← Good Bad Billionaire
Good Bad Billionaire
Vince McMahon: Wrestling's ringmaster
00:48:39
Vince McMahon turned professional wrestling into a global phenomenon
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- [00:00]
Simon Jack
This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the uk.
- [00:06]
Sue Lin Wong
Hi, I'm Sue Lin Wong. I'm a journalist at the Economist. And for the past year, I've been investigating how the CEO of a bank in rural Kansas was duped out of $47 million. This wasn't your classic scam. He'd been ensnared by a new global criminal industry, one that's coming for you and me. My new series is called Scam, Inc. To listen and subscribe, just search Economist podcasts plus.
- [00:38]
Simon Jack
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Madison Square Garden, New York. It's March 31st, 1985. Inside the arena, 19,000 fans are buzzing. They've traveled from all over for one reason. The inaugural WrestleMania touted as the super bowl of wrestling. And there's a lot of money on the line for the man behind it. If it flops, some say he could be out of business. If it succeeds, it could catapult his company into the big leagues. Match after match has fired up the crowd. Now it's time for the main event, the fight everyone's been waiting for. Hulk Hogan and Mr. T. The dream Team against Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorff. Fists. Chairs flying. But in the end, Hulk pins his opponent. The ref counts 1, 2, 3. And it's over. Hogan and Mr. T, exhausted but victorious. Stand tall. But will this win inside the ring translate into success outside of it? Today, we're diving into the swagger, the biceps, the spandex of American wrestling with ringmaster Vince McMahon. Welcome to Good Bad Billionaire from the BBC World Service. Each episode, we pick a billionaire and find out how they made their money.
- [01:55]
Zing Singh
Then we play a game where we judge them whether we think they're good, bad, or just another billionaire.
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Simon Jack
We take them from zero to their first million, then from a million onto a billion.
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Zing Singh
My name is Zing Singh, and I'm a journalist, author, and podcaster.
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Simon Jack
And my name is Simon Jack, and I'm the BBC's business editor.
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Zing Singh
And on this episode, we have basically the kingpin of wrestling.
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Simon Jack
The huge drama, kind of half opera, half pantomime, half baying, crowding crowd, big personalities. It's all about the theater of it.
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Zing Singh
Yep. And that man is none other than Vince McMahon, who is currently worth 3.1 billion. He's the former owner of WWE. That stands for World Wrestling Entertainment, which used to be called World Wrestling Federation, or wwf.
- [02:39]
Simon Jack
Not the panda thing.
- [02:40]
Zing Singh
Not the panda thing. Very important distinction. Now, Vince turned what was a niche sport into a $6.8 billion industry. He is the man who Made stars out of wrestlers whose names you already know, like Hulk Hogan, John Cena and D. Dwayne the Rock Johnson.
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Simon Jack
What do you know about wrestling?
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Zing Singh
Well, I actually had an ex who was very into wrestling, could actually name iconic wrestling matches from the 90s onwards off the top of his head.
- [03:06]
Simon Jack
It was funny because I remember for a Brit going Back to the 1980s, on ITV, one of the three channels at that time, Saturday afternoon was Wrestling Day on itv and you had these characters called Giant Haystacks and Big Daddy. And there was also a guy who pretended to be this giant Japanese ninja type. His name was Kendo Nagasaki.
- [03:28]
Zing Singh
Right.
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Simon Jack
And he was actually. His name was Carl and he's from Leicester.
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Zing Singh
Oh, my God.
- [03:34]
Simon Jack
And it was seen as a kind of. It was sort of almost like a sport of ridicule.
- [03:39]
Zing Singh
Right.
- [03:40]
Simon Jack
It didn't really hurt each other. It was very popular with women as well. Women clutching their handbags. Go. Go on, game. Get him. Whatever. Like this. I know probably being a bit patronizing there, but that was what it was like. But it wasn't until the 90s, when Hulk Hogan, who you've already mentioned, appeared in a Rocky film, that I realized that wrestling was erupting into the mainstream. And even people who'd never watched it would know people like Hulk Hogan or the Undertaker or Bret Hart or.
- [04:08]
Zing Singh
Yeah, I remember growing up with names like that. I mean, even now, when you look at cinemas, you'll see people like the Rock and John Cena headlining films. And that probably was unthinkable back in the day of Big Haystacks, right?
- [04:20]
Simon Jack
Giant Haystacks. Giant Haystacks. He was bigger than Big. He was giant. But let's talk about the man who made billions out of this sport. It's more of a spectacle, if you.
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Zing Singh
Ask me, Sporting spectacle.
- [04:30]
Simon Jack
His name was Vince McMahon. He first made a name for himself as a TV wrestling announcer, kind of, you know, commentating on it, and a promoter. But in the 1990s, he stepped into the ring himself as the character Mr. McMahon playing a Ruthless, bullying, sexually aggressive boss. Fast forward to 2024. We've had news breaking of a sexual trafficking lawsuit against Vince. And people wonder then whether there's any overlap between Vince's character as Mr. McMahon and his real life Persona. Vince himself has called this a predictable path of conflating the Mr. McMahon character with my true self, Vince. As of March 2025, that lawsuit is still ongoing.
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Zing Singh
But let's rewind all the way to the begin of Mr. McMahon. We're in North Carolina August 24th, 1945. And Vincent Kennedy McMahon is born, the second son of Vicky and Vince McMahon.
- [05:26]
Simon Jack
But his childhood wasn't exactly a fairy tale. His mom left his dad when Vince was just two years old, citing desertion. From there, Vince bounced around between different homes with his mom, her new husband, his older brother and their two step siblings. And Vince himself has said his stepdad was abusive, even accusing him of beating him with a wrench from the age of 6 years old.
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Zing Singh
Gee, so a very, very hard childhood. In Vincent's mind, however, he was a bad kid, lashing out in response to being made fun of. But his schoolmates paint a different picture. According to Vincent's biography, Ringmaster, by Abraham Josephine Reisman, they say that Vince was popular and very sociable, very friendly, very outgoing to his peers.
