FLASHBACK: Holiday Hell

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the Creative Control Network. I've just been kind of ter sending episodes in, but now I've got a fresh intro with the Queen of Extreme ready to talk about what do you think today? Wrestling? We are we're going to talk about wrestling. I don't know, I never know. We're going back in time all the way to I think twenty twenty where let me see Oh Jesus No. Twenty nineteen. December sixteenth, twenty nineteen, we published a episode for Patreon

called ECW Holiday Hell Holiday Hell. Do you remember Holiday Hell? Well? I remember the title, but I don't remember what I did. Well, you did something hillacious, that's for sure. You don't talk about it. But one thing we've talked about on Patreon. We've talked about, you know, the one show where Shane and Candido dressed up for Halloween one time. We've talked

about some of the shenanigans that go on. But Holiday Hell was kind of like towards your end of the year calendar at the Arena, and it was a couple of years in the row that they would run this. It's just just something to spice it up for the fans, make it look special because it's around the Christmas time and end of the year. Yeah it was. I mean, if you remember we had November to remember, we had heat wave in the summertime, holiday, Hell, it was near

Christmas time. It was just the season. I guess Paul would just do these shows according to what the season was. But I don't remember what I did on this show. Yeah, I don't remember which match this is. I have to listen to the full clip, but usually, especially if it was after something like November, to remember, it would feature some form of a rematch, Okay, but not like so let's say November. Remember ninety six is Shane and Brian Levers,

Terry Funk and Tommy Dreamer. I believe the December show was like a modified version of that match with no chunk. Okay, Well, whatever it was, I'm sure it's it's wonderful and I'm sure you'll enjoy listening to my recap of it because when we shot this episode or filmed this episode, I knew what I was talking about, and three years later, I have no idea. That's right, But we are very very again right now, so I can relive exactly everybody. She likes to be surprised folks, so that's why I

surprised her. I never know anything. On Patreon, we have a ton of back content. We like to give it to you here as a previews so you can come over and join us. And not only do you get these episodes we post exclusively on Patreon, certain tier levels you get access to private discord group where you get chat with Francine and some other little bonuses that you get as well. And it's never a dull moment on

the Patreon side. No, it's fun and we would love to have you join our growing family, I should say, so, come on over. It's www dot patreon dot com. Forward slash faran scene podcast, and there's all different tier levels to suit your budget. So do you go to Starbucks? Do you get a grand day? It's like what nine dollars in tax? It is now okay and you probably drink it within a half hour and it's gone gone. For ten bucks, you get thirty one day's worth of content.

M h. That's like pennies a day. Pennies a day. So come on over, just do it. We're waiting for it. I mean, you won't be disappointed. I'm here to welcome you. You are, and you are you send them a welcome message. We asked for feedback. We actually dms. Did you come on? You get to come on the show. You get to DM me for free. I mean, I don't charge for dms. If you're a member. All the dms are always open. You can ask me whatever you want, and believe me,

people do. And there are some doozies out there, that's right, but you know, we would love to have you. Like I said, and there's so many perks. Just just go over to the page and take a look, and I feel like what you see. Come on over and join. That's true, That's very true. So if you want to follow me, it's at Chat, E and B on Twitter, at ib Exclusives on Instagram, and head over to Patreon, Patreon, dot com, slash franccene podcast and across the board on

social media. You can find me at ECW Diva fan scene. But now, enjoy the show all right, Getting back here on Patreon, the Patreon eyes up here extra trademarked copyright, so you can't steal that name. I thought about that on the last one. I'm gonna sit in here today with Francine to talk about ECW holiday hell shows from way back in the day. But before we get into that, first we'll say hello to Franceneho is just taking a sip of drink and just finish the banana. Hi, Francine,

that was my lunch water. Yeah, very nice, hydrated and fulfilled. But I also want to make a quick announcement in regards to the content here for Patreon. We're gonna be adding one show in the new year. We're gonna wait till the new year, though, so hold your horses. We're gonna be talking more about specifically ECW, and I think covering anything having to do with ECW, not just Francene, but ECW as a whole, maybe something that popped up a moment, a match, a card, something just a week.

Get specifically talk about that topic because I know a lot of people want to talk more about ECW just because they love ECW. And we'll leave this open to talk about whatever. Like last week we talked about the Sam Man and the Restle Caide fiasco. You know, other times we've talked about more general things. So that show will add a different or secondary Patreon show specifically about ECW. We're not going to divert ECW only, and that's coming

in twenty twenty. That's all. You're working me too much, Chad, I'm exhausted. If you give me an extra twenty minutes every time we record, then you will be set to go. Okay, I can do that, but anything for the Patreon family, that's right. I want you guys to stay, So we want to give you extra content when we can. And if there's anything you want us to talk about, leave it, give it on the what do we do? We have a message board or you can comment under and I

think you can kind of do both things. You can either send a message on the Patreon message portal, or you can comment underneath a video and just tell us what it is that you want to hear or see or whatever. Because I think this is a you know, even in the podcast world, this is a market that really hasn't kind of been like touched on. And I know with you, I mean, you were there for so long, you saw so much of it. It's cool to to kind of shoot things out. You see what you we live.

