The Ninth Wonder of the World falls - Chyna, 1969-2016

April 21, 2016 12:06 PM

Pro wrestler Joanie "Chyna" Laurer has died. Known as the Ninth Wonder of the World (André the Giant had long been billed as the Eighth) for her physique and dominance in the ring, Laurer was 46.

Laurer was the first woman to hold a non-women's championship in WWE history, when she defeated Jeff Jarrett for the Intercontinental title at the No Mercy pay-per-view in 1999. She would win that belt one more time, and the Women's Championship once as well, leaving the then-WWF without losing the belt. Laurer posed for Playboy in 2000, claiming that a plan to make her the first female WWF World Champion was scuttled as a result.

Stories vary on why Laurer left the WWF. She had a long-time relationship with Paul "Triple H" Levesque that ended when Levesque started dating Stephanie McMahon (after a storyline relationship between Triple H and McMahon). Former WWF/E announcer and executive Jim Ross claims that Laurer left of her own volition after her breakup with Levesque, while Laurer claims she was fired via fax.

After her time in the WWF, Laurer wrestled briefly in New Japan Pro Wrestling and Total Nonstop Action Wrestling. She made appearances on Howard Stern's radio show, several reality TV franchises, and adult movies. Her first was 1 Night in China, a sex tape featuring her with then-fiancee Sean "X-Pac" Waltman), and she went on to star as She-Hulk in Vivid Video's Avengers parody and her own spinoff She-Hulk XXX.

Laurer served in the Peace Corps and taught English in Japan before trying to become a fitness model. She spoke four languages, often joining the Spanish announcing team ringside to "cut promos" during her rivals' matches.

She had a history of substance abuse, appearing on Celebrity Rehab in 2008. Her death is being investigated as a possible overdose.

posted by Etrigan (57 comments total)

For another person who had to battle demons and self-medication: .
posted by Melismata at 12:12 PM on April 21, 2016 [5 favorites]

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posted by drezdn at 12:13 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Faintdreams at 12:14 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Sys Rq at 12:15 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by lord_wolf at 12:15 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by djeo at 12:15 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Faint of Butt at 12:16 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Joey Michaels at 12:17 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by jonmc at 12:17 PM on April 21, 2016

I was never into wrestling, but saw her on the occasional talk show and such. She always seemed terribly, ferociously intelligent, not to mention kind.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 12:17 PM on April 21, 2016 [10 favorites]

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posted by Gelatin at 12:21 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by scaryblackdeath at 12:26 PM on April 21, 2016

She was an incredible force during her time at WWF and, even considering the Intercontinental Title reign, she deserved better than the legacy the company ultimately gave her -- for instance, keeping her out of the Hall of Fame thanks to her porn career. (Shockingly, Vince McMahon's company was riddled with weird sexist bullshit. Who'da thunk, right?)

Also, it's worth noting that after a trademark fight with WWF/E, she ultimately changed her legal name to Chyna so she could return to using it professionally.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:30 PM on April 21, 2016 [7 favorites]

I am seething with anger at how the WWE has exploited this in social media already. You can't pretend to love and appreciate someone you've snubbed, ignored and openly bashed for years.
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 12:31 PM on April 21, 2016 [30 favorites]

Not a huge fan, but it seems like she tried to leverage inescapably being seen as a freakshow into some kind of celebrity, and suffered terribly for it. No good solutions for a girl like her.
posted by praemunire at 12:31 PM on April 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

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posted by The Ardship of Cambry at 12:34 PM on April 21, 2016

Not a huge fan, but it seems like she tried to leverage inescapably being seen as a freakshow into some kind of celebrity, and suffered terribly for it. No good solutions for a girl like her.

The list of former wrestling stars who've done anything but crash and burn after total retirement is very very small and relies almost entirely on either acting talent or serious entrepreneurial hustle. Basically her only career path was a continuing association with WWE, and when they decided they didn't want her, well....
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:41 PM on April 21, 2016 [10 favorites]

I haven't watched wrestling in a long time, but I really respected her when I did.
Rest in Peace.
posted by Duffington at 12:45 PM on April 21, 2016

She seemed like someone who very much wanted something more out of her life, and a kind soul at that. It seems like a sad tale.
posted by xingcat at 12:46 PM on April 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

No good solutions for a girl like her.