- [06:07]
Simon Jack
But his life changed a bit when he was 12. He reconnected then with his biological father. And this is when wrestling first entered his life. Because his grandfather had been a college educated boxer turned wrestling promoter in New York, and his father, Vince McMahon Sr. Had founded a wrestling company, the World Wrestling Federation, WWF. So Vince Sr. Was living in Washington, had a beach house in Delaware, a far cry from the sort of trailer park tough time Vince had been spending with his mom and his siblings.
- [06:35]
Zing Singh
And then there was this whole, I guess you could call it crazy world of professional wrestling. So full of theatrics, over the top characters, macho bravado. You know, wrestlers back then had, as they do now, signature moves. They had gimmicks. Vince's favorite wrestler, Jerry Graham, was a man who would light cigars with hundred dollar bills. Now, Vince idolized him along with Vince Sr. His biological dad. Vince said that he fell in love with his dad the moment they met again. But he also added that his dad didn't actually say I love you to him until just before he died.
- [07:07]
Simon Jack
Still, Vince began spending summers with his dad, quickly got into fighting. He wrestled at school and in the streets as well. He claimed that he and his friends used to take on groups of Marines stationed nearby. Some of them were tough, he said, but me and my guys were street fighters. They couldn't believe we weren't fighting fair.
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Zing Singh
I mean, it takes a kind of certain attitude to think you can take on a Marine.
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Simon Jack
Yeah, for sure.
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Zing Singh
Now. Inspired by his dad, Vince also started organizing wrestling matches in his school gym. But Vincenior wasn't exactly thrilled with the idea of his son actually becoming a wrestler himself. So at 14, Vince was packed off to military school.
- [07:43]
Simon Jack
It's worth saying that wrestling as a sport in schools in the US is way bigger than it is. For example, example, in the uk, it's quite a normal thing for. Do you remember the Breakfast Club? Yes, the movie. The Emilio Estevez character.
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Zing Singh
The jock.
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Simon Jack
Yeah, the jock. He's the wrestler of it. So wrestling is a kind of, you know, thing that people did a lot in, in American schools. Anyway, a couple of years later, Vince met the woman who had become both his business partner and his wife, Linda Edwards. She was the daughter of one of his mother's friends. And unlike Vince, Linda came from a middle class background, had a much easier life.
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Zing Singh
Linda was 17 and Vince was 21 when they married. And she soon joined Vince at East Carolina University and managed to squeeze her college degree into just three years so they could graduate together in 1969.
- [08:27]
Simon Jack
And in the early 1970s, Vince worked for his father's company. But he was also eager to carve out his own path. He tried his hand at booking shows for musicians like Jerry Lee Lewis, but none of that quite took off.
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Zing Singh
And then one night, fate took a hand and pulled Vince from behind the scenes to behind the mic at one of his dad's wrestling TV shows. Now, the regular announcer had just walked out after a dispute over pay. So Vince Sr. Thought, hey, why not give my son a shot? Now, the first time announcer was a little awkward. Vince's delivery was stiff. The wrestlers even laughed at him. But they admitted he had a real knack for storylines. And these are scripted narratives that drive things like rivalries, like character arcs of the wrestlers. They hook people in to wrestling and keep them watching because it's like a soap opera.
- [09:15]
Simon Jack
Yeah, and they're long standing. These grievances and feuds go on for years and people really tap into them.
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Zing Singh
I won't be the first person to say that wrestling is a lot like soap opera for men.
- [09:24]
Simon Jack
Yeah, for sure.
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Zing Singh
You've got the recurring characters making surprise appearances. You know, something about it is very much in line with that kind of operatic narrative that soap operas just thrive of. And when Vince walked behind that mic, something just clicked for him. So from that night on, he appeared as an announcer every three weeks on his dad's wrestling TV show.
- [09:44]
Simon Jack
But like most of our billionaires, he wanted more. He kept trying to break through as an events promoter, and some of them were pretty unusual. For example, one time he tried to organize an Evel Knievel canyon jump. Now, do you even know who Evel Knievel is?
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Zing Singh
I sort of. He's a professional daredevil. Is that right?
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Simon Jack
He was a motorcyclist who used to take on death defying jumps over like 50 buses or something. And he would wear a kind of all American Star Spangled Banner with a huge cape flowing by. He's like half Elvis Presley, half cyclist.
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Zing Singh
Right.
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Simon Jack
Doing death defying things. And there was this famous thing about a canyon jump where he was going to jump right over a canyon. Well, he didn't even make the jump. He had to pull his parachute. Ticket sales were actually pretty poor, Linda and Vince ended up losing nearly quarter of a million dollars. But it did show that he had a flair for drama for trying to tell a story.
- [10:33]
Zing Singh
So if you haven't watched wrestling before, it's full of these terms and phrases that you might not know the meaning of. So to help get our heads around some of these vocabulary, I'm going to test Simon's knowledge. Are you ready for a pop quiz?
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Simon Jack
I'll try.
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Zing Singh
Okay, so question number one. American wrestling is all fake, True or false?
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Simon Jack
I would say it is all fake because sometimes if you look at the real close ups, they don't actually like land the blows that they're landing. But some of them do get horribly injured, as we'll find out later. So it's not all, you know, it is a high contact sport, so I'm gonna say it's 90% fake.
- [11:12]
Zing Singh
Okay, well, apparently the fighting is all real, so that is false. So it's kind of like stage fighting or stunt work. It's taken to physical extremes. The story itself is created, but who will win the fight is planned. How they get to that point is apparently up to the wrestlers.
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Simon Jack
I think that's a strange definition of real.
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Zing Singh
Wow. I mean, we live in the world of Big Brother.
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Simon Jack
I mean, that's a bit like saying stage fighting. That's like saying that, you know, lightsabers are real or something.
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Zing Singh
Okay, well, unfortunately, we don't have Vince McMahon on speed dial to confirm or deny this.
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Simon Jack
I've got a question for you. What does kayfabe mean?
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Zing Singh
Is it when people fake it? When they fake falling or fake punching?
- [11:52]
Simon Jack
It's not so much that. It's more about the agreement of wrestlers to stay in character and the audience to know there's a storyline. So anyone who reveals the reality behind the characters, like if you step out of character, you're breaking kayfabe. And that's a big no. No, you gotta stay in character. Right.
