83 Weeks - David Arquette in WCW [Show Notes] (Patreon)

David Arquette

On April 26h, 2000 on WCW Thunder, we saw a World Title change that would be pretty famous in the history of WCW. However, we didn't see Ric Flair win the title, or Sting, or Hulk Hogan, or Goldberg win it, we saw David Arquette win the WCW World Title

David Arquette was an actor. He starred in movies such as Scream 1, 2, 3, & 4, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Airheads, Never Been Kissed and many more

A lot of fans can't remember who the WWE World Champion was 1 month ago, but David Arquette winning the WCW World title is still talked about today, 20 years later.

David was in the movie, Ready to Rumble, and he started to appear on WCW TV to promote it.

Talk about how that happened and whose idea was it to bring David to WCW TV?

He made his first appearance on the April 12th, 2000 episode of Thunder, sitting in the crowd before jumping into the ring & have a confrontation with yourself, and the New Blood.

On the April 24th Nitro, from Rochester, New York, They showed the three-decker cage from the "Ready to Rumble" movie. You called out Page, and Kimberly gave him divorce papers. Page went after you, but Jarrett hit Page with a guitar. This brought out Arquette to jump on you. Jarrett pulled him off but before Jarrett could pound on him, Kanyon saved Arquette. You then challenged Arquette to a match. The stips were if Arquette won, Page would get a cage match for the title on this show. 

When this happened, did you already know you guys were going to go with him winning the title?

Later in the show, you and David had a match against each other. You kicked him into the corner, but David comes back with a spear, followed by the Worm for one of the loudest reactions of the night. Jarrett pulls the referee out at two and hits Page with the belt. You hit a low blow on Arquette, but Jeff hits you with the guitar by mistake, giving Arquette the pin. 

What did it feel like to take that guitar shot?

On the April 26th Thunder. Show opened with Jarrett, yourself and Kimberly having kidnapped Arquette because Jarrett blamed him for the title switch and said they'd hold him hostage unless DDP agreed to put the title up in a tag match.

Later in the show, Arquette spears you as Jarrett hits Page with the title. We get a double cover and another referee comes in to count the pin on you, making Arquette the World Champion. 

David said DDP told him he was going to win the title, and David thought it was a joke at first

“I thought it was a bit of a joke and he was like, ‘No, I’m serious,'” Arquette recalled. “I think [my] response was, ‘That’s a terrible idea. No, we can’t do that,’ but then they explained the storyline that I wasn’t pinning a wrestler, I was pinning Eric Bischoff.” 

How did you personally feel about this, having to be the one who he pinned?

This was obviously a publicity stunt. What did you guys think could or would come out of this? It did get some pub, Entertainment Tonight, Extra and Access Hollywood all mentioned the Arquette title win 

The USA Today wrote of it on May 1st, 2000 -

“David Arquette, star of the wrestling movie Ready to Rumble, captured the World Championship Wrestling heavyweight championship last week by pinning Eric Bischoff in a tag-team match. He defends the title tonight on TNT’s WCW Monday Nitro Live! (8 ET/PT).”

This Thunder did a 2.72 rating. The number was higher than Thunder had been drawing over the past six months, but down from the previous episode two weeks earlier 

The Arquette match wasn't a success even if the show drew a higher rating than usual since the main event drew a 2.25, which was the lowest rating of any segment on the show and lost 25% of its audience largely after the Paisley vs. Tammy match on a show which went unopposed. 

Meltzer reported - Yes, the most prestigious title in our sport changed hands twice more this week, with DDP beating Jeff Jarrett at Nitro on 4/24 in Rochester, NY and then it being put up to the winner of the fall in a tag match on Thunder on 4/25 in Syracuse, NY, with David Arquette pinning Eric Bischoff. The idea, and since this just happened as we went to press time will tell if this is correct, is that WCW believes the publicity about Arquette winning the title will hit mainstream and lead to a ratings boost on 5/1 since WWF looks to be changing its world title to Rock and Austin will appear. 