Woman, actually.

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posted by mudpuppie at 12:47 PM on April 21, 2016 [62 favorites]

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posted by PussKillian at 12:49 PM on April 21, 2016

Here's a very nice remembrance from Stephen Tobolowsky about his fairly brief acquaintance with her.
posted by Vendar at 12:52 PM on April 21, 2016 [11 favorites]

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Nthing that she sought more out of her life than she received. Godspeed, Joanie.
posted by Sphinx at 1:09 PM on April 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

this really upset me today, and I wasn't sure why because I don't really know much about the WWE, and by not much basically nothing really. I just saw her a few times on reality television but she seemed like a nice person and had lots of years left.
posted by zutalors! at 1:09 PM on April 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

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posted by AugustWest at 1:09 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by get off of my cloud at 1:11 PM on April 21, 2016

Mick Foley remembers Chyna
posted by sporkwort at 1:17 PM on April 21, 2016 [12 favorites]

Woman, actually.

I was thinking of her as a young person starting out. Seems like there was never really a niche for her where she wasn't going to be exploited.
posted by praemunire at 1:23 PM on April 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

That post from Mick Foley is really sweet.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 1:23 PM on April 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

Mick Foley is a good dude. I'm glad they were friends, and reconnected before her death. I'm pissed (not at him, at the world in general) that he felt he had to say he cared about her "whether it was politically correct or not."
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 1:25 PM on April 21, 2016 [3 favorites]

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I don't watch wrestling anymore, but when I did, she was always so great to see on screen. And in interviews elsewhere she was always witty and on point.

Ugh what a day.
posted by numaner at 1:25 PM on April 21, 2016

All I ever knew about Ms. Laurer I saw on Celebrity Rehab season 1, and I remember my heart going out to her. She seemed so smart and sweet, but that addiction monkey was hanging onto her back as tight as it could. My heart goes out to her again, and to her loved ones.
posted by magstheaxe at 1:27 PM on April 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

She seemed like a nice person who picked a meat grinder of a career. There is no career that seems to chew up and spit out employees like the absurdist farce that is WWF/E's "sports entertainment." What Don King was to boxing, Vince McMahon is to this genetically mutated child of bad acting and bodybuilding.
posted by prepmonkey at 1:35 PM on April 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

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posted by bonobothegreat at 1:40 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by xcasex at 1:44 PM on April 21, 2016

In the ring, Chyna was presented as this unstoppable physical force, and Joanie certainly had the build and the drive necessary to make it believable. In his autobiography, Mick Foley said that Chyna slamming the door on his head during a cage match was the hardest he had ever been hit by anything, and given the variety of things with which Mick Foley has been hit, that is really saying something.

Out of the ring, post-WWE, I found her (through no fault of hers) too painful to watch. She reminded me of too many women in my life who deserve better, and who know that they deserve better, and who are canny enough to recognize how thoroughly the deck has been stacked against them, but who still hold on to just enough hope that it emotionally crushes them when they fall just short of overcoming near-impossible odds.

I am not looking forward to watching WWE pretend that Joanie being betrayed and then tossed aside like garbage wasn't de facto company policy for the last decade.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 1:45 PM on April 21, 2016 [23 favorites]

I'll repost what I said on Twitter, here:

I have not watched pro wrestling (except for UR Fight Show and Shane's match at 'Mania) in 11 years. Still sucks to hear Chyna died.

Real messy story there. I liked when she showed up in WWE and they had a legit scary woman, not some eye-candy prop. Then... darkness.

I tend to have a soft spot for people who defy dumb misconceptions I have. (At ~12-13, one of them was "women can't be tough.")

RIP.
posted by Dark Messiah at 1:46 PM on April 21, 2016 [3 favorites]

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posted by adrienneleigh at 2:22 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Splunge at 2:28 PM on April 21, 2016

Ridesharing with Prince.