But also I mean there's a couple of years that you weren't there that maybe I could send you some clips and we can talk about something that happened even before you got there, because this will be an ECW retrospective, and I just think that'll be a cool little thing to day. Yeah, these wonderful folks, the early Eastern days are Yeah, we're talking like, you know, Jimmy Snooka versus Don Morocco before I didn't get there the late ninety three,

so anything before then. I'm not like prevy too. I've had a lot of recent nineties nostalgia, like a lot, I really you know, I mean, I was you know, I was younger. It was early teen in the early or preteen, early nineties, and there was just so much stuff that like, looking back, I wish I either like knew about or saw And like, I get nostalgic for the eighties a lot, because I was a wee whipper snapper at the time. But I don't know some about

the nineties lately. I almost wish like I was born five years earlier, so I could have gotten in on some of those some of those cool trends and things. And you know, I don't know, I I tell me, well, no, I often wonder if I was born later, would my path have led me to wrestling or would it be somewhere else, Because I mean, you have to remember I was a Philly girl, right and ECW was based out of Philadelphia, and that's you know, I just called that number and that's the way I got in. But nowadays

you don't do that, you know. It's like, I mean, unless I really wanted to do it and did what like Salida or a Leasha show up at these indies shows and hope somebody recognizes me. Like, I don't know if I would have did that back then or now if I was twenty years old. I guess you really have to have a passion for it, you know. I was just trying to transition jobs because I thought wrestling looked cool and it was something that you know what I mean, Like it wasn't something I grew up really

wanting to do. Right. But I always say to myself, Gosh, I like today you can't just pick up a phone and make a call and meet somebody and go down and train and hope that they like you. Like it's different like the performance center. You have to get it, like it's a whole different thing now, you know. So I don't. I don't know. I don't know if I'd be in the business if I was twenty in twenty nineteen. Like, it's something I think about. You know, it's weird about that.

And maybe because people in this day and age think about so when they broke in, they might not necessarily have broken in the way you did of that same thing. They might have had to go through a wrestling school and call them I did. I'm talking about like the I know what you're talking I meaning like, like let's just say like like the performance center, right, I'm talking about even guys that broken ten years ago, if they're teaching at a school, they only know how to go

through like that set up. Do you know what I'm trying to say? Like it's you continue, I'm watching what I want to say, you continue? Get me back up there, I think, I I mean, I might be wrong, but don't you have to like have be invited to the performance center and get it. It's a whole different Yeah, right, it's a whole Right, That's what I'm trying to say. It's a whole thing. Right. So for me, like I watched it on TV. I thought it looked cool. I

picked up the phone. I went and Todd Gordon and thank god I had talent, which I didn't know I had because I was never an actress or anything. But I just went there and I worked and they liked

what they saw and I got a contract. Yeah you know what I mean, Like, uh, but it's not as simple as that, That's what I'm trying to Yeah, but I did have to go through the wrestling school, but it wasn't like I had to like audition to get you got an audition now, I mean you got to Basically it's so different, right, And I'm saying that people who train under that model now when they if they want to become a trainer and say fifteen years, that's

all they know. They don't know the actual like the grit side of it and like the you know, oh, I know, taking a chance or like an Alisha or Selena go into a show and what it's you know, it's it's it's a different world. And I tell you what, the way I was trained is not the way that

these girls are trained. So if I would never do it now because I'm too old, But if I went into the ring now and you know, showed them what I would they would be like, we don't do that here because it's a whole different world over there, you know what I mean. So it's just a different concept. But were all these other little things that they all adapt that model? Now, yes, it's all that everybody's picking up on that model. Well, yeah, well that's we can

go off on another change. I'm I want to focus on the holiday hell things. I want to get people a preview of what we'll talk about on that ECW extra show. So ECW Holiday Health it was an annual event. It was a ninety three through two thousand and one thing. We'll go through a couple of the cards, a couple of the matches. But you remember any of these holiday health shows and kind of like, you know, was that like a wrap up towards the end of the year

kind of thing? Yeah? Yeah, you know, me with my memory, it's not very good. I remember the name. I couldn't tell you where where we wrestled. I think it was New York most of the time. Yes, okay, so I know that. I don't know if it was the Elks Lodge or somewhere else, but yeah, it was. It was the It was the end of the year for us, you know, and because we had November to remember and then it would go into holiday hell, and then we

would start a new year. But I could honestly, I can't tell you what I did on any of the shows. We'll talk about that, but yeah, it's just it was. It was basically either the week before or days after Christmas. And you know, I know specifically there's some that you know that you've definitely seen clips of if you've watched you know, old DCW programming. Uh, and just scanning through the list, I mean, I'm trying to I want to