They did a double pin finish with Jarrett pinning Page at the same time Arquette pinned Bischoff, but they announced Arquette as winner and new champion and had him parade around with the belt. Kimberly was the ref and kept counting slow whenever Page had Jarrett pinned and counting fast the other way. 

Somehow she was out of there and Mickey Jay ran in and counted the double pin and signalled that Arquette had won. Most likely on 5/1 it'll go back to Jarrett perhaps as an executive decision or perhaps in the ring 

David has said - There was a lot of hatred, and a lot of people got so pissed off," said Arquette. "I remember telling one wrestler, I'm not sure who it was, wasn't Bam Bam Bigelow, but it was someone who hadn't ever been the champion before. And he was just so pissed. I was like I don't know what to say, man. You know, that was my first inkling on how sort of upset people were gonna get.

"And obviously, I get it. These people dedicate their lives, I have nothing but respect for wrestlers. To this day, I haven't taken a dime for wrestling... I get it. I've just been training for a little over a month now, and I get it. I mean, it's painful. It's intense. It takes a ton of hard work. These people go in and out every day working on themselves and working on their craft. 

So I get it... I always respected the business. I just sort of had an opportunity that I think a lot of people would have made the same decision if they were in that situation. And it's sort of a dream come true for me, so I was like, 'yeah. This is amazing.'"

What do you remember the reaction being from the other wrestlers when David won the title?

Who do you remember being the most upset about it?

Even though a lot of people hated this, David seemed to be embraced by Ric Flair. David said - “Ric Flair at one point put his arms around me and said, ‘Hey guys, he’s one of us,'” Arquette said “That made me feel really great.” 

Arquette learned about winning the title the afternoon of the Thunder show, when the idea was formulated, and at the time was asked to keep it through the PPV, in an Alex Marvez interview on wrestlingobserver.com said about the offer, 

"I said I felt alright, but I did feel kind of weird. Obviously, I don't deserve it. These guys are so skilled and it takes so much athleticism and gymnastics and strength, not to mention all the acting stuff that goes into it, it's really hard."

Arquette said he learned wrestling from Kanyon, DDP and Shane Helms in a ring at the warehouse where they practiced before doing the movie "Ready to Rumble," and said he messed around when the ring was up while they were doing the movie. After the show in Syracuse where he won the title, Arquette was buying food and drinks at the bar for everyone, not just wrestlers but also fan hangers-on, and he was, unlike many celebrities who get involved, very well liked by the wrestlers, even the ones who didn't think using him in that way was a smart idea. Arquette is said to be splitting his earnings from doing the pro wrestling to the family of Owen Hart, Brian Pillman and to Darren Drozdov 

There's been a lot of rumors over the years about who was actually the one that came up with this idea. The Nitro Book wrote -

Russo looked to his right at Tony Schiavone. What are you thinking? he asked the announcer. Nothing. What are you thinking? Schiavone replied. You want David Arquette to win the world title? Russo joked, comedically putting words in Schiavone’s mouth. Well that’s a thought, responded Schiavone. Did anybody think of that? Immediately, Russo reformed the meeting, running the idea past “10 to 15” people, he claims, including Bischoff himself. 

According to Russo, his zany proposal met zero resistance, meaning that in a swerve no-one could see coming, David Arquette would become World Heavyweight champion. “We were gonna do the predictable thing,” Russo told Wrestleline a week later. “We were gonna do the tag match, and Jarrett was going to get the title back. [But] I said, ‘wait a minute Eric, the whole idea of putting the belt on Page was to be unpredictable. 

Now we’re gonna turn around tonight…and do exactly what everyone thinks we’re gonna do - and that’s put the belt back on Jarrett!’ I said, ‘we can’t do that - we’re predictable again!’ 

So at the building, we came up with the David Arquette scenario.

Is that how you remember the discussion about it going down?

