaw there
and he says, "If you’re gonna rent a car,
why don’t I ride to the show with you?"
- The Sheik and Duggan were supposed to hate each other.
One guy is the flag-waving All-American,
the other one is the Iranian terrorist.
And here they were in a car together
doing illegal things.
- The worst thing about it is,
they were gonna wrestle each other that night.
So any way you looked at it, it wasn’t good.
- Hacksaw Jim Duggan and the Iron Sheik
get in the car together.
They stop at a liquor store along the way.
They get some beers for the road.
They keep driving. They get pulled over.
They’ve got drugs along with the alcohol in the car.
- They got the Sheik out and he carried a purse.
And they opened up the purse, boom,
right on top, a gram of cocaine.
Now they got the Sheik hooked up.
Now the police car, vroom, vroom,
there’s eight or ten police cars.
People are driving by, they’re going,
"Hey, there’s Hacksaw Jim and the Iron Sheik?"
- They got out of jail, by the way,
in time to make the show
and still wrestle each other that night.
- We worked together that night in Asbury Park.
We didn’t tell anybody.
So we got to the hotel that night.
I called my wife, I’m like, "Honey,"
I said, "We got popped
but nobody knows about it."
She calls me about 5:30 the next morning--
everybody knows!
- Police say marijuana was found in the ashtray
and they also found cocaine in some luggage.
By the way, Duggan and the Iron Sheik
are supposed to be bitter rivals.
- We went to our parents
and we’re like, "Mom, did you see this?"
And she was like, "I can’t believe it.
I’m so disgusted."
And we’re like, "Us too.
What were they doing together in the same car, Mom?"
- So the arrest of Sheik and Duggan
pulled the curtain back on our industry
in a way that had never really been pulled back.
[crowd cheering]
- Weighing 275 pounds,
Hacksaw Jim Duggan! - Hooo!
- Up until this stage, even fans who knew
that things were predetermined could live in denial.
Once these mortal enemies were arrested
in each other’s company,
it was pretty hard to delude yourself like that.
- It killed kayfabe.
Kayfabe is the good guy versus bad guy.
It was always never supposed to be together.
You’re never supposed to ride together.
- That’s the first no-no in the wrestling business.
The good guys don’t ride with the bad guys.
- You can’t have the Ninja Turtles
and Shredder in the same car
driving to the show together.
- Turn on the TV set
and all I see is this Iranian over here,
this Russian over here,
yelling and jawing at the mouth.
Well, Hacksaw Jim Duggan’s here to take on any man, one on one.
- Great American hero, Hacksaw Jim Duggan,
who swore that he would defeat his enemy,
that Iranian Iron Sheik,
but yet they’re really friends in real life?
- Kind of-- the curtain was pulled back.
Well, I’ll say this, I think the curtain was yanked back.
- And now everybody knew it was all a show.
[crowd chanting] USA! USA! USA! USA! USA!
- All of a sudden, that’s when it became entertainment.
And it really became bigger since that happened.
We told everybody, "Hey, it’s entertainment,"
you know?
That old story, for those who believe,
no explanation is necessary, you know what I mean?
- And news today that professional wrestler
Iron Sheik has escaped the hold of some recent drug charges.
The judge in Freehold yesterday dropped the charges,
providing he complete a year’s probation
and submit to drug testing in the future.
- You know, I think the WWE still valued the Iron Sheik
and more importantly valued him as a human being.
So they did send him to rehab at this point.
- We know it was a pretty low period for him.
He really didn’t have much going on in terms of bookings.
And he would just take whatever he could.
- He lost his job.
He came home.
He was miserable and sulking.
And he started working for independent promoters.
- The Sheik ended up going to WCW.
But he never really picked up traction over there.
He was a long way from headlining
Madison Square Garden and it was a little sad.
- USA! - Hey, Madison Park.
[vocalizing]
- Well, he may be an Iranian champion,
but he’s not too smart. And we’ll be right back.
- For whatever reason,
Vince McMahon always had a soft spot for the Iron Sheik.