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Zing Singh
You can't break the fourth wall. Okay. So this should be quite easy. You probably know this. What do you call the good guys and the bad guys in wrestling I have no idea. Oh, okay. So the good guys are called babyfaces, right? Because they usually tend to have quite, you know, quite good looking guys. You know, the bad guys are called heels. Heels, yeah.
- [12:27]
Simon Jack
And it's all about the characters, isn' it really is.
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Zing Singh
So it's this kind of brazen world which just loves villains, heroes and the audience are also a really vocal part of it. So it's kind of like a British pantomime. If you go to a wrestling match, people will be booing at the villains, they'll be cheering the good guys, they'll be shouting people's catchphrases.
- [12:47]
Simon Jack
Yeah, I've never actually seen one live. I've been to boxing before, never been to wrestling. Let's take it back down to the early 1980s where we were. Vince and Linda are struggling. But then an opportunity comes knocking. Vince's dad was ready to retire. And you think the obvious choice to take over would be his son. After all, Vince Jr. Had been working alongside him for years. But Vince Sr. Wasn't just going to hand him the keys to the kingdom. He had to convince his dad and the three other men who co owned the company to sell him wwf. Vince offered a million dollars paid in installments through bank loans, future profits after he'd modernized the business. But if he missed any payments, Vince Sr. Could take the company back. And anything Vince had already paid. So tough deal.
- [13:27]
Zing Singh
Yeah, tough deal from his dad. But you know, the deal was done. Vince had massive plans for American wrestling. So the first thing he wanted to do was expand. But that was tricky in and of itself. So the wrestling world at the time was split into 32 regional territories in the US. Each one had its own promoters and its own rules. And it was all governed by an organization called the National Wrestling alliance, the nwa. And there was also what you can call a gentleman's agreement. So promoters only really staged matches within their own territories. But Vince didn't care about any of this. He started promoting shows in other people's territories, kicking off a turf war. So Vince claims his dad was told, stop him or he's going to end up at the bottom of the river. Quite a Sopranos style threat. But Vince wouldn't back down. To him, this is all just healthy competition.
- [14:17]
Simon Jack
And the next step was some new faces. Vince needed the best wrestlers, so he made them an offer they couldn't refuse. More money, basically. And he started poaching stars from other territories. Once again breaking that gentleman's agreement his dad had followed. Tony Atlas. Great name one of the Wrestlers who made the jump. Put it simply, it's a dog eat dog world and you have to get your bite out of it.
- [14:35]
Zing Singh
Speaking of talent, Vince also brought back stars that his dad had let go, such as Hulk Hogan. So Hulk had actually been fired by Vince Sr. For appearing in the movie Rocky 3. But Vince Jr. Saw something his father didn't. Hulk was becoming a household name.
- [14:50]
Simon Jack
Yeah, I can definitely vouch for that. Him appearing in Rocky III was a big moment. I think his wrestling character's name in that was Thunder Lips, which I think is worse than Hulk Hogan.
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Zing Singh
That is almost definitely worse than Hulk Hogan.
- [15:02]
Simon Jack
And Hulk is this bold, brash, huge kind of guy. He had the kind of personality Vince knew that would sell tickets. So Hulk returned, reigniting his iconic rivalry with Andre the Giant. I remember him too.
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Zing Singh
Yeah, so he was that French wrestler, right? He was. I think I looked this up because I was like, come on, how much of a giant could he be? Turns out he was actually just over 2.2 meters tall.
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Simon Jack
What's that, six, eight, something like that.
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Zing Singh
Six'eight I think he got called the eighth wonder of the world.
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Simon Jack
But Vince wasn't just building a roster. He was making wrestling more topical. After the 1979 US hostage crisis in Tehran, Vince capitalized on that moment with a match between the popular hero Hulk Hogan and a villainous Iron Sheik. Now, the Sheik's character was known for taunting the crowd with his love for Iran and disdain for America, even spitting whenever he said usa. And it tapped into real world anti Iranian sentiment. And as it was all just a performance, the audience were given permission to unleash their own hate on the Iron Shake.
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Zing Singh
That's so interesting because Tony Atlas also said that wrestling was like an imitation of the world. Actually, his words were, if you want to know what America is like, watch wrestling.
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Simon Jack
Interesting. Vince was confident that wrestling could go mainstream.
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Zing Singh
Yeah, so it had been seen as this kind of outlier, low class sport. But Vince believed that television could help change all this. So he started buying up wrestling TV slots that were coming up for sale, whether it was due to retirement, retirements, or I guess you could call it issues. And by issues, we're talking about things like Georgia wrestlers causing a PR disaster by throwing pig poop at each other. Yep, that really happened. But Vince saw an opportunity and he swooped in. He snagged their slot on USA Network.
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Simon Jack
Yeah, and they loved what Vince was doing with WWF so much, they gave him his own wrestling talk show. It was called Tuesday Night Titans. Vince described it as the Wild west in a talk show format. And he wasn't wrong. It was a chaotic mix of skits, cooking demos, musical performances, visits to wrestlers homes, a whole bunch of stuff.
- [17:04]
Zing Singh
So really he's trying a lot of stuff out here, throwing everything at the kitchen wall to see what stakes. But Vince knew he needed to lean into the spectacle of wrestling to attract this broad audience. And he did just that, sometimes to quite strange effect. He called it sports entertainment.
- [17:19]
Simon Jack
Yeah. Key to Vince's success was he recognizes cross promotion.
- [17:23]
Zing Singh
Yeah. Because cross promotion helps to elevate the appeal of wrestling. And it was pretty soon after that a rather unusual opportunity was about to right into Vince's lap.
- [17:33]
Simon Jack
Yeah, it's the 1980s. Big hair, bigger personalities, everything. Bright, bold, the music. I call that era poodle rock.
- [17:41]
Zing Singh
Right. I assume you were not a fan of the spandex.
- [17:44]
Simon Jack
I have to say, I've never, never donned, never knowingly worn an item of spandex.
- [17:49]
Zing Singh
I feel like it's impossible to unknowingly wear spandex. You would know.
- [17:53]
Simon Jack
Okay, you're right. Okay, fair enough. And actually a pop star had a huge role in making that crossover and making wrestling even more popular.