“I went over to Jeff and said, ‘Jeff, sit down. I gotta lay somethin’ on ya’. You know, Jeff laughed, because he knows me. He knows how I write television, and he trusts me because he knows I was successful before. So Jeff really didn’t have a problem with it.” Russo didn’t find Page to be quite as receptive. “When they told me,” 

Page remembers, “I started laughing. I said, ‘yeah right, what’s the finish?’ They go, ‘that’s what we’re gonna do’. I said, ‘no, we’re not’. I pleaded for at least 10 minutes. I argued, but sometimes...you realize that you’re just a character on the fucking show, and you’ve just gotta move on. That said...I fucking sucked it up and did what I had to do.

“I walked downstairs and pulled David aside. When I told him, he burst out laughing and said, ‘yeah right’. I said, ‘no dude, they’re really gonna do this tonight’. He said, ‘no! No! We can’t do that!’ I said, ‘guess what? Yes’. I said, ‘If you don’t wanna do it, say you don’t wanna do it or...guess what dude? You’re the world champ’. Then it fucking hit him like, ‘are you fucking kidding me? Do I wanna be the WCW world champ? Fucking-a right I do!

On the May 1st Nitro from Birmingham, Alabama, DDP, Kanyon and Arquette came out to no real pop with the belt. When Arquette started talking, the audience started booing. He said he'd give up the title. You told him he couldn't and that he'd have to be in the three cage match at Slamboree. Russo, Liz, Jarrett and Kimberly came out with you. Luger ran out in the middle of all this looking for Liz. You told Arquette he'd have to defend against Tank Abbott. DDP said he wanted the match with Abbott. It set up Abbott vs. DDP and if Abbott won, he'd get a title match. 

Tank beat DDP after Jarrett hit DDP with a bottle, which set up Arquette defending the World Title against Tank Abbott later in the show

Later in the show, David pinned Abbot in 2:13 after DDP hit Abbott with the diamond cutter.

A few days later on Thunder, Arquette ran out but a part of the stage that was gimmicked was broken during the show, and he must not of been told about it, because he fell down into it as he was running out

That takes us to the Slamboree pay per view. It took place on May 7th, 2000 from the Kemper Arena, in Kansas City, Missouri

It drew 7,165 fans, which was 4,862 paying $139,202. It did a 0.14 buyrate, which was the 2nd lowest in WCW history

Jeff Jarrett won the most prestigious title in the history of our sport,the WCW heavyweight strap, over champ David Arquette and Diamond Dallas Page (Page Falkinburg) in 15:30 in a three-decker Ready to Rumble cage match. Arquette got to miss a splash off the top early and they did an early spot where Page whipped Jarrett into Arquette. It was pretty well telegraphed during the show that Arquette was turning on Page for the finish. Jarrett and Page juiced. When they got to the second cage, there were a ton of weapons, which was really smart because it saved it from behind like the last triple decker cage where you couldn't bump in the second cage. Arquette was selling that collision for a long time keeping him out of everyone's way. 

They gimmicked one of the sides of the cage so they both went through, teasing someone falling off the cage and dying. Page actually got a table to stand up in the second cage, which wasn't easy since it was a mesh ground, and slammed Jarrett through it. Page juiced. Arquette then climbed all the way to the top and laid there on his stomach, like he was scared to death being so high. Mike Awesome showed up in the middle cage to take a diamond cutter from Page. Arquette never grabbed the belt when he could. They got to the third cage which had a bunch of guitars. Arquette had a guitar on top for protection while Page and Jarrett missed guitar shots on each other. 

Both were climbing to the top while Arquette stood with a guitar, and they teased he was going to hit Jarrett, but of course instead hit Page and Jarrett got the belt. In other words, the exact same finish from the last PPV (with Kimberly in the Arquette role) with the same two participants, and worse yet, the exact same finish as WrestleMania. Kanyon then showed up to fight with Awesome standing on top of the bottom cage, which looked to be close to 20 feet from the ground. Awesome threw Kanyon off the top of the cage onto the ramp, which was heavily gimmicked so he wasn't hurt seriously taking the stunt man bump. 

They stacked cardboard underneath the ramp to soften the blow underneath the spot he was supposed to hit, which he had marked. Of course from that height, any major flaws in the execution or even landing in a bad position wouldn't have been pretty, but he did practice it three times the day before without a hitch. Page and Jarrett were doing a run-through the day before and Page took a really bad bump (which is why he was taped up) and they had to fly in his doctor to work on his shoulder and back for him to just be able to work this match. After the show went off the air, Kanyon was selling it huge with EMT's, etc. 