- I wanna show something to the people.
- In comes the Iron Sheik-- another chance.
Because Vince just had a soft spot for the Iron Sheik,
and that Iron Sheik didn’t take Verne Gagne’s blood money,
if you will, and break Hulk Hogan’s leg.
And there was a loyalty there.
- What was going on then was the Gulf War.
So we don’t need an Iranian sympathizer anymore.
We need an Iraqi sympathizer.
And that’s where Sergeant Slaughter, of all people,
comes back into the story.
- We took the All-American hero, Sergeant Slaughter,
and made Sergeant Slaughter an Iraqi sympathizer.
- Got a little snake bit. [laughing]
- He had a manager named Colonel Adnan.
And then the Iron Sheik would be brought back in,
but this time as Colonel Mustafa,
who would be part of Sergeant Slaughter’s faction,
the Triangle of Terror.
- Twirl that mustache. Get everything looking pretty.
- I don’t know what it is about this guy that’s so revolting.
But let’s look at him in action there.
- He was the thimble there.
He kind of helped put it all together.
The Triangle of Terror was really a great entity.
- When we did that,
it was the emergence of Saddam Hussein in Iraq.
This was before we declared war on Iraq.
- When we actually went to war,
the WWE was too deep into the story
to kind of turn back.
So we actually had somebody on television
sympathizing with the enemy’s side in a war
that we were actively in,
creating what I would call nuclear heat.
- And now the Colonel goes to work.
- He may be even dirtier than Sergeant Slaughter.
- [hawks, spits]
- And so we’re shooting for SummerSlam ’91.
Gonna be Hulk Hogan, the Ultimate Warrior,
against the Triangle of Terror.
- SummerSlam is going to be
a match made in hell.
- We go back to Madison Square Garden,
and WWE puts on SummerSlam 1991.
- We’re ready to go here. The bell has sounded.
We’re underway.
- Slaughter is a traitor.
And he can’t get enough tonight, in my mind.
- Oh, reversal!
- Oh! - Oh!
- It was Hulk Hogan and the Ultimate Warrior,
at that time, two iconic heroes in WWE,
facing the entire Triangle of Terror.
- Warrior chasing Adnan and Mustafa
all the way back to the locker room.
- What did Hogan use there? One time and the count--
- A little bit of powder and a one, two, three.
[bell ringing] And it’s all over.
- Remember, Allah always help Khosrow Vaziri.
- In the mid ’90s, Vince McMahon
once again finds it in his heart
to bring the Iron Sheik back.
This time he’s not being brought in
as a wrestler anymore, those days are over.
He’s brought in as a co-manager
with his old enemy, Bob Backlund.
The two managed a new not-quite-discernible
foreign menace named the Sultan.
- Camel Clutch! - Pull, Sheik, pull!
- The Sultan doesn’t resonate with crowds.
- The Sheik is begging for mercy.
- Fan attention goes elsewhere
and the Sheik doesn’t last that long.
- Booyah!
[resonant music]
♪ ♪
- The Sheik is really down and out at this point.
And he’s struggling financially.
♪ ♪
- He wasn’t making money, and it was rough.
And we lost our house, we lost our condo.
- And at one point, he’s on the road,
working in some small building.
And someone turns him onto crack cocaine.
And this commences a very sad stage
in the Iron Sheik’s life.
- He would go on a binge
for like five, six days, not sleep.
- He would go on binges for nights upon nights.
And he wouldn’t return home.
His family was in the crossfires of this era.
And the Sheik really-- he wasn’t himself.
He wasn’t the guy that he was proud of.
- His drug use was a real problem.
It was a real issue.
♪ ♪
- The next time I ran into
Khosrow was at
the Gimmick Battle Royal
in Houston, Texas.
♪ ♪
- It was a big moment for him
because he was really feeling down.
He was in a really dark period.
And that match kind of gave him a boost.
♪ ♪
- WrestleMania X-Seven, the Gimmick Battle Royal,
they bring all of their best gimmicks back
and put them all in the ring
for an over-the-top rope contest.