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Zing Singh
Yeah. So you know the song Girls Just Want to have fun? Well, in 1983, Cyndi Lauper exploded in music with that song. It was playful. The video is pretty unforgettably iconic as well. And it also featured none other than a WWF wrestler called Lou Albano playing her dad.
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Simon Jack
But you know how it goes. The phone rings in the middle of.
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Zing Singh
The night, My father says, when you're.
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Simon Jack
Gonna live your life, Right, Something like that, exactly.
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Zing Singh
So Lou Albano, the first music video, WWF crossover star.
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Simon Jack
And actually later on the video, Cyndi Lauper puts him in a wrestling hold, which was seen as quite an empowering kind of song. Yeah, which is not a normal fit, I would say, with wrestling and where wrestling went eventually anyway, as we will see.
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Zing Singh
Not at all.
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Simon Jack
Pretty weird collaboration, I would say, this time.
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Zing Singh
I mean, how did it happen?
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Simon Jack
Well, as far as we know, it started in the first class cabin of an airline when Cyndi Lauper and Lou Albano appeared, happened to be on the same flight, they struck up a conversation and when Lauper's management asked Lou to be in her music video, he told them they'd have to ask his boss, none other than Vince McMahon, of course. So unlike his dad, who'd actually fired Hulk Hogan for daring to appear in Rocky 3, Vince was super keen. He was all in. Didn't want it to be just a one off music video, they were thinking bigger. So together, Vince and Lauper's manager came up with Rock N Wrestling. This is live wrestling shows film for mtv. MTV in its infancy at this point. So they're trying anything. They're a new format or a new thing. And the first one was called the Brawl to End it all for July 1984. And even though the format was untested, MTV agreed they're being experimental. It was a low viewing Monday slot right before the Olympics. They figured they had nothing to lose.
- [19:47]
Zing Singh
Now you might be asking yourself, what on earth was the Brawl to end it all even about? So the storyline was that Lou and Cindy had a falling out over his sexism. And so they decided to settle it through a wrestling match. Both picked female wrestlers to square off in the main event of the night. One of 10 matches. And now female wrestling had always been seen as lower tier compared to men's matches. But Vince actually saw this as a chance to get more eyes on the. And the drama was kind of cranked up for the final match. You know, they shot Cindy in the gym pushing her fighter through training and it was huge. The Brawl to end it all was a big success. It turned out to be one of MTV's highest rated broadcasts at the time.
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Simon Jack
In fact, it proved what Vince had always believed since taking over his father's company just a year before, that there was a much wider audience for wrestling.
- [20:38]
Zing Singh
Now, it's not exactly clear how much money Vince made directly from the broad to end it all, but it did pave the way for bigger TV deals and events, including a partnership with NBC Sports.
- [20:48]
Simon Jack
WWF's gross income from 1984 was nearly $30 million. So even after covering costs, it's safe to say Vince McMahon is officially a millionaire.
- [20:58]
Zing Singh
In 1984, his powerhouse cross promotion had paid off. But now he had an even bigger idea. Vince wanted to create something that had never been done before. A Super bowl for wrestling. But the big question was, would it catch on?
- [21:31]
Sue Lin Wong
Hi, I'm Sue Lin Wong. I'm a journalist at the Economist. And for the past year, I've been investigating how the CEO of a bank in rural Kansas was duped out of $47 million. This wasn't your classic scam. He'd been ensnared by a new global criminal industry. One that's coming for you and me. My new series is called Scam Inc. To listen and subscribe, just search Economist podcasts pl.
- [22:04]
Simon Jack
So let's trace him from a million to a billion. Vince looked at all the other major Sports. American football has the super bowl, baseball has the World Series. Why shouldn't wrestling have its own big annual marquee big event?
- [22:18]
Zing Singh
And the idea, well, it actually came to him on a quick Caribbean getaway with his wife Linda. Although Linda was quick to remind him, if you're thinking about work, it's. It's not really a holiday.
- [22:28]
Simon Jack
No. Fast forward to March 31, 1985. WrestleMania is live from Madison Square Garden. Whenever I hear Madison Square Garden, I put on a different voice. There's something about where the boxing announcers come down. So Madison Square Garden. But this wasn't just another wrestling show. Vince pulls out all the stops. So Liberace there he was this famously camp piano player, singer, and he would come and says, I'm just gonna go and slip into something a bit more comfortable and all this kind of stuff. It was a huge high camp, but he could really play the piano. So you got Liberace there, you've got high kicking, line of showgirls in red, the guest referee, only the greatest of all time, Muhammad Ali. Oh, yeah, and Andy Warhol. He's there too. There's something quite Warholian about this in a way, isn't there?
- [23:13]
Zing Singh
There really is. You can imagine Andy Warhol was taking notes.
- [23:16]
Simon Jack
It was like a kind of social experiment with him just sitting there, Andy.
- [23:19]
Zing Singh
Just watching, just watching with the dark glasses on. Now, it wasn't actually just the crowd plus Andy Warhol inside the Garden watching everything kick off. So this entire extravaganza was beamed out to packed stadiums around the country. As in, fans actually bought t to watch it on the big screen in person. Which sounds weird now admittedly, but back then it was the norm. So over a million people saw it via closed circuit tv, which made it the biggest pay per view event of its time.
- [23:47]
Simon Jack
So in short, WrestleMania turned out to be a massive game changing success.
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Zing Singh
And WrestleMania has become an annual tradition ever since.
- [23:56]
Simon Jack
And along the way, it sparked a long running connection between Vince McMahon and another great showman, Donald Trump. He actually got in on the action. In 2007, he chose Bobby Lashley to fight for him in the battle of the billionaires against Vince's guy umaga. And in 2009, WWE played it up again. Trump bought Monday Night Raw, only to sell it back to Vince shortly after.
- [24:18]
Zing Singh
So Vince had done it. His vision of sports entertainment had taken over. Wrestling was everywhere. They actually call it the golden era. And at the center of it all was one star, Hulk Hogan. So there were cartoons, merchandise, endorsements. Hulk Hogan was selling everything from deodorant to cereal. And WWF's revenues exploded. They jumped from $63 million in 1983 to 140 million by 1990.