They didn't practice due to the ramp how long it took to make it look like he was hurt and then to carry him out, and live, since it took so long, left a lot of people with a bad feeling. The reaction to this was interesting. Most fans watching on TV loved it, or at least popped for the bump. 

Every e-mail we received (with maybe one exception and maybe not even that) of people there live mentioned it negatively because it was Kemper Arena and they were the same fans who saw Owen Hart die from falling from the ceiling and felt this was too similar and with them selling it like he was maimed far too much of an exploitation of the tragedy. Actually at the time I thought they were copying Mick Foley, and that because of the big bump at the "Ready to Rumble" movie finish and to distract from the fact they were doing the same main event finish on two straight shows, figured somebody had to take a big bump. 

The Owen Hart thing had been discussed, at least a little, in reference to this, which sort of made it sad. I didn't have a problem as much with the paralysis claim on television the next day, even with the obvious comparison to Darren Drozdov (well, they could have sold it in a different way) because the hospital angle with DDP getting beaten up was so Three Stooges like that it isn't like anyone could possibly take it seriously. ***1/4 

The Kemper Arena is where Owen Hart tragically passed away one year earlier, on May 23rd 1999. Ironically, Slamboree took place on May 7th, which is Owen's birthday

David pinned you to win the title. Did you ever consider beating him and winning the World title yourself?

The next night on Nitro, you came out with the New Blood and Arquette and you said  Page, “We wanted you to buy it hook, line and sinker. Just like all these morons in the arena, and all the Internet wrestling experts, who thought it was such as disgrace to put the WCW World Heavyweight title on Mr. David Arquette, I did it for one reason only - to screw you royally. Page ended up coming out and hitting David with the diamond cutter

The Nitro book had some quotes from guys reflecting on David's title win in hindsight -

“Putting the belt on David Arquette - stupidest thing ever,” reflects DDP today. “I’ve never taken more shit from anything than that. Eric had just come back in, and I know he was just trying to work with Russo. I love Vince [now]...me and him are buddies again because we let shit go - there’s no use holding on to it. But that was Vince’s idea, and it was a bad one. Really bad. It is what it is. I had plenty of ideas that weren’t great ideas. Not one as bad as that one though!”

“Whenever I hear those guys who bust David’s balls,” growls DDP, “I tell them, ‘David only made $10,000 off that pay-off, and he gave all of it to [Brian Pillman’s widow]. He gave it all to her.

“That changes people’s viewpoint on it. I tell people, ‘if it was you, you wouldn’t have done it, right?’ I say, ‘fuck you, you would have cut your buddies throat to get that spot’. David was just one of the guys that got that spot. “It was really stupid though!”

“When we were in Florida,” offers Kevin Sullivan, “Eddie Graham had two rules. One was that faces and heels couldn’t be seen together. The second was if you lost a fight in any public place, you were fired. Guys that wanted to be wrestlers used to [get beaten up by the pros]. Guys used to leave with broken noses and broken faces. One time they beat [a hopeful] so bad, they stripped him of his clothes. I’m not condoning that, but David Arquette winning the world title? Boy, Scott Hall never won the title. Scott Hall never won the World Heavyweight championship, but David Arquette did. Can you tell me what’s wrong?”

Russo defended the decision in the Nitro book - “One of the first things that got the WWF over was the unpredictability of it, because things were starting to happen that you never in a million years thought would happen. So basically on a week to week basis, you had to tune in, [in order] to see what was happening. To me, David Arquette was one of those instances.

“Number one, it is part of the big story. The David Arquette thing is going somewhere, and Eric and I knew that from day one. And also number two, it got people talking about WCW. Negative or positive, they were talking about WCW again, and that’s what we need people to do. Nobody has mentioned this, but [before] Nitro, somebody hands me a USA Today and there it is. Right on the cover of the entertainment section, David Arquette [is shown] winning the WCW title, with a plug for Nitro tonight at 8:00pm. Well, that kind of exposure would have never happened [without the angle].”