♪ ♪
- We had Khosrow introduced early
because it was a long walk down to the ring.
- It was probably about a 70-yard walk to the ring.
And it took Sheik forever.
And so Bobby Heenan made the comment, he goes--
- By the time the Iron Sheik gets to the ring,
it’ll be WrestleMania 38.
- Just as I was to go out, I got grabbed.
And Vince McMahon said to me,
"Uh, we got a little problem."
- The Sheik had put on an awful lot of weight
and was very fragile.
So it was like, well, who the hell’s gonna get him
up over the top rope?
♪ ♪
And then if they do, what’s that gonna look like?
And it was decided upon that Sheik would win the thing.
- The reason that the Iron Sheik was declared
the victor of the match
was because his knees were shot
and so he couldn’t take an over-the-top rope fall.
So in order to avoid throwing the Iron Sheik
over the top rope,
they just had him win.
- Watch this! Watch this!
The Iron Sheik wins it! The Iron Sheik wins it!
- They were kind enough to let him win.
It meant the world to him.
- My life had many turn,
some good, some bad.
- There is no moment more impactful on the Sheik’s life
than the loss of his daughter, Marissa.
- This is undoubtedly the most painful part
of the Iron Sheik story.
He had three daughters,
Tanya, Nikki, and Marissa.
Marissa was a beautiful 27-year-old woman.
Somewhere along the line,
Marissa had found a boyfriend
who, from what I heard,
was taking more than he was giving.
- We weren’t impressed.
We thought, "Marissa, you’re so beautiful.
What are you doing with this guy?"
[somber music]
- And she was resolved to end the relationship.
And apparently, when she informed him of this,
he strangled her to death.
- Marissa was strangulated
by this gentleman, Charles Reynolds.
- And then he put her body underneath a blanket
and brought the covers up to her chin
and called his minister
and admitted his crime.
♪ ♪
- Khos went crazy when he found out.
He screamed.
He howled.
He cried.
It was just the worst time of our life.
- It was like, why would God do this?
And we really don’t know why
this guy crossed into her life.
I mean, after two weeks.
It was crazy.
[somber music]
♪ ♪
- This is a man in severe pain
who also blamed himself largely
for what happened to his daughter.
Because he felt that if he’d been a better role model,
his daughter might have made better choices.
And all he was doing was punishing himself.
♪ ♪
- This was his biggest loss.
And there was nothing he could do about it.
And that was the most frustrating thing for him.
And so he kept on going to a darker place
through this era.
- There was an incident where the daughter’s killer
was in court.
And the Sheik put a razor blade in his mouth
and he was planning to go up to the front of the courtroom
and cut the man’s throat.
- He was ready to go to prison for the rest of his life
to get revenge.
And fortunately, his family
physically leaned their bodies against him
to prevent him from doing that.
- They said, "No, Daddy, I can’t lose you,
I just lost my sister. I can’t lose my dad."
- I think that that resonated with him.
And that’s why he didn’t, at that moment,
you know, come at him.
- The man was not attacked. He went back to his cell.
And the Sheik’s surviving children
still had their father.
♪ ♪
[soft tense music]
- After the Iron Sheik’s daughter died,
there wasn’t much positivity in the Iron Sheik’s life.
He really was a lost soul.
And he didn’t have a lot to look forward to.
And then 2005, WWE decides
to induct the major stars of WrestleMania I
into the Hall of Fame, including the Iron Sheik.
- I can stand up here for many, many hours
talking about the Iron Sheik.
- It’s a real life. It’s a real life story.
And the Hall of Fame means everything to us
because it means we’re recognized
by our business and by our peers.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
- It really meant a lot to him.
And even to this day,
that is something he absolutely cherishes.
- Like, I think that that was the highlight of his life.
And he just let everything out
on all the hardships he had endured over the years
to get to that point.
- I used to drive the truck,
put on the ring, pick up the ring--yeah!
And I was referee. I paid my dues!
- You know, it was Sheik’s moment in the sun.
And Sheik got exactly what he deserved.