- [24:45]
Simon Jack
But as often happens when you have these massive snowballing successes, some wrestlers started asking, you know, where's all this money going? Who's really benefiting here? They were working brutal schedules. They were fighting on, no matter what their injuries were. They had no health insurance, no pensions. And that's when the wrestler Jesse the Body Ventura made a move. He tried to unionize the wrestlers and almost pulled it off. But Hulk Hogan turned out to be a bit of a fifth column there. He snitched. Vince called the wrestlers in one by one and told them, you show up to the meeting, you won't have a job in the morning. So the dream of a union collapse. Looking back on the union attempt, Vince said the whole thing was a sham. But interesting, this crossover between wrestling and politics. We've heard about Donald Trump's involvement there. Jesse the Body Ventura, he, of course, became governor of Minnesota. There's something about the showmanship and the platform which. Which lends itself to this.
- [25:39]
Zing Singh
It's interesting, isn't it, the crossover between politics and, I guess you could call them, show business. Show like, well, show business, but also muscly men. Look at Arnold Schwarzenegger, Governor of California.
- [25:49]
Simon Jack
That's true, of course. Yeah. Vince, though, was about to face more than just unhappy wrestlers. The early 90s brought a wave of lawsuits and accusations.
- [25:58]
Zing Singh
Now, it all started on February 26, 1992. The New York Post ran a shocking headline, WWF to face suit Alleging Child Sex Abuse. The report accused WWF employees, including the ring announcer Mel Phillips, of sexually abusing young ring boys. Now, these were teenagers who worked backstage at wrestling events. And over the next few weeks, Vince McMahon and one of the alleged victims, Tom Cole, both appeared on talk shows. Vince went on the Phil Donahue show to deny any knowledge of the abuse, and the three accused employees were fired. But one was later rehired. And eventually, after Cole was paid $55,000 and given his job back, the lawsuit was dropped.
- [26:39]
Simon Jack
But that wasn't the end of it. Decades later, in 2024, a new civil lawsuit was filed by five other former ring boys against Vince and Linda McMahon. The first time they were directly named in a suit, it claimed they knew about the abuse at the time. It also alleged that Mel Phillips, who was one of the announcers, was rehired just six weeks after being fired on the condition that he stay away from kids, which, according to the lawsuit, he did not. The lawsuit claims the five former ring boys were groomed and sexually abused. Vince and Linda's lawyers dismissed the claims. Vince has called them defamatory and utterly meritless, while Linda said the lawsuit contained exaggerations and misrepresentations. As of March 2025, the case has not been resolved.
- [27:23]
Zing Singh
And then there was another allegation. In April 1992, former referee Rita Chatterton appeared on the Geraldo show, another American talk show, and accused Vince McMahon of raping her. In 1986, when asked why she waited so long to speak out, she said, you people don't understand wrestling. Nobody talks. It's a completely hush hush world. But Chatterton's claims were mostly ignored. The statute of limitations had passed and the media brushed it off as tabloid sensationalism. Vince even tried to sue the show that Rita appeared on. But in 2023, he paid her a multi million dollar settlement. His lawyer asserts Mr. McMahon denies and has always denied raping Ms. Chatterton, and he settled the case solely to avoid the cost of litigation. But there are more lawsuits incoming.
- [28:10]
Simon Jack
But if we go back to the time when those allegations were first made. In November 1993, Vince McMahon was hit with another major indictment. The US Department of Justice accused him of supplying his wrestlers with illegal anabolic steroids, even employing a doctor to keep them stocked. Vince's lawyer claimed that Vin Vince was provided with the steroids for his personal use as an amateur bodybuilder, but denied that he distributed them to wrestlers. If convicted, he was looking at 11 years behind bars.
- [28:37]
Zing Singh
So the trial kicked off in July 1994, and it was everywhere in the press. It was fueled by the lingering war on drug stigma of the 80s. Wrestlers took to the stand testifying that Vince had provided them with steroids. But then came a twist. The government star witness was none other than Hulk Hogan. Now, by this point, Hulk had left WWF for Hollywood and he was trying to distance himself from this whole steroid scandal. But instead of sinking Vince on the stand, Hulk defended him. And just like that, Vince was found not guilty.
- [29:08]
Simon Jack
The case collapsed. Yeah, but all these lawsuits had taken a toll on Vince and on wwf. Ratings were starting to slip.
- [29:15]
Zing Singh
And just as Vince was struggling, real competition stepped into the ring. Ted Turner. Ted Turner, the media mogul, founder of CNN and owner of World Championship Wrestling, or wcw. Now, technically, it was Ted and not Vince who first put WR on national tv. But WCW never quite had the same ratings. And with a fresh rebrand, Turner was determined to launch something different. He called it WCW Nitro. And this went head to head with WWF Raw in a battle for ratings that would rage for the rest of the 90s. And on just its second episode, by the way, Nitro Beat WWF. So the Monday night wars had just begun.
- [29:55]
Simon Jack
But Ted, not just after the ratings. He wanted some of Vince's wrestlers and characters too. In a way, just like Vince had done in the 1980s, WCW started poaching some of the top stars from WWF. Vince, of course, didn't see the irony or the similarity to his own behavior. In a recent documentary, he accused Ted of stealing. And when asked how that was different from his own tactics back in the 80s, Vince replied no. Ted's philosophy was, I'm gonna hurt my competitor. That wasn't mine. I want to compete.
- [30:22]
Zing Singh
And that competition was brutal. Vince lost one of his biggest stars in what became known as the Montreal Screw Job.
- [30:29]
Simon Jack
Everything's gotta have a great title, right?
- [30:30]
Zing Singh
I mean, you gotta hand it to them, whoever writes the scripts and the storylines for wwf, the whole thing, you know, hats off to you. You should be. You should be working with Scorsese.
- [30:40]
Simon Jack
Yeah, or headline writing for tabloid newspapers.