Sid Vicious, who was in Ready to Rumble with David said he didn't see the problem with David being the champion that everyone else did. Sid said the territory (WCW) was already on it's ass, and he didn't think that'd make it worse. He said he didnt think it was that bad of a deal. He said by that time, Vince Russo & Ed Ferrera had already made a joke out of everyone, so one more joke wasn't going to hurt

Scott Steiner said that it was a slap in the face to wrestling fans

Ric Flair wrote in his book - So how did I feel about David Arquette as a champion? Well, he had a hell of a lot more character than some other guys who’d worn the championship belt.

Bobby Heenan said in Ric Flair's book - When I found out that they were putting the championship belt on David Arquette, I replied, “Is Zsa Zsa Gabor sick this week?” That’s the way it was in WCW. This is a company that had Buff Bagwell tag-team with his mother. It was like Hee Haw down there; they might as well have had Buck Owens picking at his guitar while wrestlers jumped out of the corn.

David would return to wrestling many years later. On the December 13th 2010 edition of Raw, David made his WWE debut by teaming with Alex Riley in a handicap match against Randy Orton. Orton won the match

8 years later in 2018 and 18 years after he won the WCW World Title, David returned to professional wrestling, this time on the indie circuit.

In 2018, Arquette said during an interview at The Wendy Williams Show, he has been trolled for 18 years on the Internet and he wants people to have respect for his name in professional wrestling 

Did you ever talk to David and ask him why this was so important to him to do 18 years later?

On July 15, 2018, Arquette made his return to professional wrestling making his debut for Championship Wrestling from Hollywood (CWFH) in a losing effort against RJ City

David was on the Steve Austin podcast, and he said of this match - I never really got the opportunity to wrestle, so just 18 years later, after a lot of people gave me grief, I was like, ‘I want to do it right,’ so I’ve been training with Peter Avalon, a great wrestler/trainer.” Arquette said.

“I’m getting back into [pro] wrestling 18 years later. I just had my first match… It was amazing… Against RJ City. I got my butt kicked, but it’s alright. It was good. It was a good match at Championship Wrestling From Hollywood

While David was on Austin's podcast, he also said - I actually recently talked to Vince Russo on his podcast,” Arquette said. “And then, he explained it to me. He said that part of the reason he thought it would be alright because when I first got there, I was running around.

“I did something with, Jarrett, Jeff Jarrett, and I had his guitar and I went around all the wrestlers and had them sign it. I was just a fan. And he was like, and that was part of the reason I was different. I wasn’t just an actor. I was truly a fan of wrestling, so that’s kind of the idea behind it.”

On October 6, 2018, Arquette teamed with RJ City to defeat the team of Halal Beefcake (Idris Abraham and Joe Coleman) in a tag team match at Border City Wrestling's 25th Anniversary show in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. The event was filmed by Impact Wrestling to air as a One Night Only pay-per-view in November 2018. 

On November 16, 2018, Arquette wrestled Nick Gage in a deathmatch at Joey Janela's LA Confidential event. During the match, he suffered a severe cut in the neck, causing him to bleed profusely. After the match, he went to a hospital and was operated on. Arquette would later state that he's done with deathmatches. 

On May 23, 2019, Arquette made his debut on Being the Elite, where he attempted to convince The Young Bucks to allow him to enter the Over the Budget Battle Royal at AEW Double or Nothing. Neither of them recognized him at first, however they eventually recalled his WCW World title reign, but still refused to let him compete, instead, giving him a double Superkick. 

In hindsight, do you think David winning the title was a big mistake? 

David winning the World Title won the Most Disgusting Promotional Tactic award for the year 2000 by the Wrestling Observer newsletter

In WWE Magazine a few years later, they listed David winning the title as the #1 failure of Nitro. Would you agree with that?

WCW was obviously on the downtrend when David won the title. How much do you think that accelerated the end of WCW? 

Had David never won the title, would WCW still gone out of business at the exact same time that it did?