- I mean, he stole the show that night.
- I was 180 pound,
but I was so much fall in love with wrestling.
- He tells a story. He stops.
He starts again. Everyone applauds.
- I made it to the Hall of Fame!
Yeah!
- They think his story is over.
He tells another story.
He thanks everybody. Everyone applauds.
And then he tells another story.
- So I want to say again-- [crowd laughing]
I want to say again--
- It’s probably one of the greatest
induction speeches of all time.
- And a special thanks to Mr. Sergeant Slaughter
and all WWE.
- It meant the world to him. Why wouldn’t it?
My God, man, you sacrificed your whole life
and your family to get a friggin’ ring?
Hell, that’s not it.
It’s the fact that I got one and you don’t.
God bless you guys. [speaking Farsi]
Peace! Yeah!
- Sheik, you got a telephone call.
[cheers and applause]
- After years of watching the Iron Sheik struggle,
after years of financial insecurity,
after heartbreak,
after one rehab stint after another,
his wife Caryl just had to leave him.
She was just fed up.
- I found out he was using crack cocaine
with another one of his fellow wrestlers
and got to the point where we couldn’t stand him around.
We never knew what kind of personality he would have.
- You say the Iron Sheik is a heavy drug addict?
- At--at home.
Here, when he’s with me, he’s perfect.
- Right. What’s going on, Sheik?
I’m worried about you.
- I don’t like to hear.
Come tell me I spent the money for the crack
or coke or marijuana.
- Are we lying? - [bleep]
- Are we lying? - Is he doing coke?
- You’re lying! - I’m not lying.
- Who lying? Me?
- I remember thinking at the time
I didn’t feel like there was any way he would come back
from where he had gone to,
as far as how far gone he had gone on the drugs.
- The best thing to ever happen was my mom leaving him.
[soft emotional music]
♪ ♪
- When I finally left him,
that’s when he stopped drinking, smoking,
all drugs, everything.
♪ ♪
- Despite many trips to rehab,
it was that woman that cleaned him up.
And he did it for her and his kids.
And it brought back the dad we knew as little girls,
the sweet, drug-free, alcohol-free man
who loved and worshiped his wife and daughters.
♪ ♪
- He went back to being the man he was meant to be,
the man who his parents named Khosrow of the Immortal Soul.
♪ ♪
- From Tehran, Iran,
the Iron Sheik.
- Devastating suplex. Oh, and a boot.
- Sheik’s legacy, an icon, a legend.
- It’s like a book of fiction.
The odds of a kid from Iran
being a household name in American pop culture.
It’s really hard to wrap your head around that.
And you people shut up and don’t come USA!
USA is a sick country!
- I’ve always felt like
he completely defines the American dream.
- As far as Iranians and Iranian Americans
and how the diaspora of Iranians in this country
have found their way,
part of that gateway was the Iron Sheik.
- [groans] - Perhaps one of the most
sadistic men in professional wrestling today.
- He nailed him with a cane.
- To this day, he’s probably one of the biggest heroes
in our business.
- You gonna bring that animal,
Hulk Hogan, for no reason.
- You could make the argument, and I would,
that without the Iron Sheik,
Hulk Hogan’s Hulkamania launch
would not have been as effective.
- He’s got him!
- And if it hadn’t been as effective,
who knows if WWE or pro wrestling as we know it
would look anything like it does today?
- I think he’s made his mark in history
as one of the innovators,
one of the legit bad guys that people love to hate.
- Capacity crowd on the case of the Iron Sheik.
- He was one of the best
and again, one of the top heels ever.
- Man, he embodies what it means
to be like a perfect villain.
- I’m gonna spit to your fat body, you American.
[hawks, spits]
- Oh, disgusting.
- He’s a bad guy, but I love him.
♪ ♪
There’s a lot of you out there that do, too.
- Like, all of us love him.
And now, today, he’s so respected.
- To this day, you see the Iron Sheik,
and there’s no one like him.
Yeah, he was iconic.
- Here is the winner, the Iron Sheik!
♪ ♪