- [30:43]
Zing Singh
So on November 9, 1997, Brett the Hitman Hart was supposed to win the WWF Championship. But Vince had other plans. You see, Vince had told Hart they couldn't afford his 20 year contract anymore. So he knew that there was a chance that Hart would leave and take the WWF title with him to wcw. Just weeks earlier, a WCW star had literally thrown a championship belt in the trash on live television. So Vince was not gonna let that happen again. So behind Hart's back, Vince ordered the referee to ring the bell early. Hart lost. And the wrestling world was shocked by the breaking of Kayfabe. And Hart left for the wcw.
- [31:21]
Simon Jack
That's very interesting, isn't it? The script was there that Hart would win, da da da. And then they basically went in and changed the ending of the highly scripted encounter. Now that is not a sport. If you ask me. I don't think that's a sport. That's something else. That's, that's basically a kind of live action soap opera, as you rightly say. So the competition is intense. The WWF versus WCW war raged on. Vince even mocked Turner on WWF tv, calling him Billionaire Ted, painting him as a ruthless tycoon crushing the little guy in one skit. Vince's version of Turner boasted, society is run by a handful of billionaires. Billionaires. I am one of those billionaires. Do you realize how many lies I've destroyed? Apparently Ted found it amusing, but the skits were eventually stopped at the TV network's request. Vince wouldn't be playing the underdog for very long.
- [32:13]
Zing Singh
No. And indeed he's on Good Bad Billionaire for a reason. He became one of those billionaires.
- [32:17]
Simon Jack
Exactly.
- [32:18]
Zing Singh
So after losing this ratings battle for years, Vince had to have a change of tactics. So if wrestling was built on the good guys, those baby faces and bad guys, guys, the heels, why not go all in on the bad guys?
- [32:31]
Simon Jack
This became known as the Attitude era, said to be wrestling's darkest chapter. The content got way more adult, more violent, more sexual, more offensive. And in fact, if you look at it, it's pretty shocking. There were attempted castrations. Vince's on screen mistress forced to crawl on all fours, bark like a dog, then strip. And the center of it all, Vince himself. So it was really descending in a way into a kind of lurid pit of, I don't know know, scandal, I.
- [32:57]
Zing Singh
Guess, or fake scandal.
- [32:59]
Simon Jack
It just feels like, I don't know, last days of Rome kind of thing. It's just becoming a parody of itself almost.
- [33:04]
Zing Singh
And I will say, if you look up some of those old clips, if you even just look up the altercation with his so called mistress where she crawls around on all fours, the things he's shouting at her, I was shocked because I don't remember it being that bad when I was a kid. But you know, by today's standards, it is outrageous what he shouts at her. Now, Mr. McMahon, the character is said to have been created around the time of the Montreal Screw Job. So Vince wasn't just the host anymore. He also appeared in the ring as the bad boss, the villain. And his famous catchphrase was, you're fired. And this is all a few years before made it big. But this wasn't just his story. His actual real family got pulled in. So his son Shane joined WWF at 28. His daughter Stephanie, she was just 23. And Vince had plans for her.
- [33:53]
Simon Jack
Yeah, one storyline had Stephanie set to marry a wrestler until right before the I do's, Triple H interrupts with video footage of him and a drugged Stephanie. He claimed he'd already married her and consummated the marriage several times. And the crowd chanted slut, slut, slut at her. Yep, edifying stuff.
- [34:11]
Zing Singh
Pretty shocking. Now, Triple H, the actual wrestler who staged this date rape storyline, later record that Vince saw the crowd reaction and just rubbed his fingers together. As in that's money.
- [34:23]
Simon Jack
God.
- [34:24]
Zing Singh
Vince himself added, I've got a big smile on my face. That means the audience are participating. So yes, an Entire arena chanting slut at his own daughter. And that was what went through his mind.
- [34:35]
Simon Jack
But in a bizarre twist of life imitating art, Stephanie actually married Triple H in real life. They'd grown close working together. But even then she had limits. Like when Vince suggested airing their real wedding as a pay per view event, she put her foot down. And there was one other storyline she refused to touch. Vince pitched an angle where her character would be impregnated by this Mr. McMahon character. Well, she shut that down. Her take on the Attitude era, it was a bit weird, but it was a different time. In our business, it feels like you've got to keep raising the ante, be more scandalous, be more extreme, be more controversial, and you sort of lose your bearings a little bit on what's acceptable.
- [35:15]
Zing Singh
I mean, I mean, if you're the boss of a wrestling federation and your idea of a storyline is, hey, why don't I in character impregnate my own daughter? As a narrative like that is, that is taking it way too far.
- [35:29]
Simon Jack
It's also, I mean, what's interesting is the idea of having, you know, the woman wrestler on all fours, orders barked at her, and then stripping. What have you cheered on by a bunch of guys. Some people have said that this, you know, could be the beginning of. Could be the birth of the incel. Maybe.
- [35:46]
Zing Singh
I mean, it certainly speaks to a kind of misogyny and desire to see women humiliated. And actually there's a Netflix documentary. And the editor of a publication called the Wrestling Observer Newsletter said that wrestling catered to guys who, in his words, fantasized over hot women, but also hated them because they could never get them. So therefore, seeing hot women demeaned was kind of cool.
- [36:10]
Simon Jack
By 1998, Vince's gamble on the Attitude Era, however, had paid off big time.
- [36:15]
Zing Singh
That's right. So WWF's turn to the dark side supercharged their ratings and revenue. The edgier content brought in older male fans, guys of cash to burn on special pay per view events. In 97, for instance, WrestleMania pulled in 237,000 paying viewers. A year later, it was 730,000. Merch sales exploded. There were magazines. WWF revenue jumped from 81 million in 97 to 250 million by 1999.
- [36:44]
Simon Jack
And as we've seen in many of our stories, when revenues are expanding really quick and you're the hottest ticket and things are going particularly well, that is often the opportune time to cash in by selling shares on the stock market, doing an IPO, an initial public offering. So in October of 1999, WWF hit the stock market. Shares started at $17. They closed at 25, so up 50% on the day. That made WWF's market value $1.7 billion. Vince and his family stake worth about $1.4 billion.
- [37:20]
Zing Singh
Now, that same day, another of our billionaires also went public. Martha Stewart.
- [37:25]
Simon Jack
On the same day. The very same day.
- [37:26]
Zing Singh
The very same day. But her company raised more. So the press had a field day calling it Martha's Smackdown.