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posted by radwolf76 at 2:42 PM on April 21, 2016 [4 favorites]

dammit. She deserved better. Eras are different and all, but what I wouldn't give to see Chyna in her prime wrestling Bayley, Sasha Banks, or any of the current women's wrestlers. Hell, I'd love to see her work with Dolph Ziggler, Kevin Owens, or even Samoa Joe. I'd like to point to the current run of exceptional women's wrestling, but then again, that seems to be HHH's project. You'd like to think maybe it's a sign he's matured, but keeping Chyna out of the Hall suggests otherwise.

Chyna deserved better than this. It's a goddamn shame.
posted by Ghidorah at 3:09 PM on April 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

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posted by WizardOfDocs at 3:42 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by wonton endangerment at 4:03 PM on April 21, 2016

I am not looking forward to watching WWE pretend that Joanie being betrayed and then tossed aside like garbage wasn't de facto company policy for the last decade.

I am fully prepared to watch Triple H finally induct her into the WWE Hall of Fame next Wrestlemania and watch him pretend like he wasn't one of the people who literally, personally threw her away.
posted by The demon that lives in the air at 4:31 PM on April 21, 2016 [3 favorites]

Joanie Laurer was, by all accounts, a very kind person with very serious problems - not just addiction but also mental health challenges on top of that, who was taken advantage of more than once by terrible men. ( I think it's important to note that she did not initially consent to the "One Night In Chyna" sex tape being released and was more or less bullied into it by Sean Waltman, who is a shithead.)

Could WWE have treated her better? Yes, because WWE can always treat pretty much anybody better than they do. But the truth is that she contributed heavily to the collapse of her relationship with WWE. Her personal relationship with Triple H ended very, very badly - by most accounts the relationship was all but over by the time Hunter started dating Stephanie McMahon, but she accused Stephanie for years of "stealing" Hunter, even after Steph and Trips were married with children (and in very, very aggressive terms, sometimes involving physical threats), and publicly accused Hunter of a pedophile. Under the circumstances it's not surprising WWE didn't want to rebuild bridges. She was mentally ill (although she tried her very best to get the treatment she needed, which she did not always get) and that made a difficult relationship worse.

She'll go into the Hall of Fame now, and some next of kin will get the inclusion fee (which is always sizable). But she deserved to go in while she was alive. If wretched scum like Carlos Colon, Jimmy Snuka and Fabulous Moolah could all get their Hall of Fame Rings in person, then Chyna certainly deserved the same. The only person she ever really hurt was herself.
posted by mightygodking at 4:44 PM on April 21, 2016 [13 favorites]

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posted by allthinky at 5:45 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by humanfont at 5:49 PM on April 21, 2016

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She was only 45 - 3 years older than I am now. Way too young.

I read her book years ago. (I was visiting my then-boyfriend, who lived a couple hours away from me. We were at his brother's house and he and his brother were doing something or other. I was bored and there was a copy of the book in the living room, so I picked it up.) It was actually an interesting read - even for a non-wrestling fan.
posted by SisterHavana at 6:50 PM on April 21, 2016 [2 favorites]

She wasn't a "woman wrestler" - she was a woman who performed in the ring with men, at the height of the "hyper-muscular" era, and in the middle of American professional wrestling trying to integrate japanese and luche-libre acrobatic styles into traditional kayfabe wrestling. She was a tag-team partner with Eddie Guerrero, for crying out loud, and could keep up.

OK. Here is a match. There is a lot to unpack, most of it with unfettered delight.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:16 PM on April 21, 2016 [6 favorites]

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posted by gusandrews at 8:25 PM on April 21, 2016

"There's a lot of potassium in it!"
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:31 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by geek anachronism at 8:49 PM on April 21, 2016

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posted by Ms. Moonlight at 1:38 AM on April 22, 2016

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posted by Minus215Cee at 7:32 AM on April 22, 2016

The Guardian: Deaths such as Chyna's are worryingly common in the world of WWE
posted by XMLicious at 9:23 AM on April 22, 2016 [2 favorites]

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posted by XtinaS at 10:28 AM on April 24, 2016

Chyna Deserved Better
posted by Etrigan at 11:35 AM on April 25, 2016 [1 favorite]