- [37:33]
Simon Jack
That's great. But Vince was still doing very well for himself. By 2000, he landed at number 260 on the Forbes rich list, his net worth worth an estimated $1.1 billion.
- [37:55]
Zing Singh
So now Vince McMahon is officially a billionaire. But let's take him beyond a billion.
- [38:00]
Simon Jack
Vince's empire was about to hit some major bumps in the road. Ratings were dipping, Pay per view sales falling. And then tragedy.
- [38:07]
Zing Singh
It's May 1999. Owen Hart, brother of Brett the Hitman Hart, fell to his death live on air when a stunt harness unexpectedly failed. Now, the cameras didn't show it, but the commentators told viewers what had happened. And Vince, after Bret's body was taken away, he made the call to keep the show going. His reasoning was, if it had been me, I'd want the show to go on. Owen's wife, Martha Hart, actually took WWF to court for wrongful death. And in 2001, an $18 million settlement.
- [38:38]
Simon Jack
In 2002, WWF officially became WWE and entered what was called the Ruthless Aggression Era. Violence, shock tactics. Vince doubled down on all these things to win back slipping viewers. But WWE's biggest stars, people like Dwayne the Rock Johnson, started leaving for Hollywood.
- [38:56]
Zing Singh
And by 2008, Vince made a total U turn. WWE cleaned up its act. It went Ford PG, family friendly. And it worked. By 2019, Vince's fortune peaked at $3.2 billion. But it came out recently that that same year, he'd paid 7.5 million to a former WWE employee who'd accused him of assaulting her after she refused to have sex with him.
- [39:19]
Simon Jack
Yeah. Bringing it slightly more up to date, in June 2022, the Wall Street Journal reported that Vince McMahon had allegedly used $3 million of company funds to keep an affair with a WWE employee quiet. A WWE spokesperson said at the time the relationship was consensual and added that the company was taking the allegations seriously.
- [39:41]
Zing Singh
And it later turned out that between 2006 and 2022, Vince actually spent $14.6 million on payments to women who had accused him of sexual misconduct. The fallout from that Wall Street Journal article. Vince stepped down as CEO and executive chairman of WWE the same month. Month.
- [39:59]
Simon Jack
But just seven months later, in January 2023, Vince was back, this time as a board member helping to sell the company.
- [40:06]
Zing Singh
CNN reported that he did it by forcing out some board members and replacing them with his own allies.
- [40:12]
Simon Jack
Then in September 2023, WWE merged with Ultimate Fighting Championship UFC in a massive $21 billion deal. Vince was named executive chairman of the new company, tko. That's quite an important merger that, because UFC was becoming massively, you know, it's kind of mixed martial arts cage fighting, if you like, very brutal, but with a new brand of champions and a new whole roster of people. And actually UFC began to take bites out of not just wrestling, but actually traditional boxing as well. So UFC was on the rise.
- [40:43]
Zing Singh
So this merger makes business Sense. And in 2024, TKO made headlines again, sealing a $5 billion deal with Netflix as the streamer ventured into live sports for the first time.
- [40:55]
Simon Jack
But just three days later, Vince was out of tko. Those initials are technical Knockout. TKO is a wrestling term in itself, just FYI. So a lot's going on very quickly. He resigned after a lawsuit alleged he had sexually abused and trafficked a former employee, Janelle Grant.
- [41:10]
Zing Singh
The claims in the lawsuit are horrific. Janel Grant accused Vince of physical and emotional abuse, sexual assault, and forcing her to have relations with wrestlers and other employees. The lawsuit includes graphic text messages from Vince detailing his control over her sexual encounters and a voice message where he allegedly pressured her to sign a non disclosure agreement.
- [41:31]
Simon Jack
Janelle's lawyers said she filed the lawsuit not just for herself, but for others afraid to speak out. The suit says she's since been left with PTSD and suicidal ideation.
- [41:40]
Zing Singh
Vincent's attorney has called it a smear campaign and dismissed the claims as falsehoods.
- [41:44]
Simon Jack
As of March 2025, Janelle's sex trafficking case against Vince is still ongoing. So this is the point where we have to judge our billionaire on a number of categories, which we score between 0 and 10 on things like wealth, villainy, giving back power, et cetera. So we start with wealth, which is not just how much money they've actually got, but what they've done with it. So where do we rate Vince McMahon?
- [42:10]
Zing Singh
Well, Vince actually fell off the Forbes billionaire list in the 2000s, but this may have been due to lack of information about his actual fortune. So his wealth has been estimated during this time to kind of move between one to three and a half billion dollars.
- [42:23]
Simon Jack
So pretty low entry level billionaire. So I'm gonna give him a 2 out of 10 for wealth. I mean, obviously these people are wildly rich, but in the galaxy of rich people that we look at, he's a very small star.
- [42:35]
Zing Singh
He's not even a small star. I'd say he's a little orbiting asteroid.
- [42:37]
Simon Jack
He's an asteroid.
- [42:38]
Zing Singh
I would say one out of ten. Sorry, Vince.
- [42:41]
Simon Jack
Okay. Villainy. He's part of a world that's been condemned by a lot of those who actually took part in it. At the time, Tony Atlas admitted that we abuse women. All of us did. They were like a toy for us. In January 2025, the securities and Exchange Commission, the financial police, released the results of their investigation, saying he failed to disclose multimillion dollar settlements he'd reached with two women when he led the wwe. There's all sorts of these things. For me, it's sort of. I mean, I'm gonna upset some wrestling fans. I find the whole thing just a little bit corny at best, distasteful at worst.
- [43:15]
Zing Singh
And also dangerous, actually, because there's this ongoing issue, and you get this in sports like American football as well, where athletes are getting more and more concerned by the risks of issues like degenerative brain disease, which you can attribute to kind of like physical knocks on the head. So in 2016, 50 wrestlers actually tried to sue WWE for concealing the risks of this condition, degenerative brain disease, which has been attributed to wrestling. And that WWE's exploitative business model, in their way, words, kept the wrestlers from knowing their rights under health and safety laws. In 2021, the Supreme Court declined to hear the case. But, you know, there have been other cases, such as wrestler Chris Benoit, who killed his wife, children, and then himself. People have speculated that a condition called chronic traumatic encephalopathy, cte, which has been caused by repeated concussions, could be to blame. Now, Vince doesn't believe that CTE was the cause, but WWE now has a concussion policy.
- [44:15]
Simon Jack
You know, I'm gonna sound like a real snob here, but it sort of panders to the most base instincts. It's not something I find particularly edifying or tasteful. But then, you know, so what? You know, I'm not the target market.
- [44:27]
Zing Singh
And I guess that also doesn't quite class as villainy then. So maybe if we go back and we look at what he's actually done in the process of creating this billion dollar brand. I mean, there's a lot of people he's worked with who have made quite severe allegations against him and the company. I feel like he scores pretty highly on villainy.
- [44:47]
Simon Jack
Yeah, I think you're right. I think you're right. I'm gonna give him a seven for villainy.
- [44:51]
Zing Singh
I think I'll give him a seven. Although he is a special kind of class of villainous, I think, to have to create a villainous character from Vincent.
- [44:58]
Simon Jack
Well, that's the whole thing. He would say, listen, you're conflating my character, the Mr. McMahon character, with the real life Vince. I mean, a lot of these are allegations, but it was found that he used company money to pay a number of. Of settlements for payments to women who'd accused him of sexual misconduct. So, Yeah, I think seven is about right.
- [45:18]
Zing Singh
Seven out of ten. I mean, I feel like his character, Mr. McMahon, will be disappointed that we.
- [45:22]
Simon Jack
Didn'T give him a higher score, maybe giving back philanthropy.
- [45:26]
Zing Singh
So there isn't a lot of recent information about Vince McMahon's philanthropy. He started a foundation with his wife Linda in 2006. So far, it's given away 20, 70 million dollars to education and sports charities.
- [45:38]
Simon Jack
Yeah, we've had lower numbers as a percentage of people's net worth. So I'm gonna say four, right?
- [45:47]
Zing Singh
Well, I think four. You're much better at the percentage splits than I am. So I'm gonna agree with you on four out of ten.
- [45:54]
Simon Jack
Well, actually, I'm gonna downgrade it to three. I mean, if we're thinking that a Bill Gates is 10, because he's given away 40 billion, which is, you know, a huge proportion, I think he's much lower than that. So I'm gonna say give him a three for his $20 million to education, sports charities. And then there's power.
- [46:11]
Zing Singh
Well, this is an interesting one, because on one hand, you know, yeah, you could argue that wrestling caters to the basest human impulses. And, you know, it's not a real sport, but it is enormously popular, and it's got a lot of power and pull.
- [46:25]
Simon Jack
So it's very, very popular in red states, that's for sure. In the US And Linda and Vince have donated millions to conservative groups. Linda McMahon herself gave $15 million to Trump's, you know, campaign financing.
- [46:40]
Zing Singh
So Linda was actually WWE's CEO until 2009, and then she ran for Connecticut's Senate seat as a Republican. She invested over $100 million of her own money in 2010 and 2012. She didn't win that time, but you may recognize her name because in 2024, she was nominated by Trump to lead the Department of Education.
- [47:01]
Simon Jack
And Vince and Linda have announced their Separation. They did that in November of 2024. And remember, Vince McMahon and Trump have a long standing connection. In April 2024, Vince's spokesperson clarified they have not, however, been in regular contact. So he doesn't have a hotline to the White House anymore?
- [47:19]
Zing Singh
No. And actually it seems like Linda might be the one coming out on top in terms of power.
- [47:24]
Simon Jack
Yeah, I'm gonna give him a four for power.
- [47:27]
Zing Singh
I think I would. Hmm. Well, this is difficult because he did create this incredible juggernaut that single handedly launched a lot of people's careers. Even though at the end of his storyline arc, as you might put it, he's on the down and out. I think I would give him a four as well. He doesn't seem to have that much power nowadays, especially given the fact that he's had to step back in such a big way from his industry.
- [47:53]
Simon Jack
So good, bad, or just another billionaire? I think the thing is, my judgment on this is slightly influenced by the fact that I think that it's a sport I don't like, if it is a sport at all. It preys on some of the basest instincts. It pits people against each other. It can descend into throwing pig poop at each other. They're making them go crawl on all forms and bark like a dog whilst saying awful thing. You know, that's not much fun if you ask me.
- [48:22]
Zing Singh
Yeah. And actually it wasn't until I looked up those old clips of the attitude era that I felt my attitude hardening, you might say, towards Vince McMahon. Because if you look up those clips, the ones of women being abused, of crowds chanting slut, it is really difficult to stomach. It is actually horrendous. And I've not been shocked by something in a long time.
- [48:45]
Simon Jack
And to be prepared to go there in the name of ratings, to encourage it, doesn't sit very well with me. So I'm gonna say Vince McMahon is a bad billionaire.
- [48:53]
Zing Singh
I'm gonna agree. And I think, you know, if anyone disagrees with us, just look up those clips. I mean, they're pretty out there.
- [49:07]
Simon Jack
So next week's episode we have the first Puerto Rican billionaire.
- [49:12]
Zing Singh
That's right. He could have very nearly become a huge tennis superstar, but couldn't quite make it.
- [49:17]
Simon Jack
Yeah, he did, though, become richer than any tennis player ever. So that worked out. He had made a fortune buying and selling companies.
- [49:25]
Zing Singh
But he says that his business strategy came from a pivotal moment when he was searching for diapers in the supermarket.
- [49:31]
Simon Jack
That is Orlando Bravo, Puerto Rican private equity billionaire.
- [49:36]
Zing Singh
Thanks for joining us. You've been listening to Good Bad Billionaire from the BBC World Service. This episode was produced by Louise Morris. Our researcher is Tamsin Curry, and our editor, Paul Smith.
- [49:55]
Sue Lin Wong
Hi, I'm Sue Lin Wong. I'm a journalist at the Economist. And for the past year, I've been investigating how the CEO of a bank in rural Kansas was duped out of $47 million. This wasn't your classic scam. He'd been ensnared by a new global criminal industry, one that's coming for you and me. My new series is called Scam, Inc. To listen and subscribe, just search Economist Podcasts plus.