just go. I want to stop by the first one just to tell you, like what was on here, because let me see here, there's an early Shane and Tommy singles match from nineteen ninety three. It was called the body Count. But this one was actually in Philly, so it was before they even moved to New York, because I believe, I don't know if it was it was, Oh, is that the Lost Battalion Hall? So it was it was Queens Rego Park. Let me just see here. I'm

gonna try and find some highlights quickly. Yeah, that was that was before I was even in the locker room. I started training like at the end of the year in ninety three. So, so I see you here in ninety five, but I'm just going back to ninety four. I want to see if you pop up on this one at all. No, I won't. You want to be ninety four even end of the year. Okay, all right, So your first So your first appearance at Holiday Hell in the corner of the Pitbulls as they took on

the Eliminators in a tag team match. Yeah, so nineteen five, it's the end of ninety five in early ninety six. It's right before Shane came back. I think this is actually the last group of shows that Shane came back, and it was right before mc foley left. So that's why it's kind of a transition time in ECW because Foley's about to leave, Shane's about to come back. Anything, Am I toggling anything for you? Thinking thinking back in the old dream machine? No, because well, number one, I

didn't know Shane was coming back. I'm gonna be honest. I didn't know much about Shane Douglas at all before I met him. I really didn't. I wasn't an avid wrestling fan, and I'm embarrassed to say this because like, back then, I really should have did my homework before I dared to set foot in the ring. But I never went back and watched old stuff. So a lot

of the people I didn't know who they were. And then once I started working, I'm like, okay, I need to because and remember this too, the internet wasn't as friendly back then. I couldn't just pull up certain things, and there were no smartphones around and this and that, so I was meeting a lot of legends that I didn't even know what they did, Like, I didn't know

how important they were. So when I met Shane, I knew that like he had worked with Sherry before before me, because I was such a fan of Sherry, right, was a fan of Shane. I was a fan of Sherry. But you know, once I heard that him and I were going to be paired up together, I did some homework and some research and wah, yeah that you know, you had to, But I wasn't a wrestling fan growing up,

so my knowledge was very very minimal. Well, so Shane comes back, and that's obviously, you know, the catalyst for what would be that year, because the next year you're teaming now with the old franchise. Oh, taking on Buell and Tommy Dreamer. I know on a match that you guys would have quite often, but again, this one is on the same night that Raven beats the Salmon in the barber Ye match for the world title. Well all I all I know is Brian Lee was so adamant

about taking me with him. He would tell me all the time, you're coming with me, You're coming with me. So I always thought I was going with Brian Lee to the point where I was gonna buy chaps, okay, like because I always tried, Like with Stevie, I had the half shorts and the shirt, and I tried to match the person I was with Pipples. I had to wear the god awful vinyl or whatever the hell it was,

which I hate it with a passion. And then I remember Paul calling me and just saying, you know who I'm putting you with, right, And I was like, yeah, Brian Lee, who I love? You know, Brian's great, And He's like, who the hell told you that? And I said, well, Brian Lee. He goes, Brian Lee doesn't know anything. You're gonna go with the franchise and I was like what So I didn't even know what was happening. It was

just all new to me. So they I don't know if Shane knew before that, but there was this place all along to put us together. Interesting. Yeah, I didn't know. I had no clue. And then we were practically married to Tommy and Bulah for like the three and a half years, you know. And I told you before, if Shane never left and Teresa never left, we probably would have worked with them until two thousand and one because the four of us had incredible chemistry and just we

all four of us enjoyed working together so much. It was so easy. It was just so easy. And it was when I would get to work and see that I was working with them, I was like night off, so so fun, you know, like I loved it, loved it. So some of my favorite times were working with those two. And I'll tell you what I actually, you know, I botched a little something there. Actually after ninety six, there

wasn't another help till two thousand. Yeah, you know, I remember them not promoting it for a while, but I didn't know how many years we skipped. But this is like looking back at those ninety five. See, my favorite era of ECW was ninety five ninety six, So when we'd even do the retrospectors, there's going to be a little heavy emphasis on those because I personally love those shows because that's around the time I first discovered it

was like mid ninety five. But jumping ahead to two thousand, I mean, like it's a completely different group of people. So that's a great question. So the difference between the end of ECW guys in kind of the middle was there? I know the camaraderie was always very strong, but did you feel any difference between the maybe the the elder statesman of the ECW originals and in the later half the people were some people were pissed when people would leave.

I never like resent it anybody leaving, Like you had to do what was best for your family and if you were taking another job with more money, like go ahead. When Shane left, you know, it upset me because we were such a good team. So in the back of my mind, I'm like, oh my god, what is going to happen to? Like who am I going to go with? You know what I mean? Like I wasn't really sure.

But the great thing is when somebody left, there was always somebody to move up and take that spot, you know, because Paul was just grooming the younger kids who maybe were opening act. Now they're going to move the mid card. Mid card is going to get a chance to shine and maybe semi or main event or whatever. So you know, Paul knew what he was doing. There were always people

outside trying to get in. There was always you know, people indie guys waiting on the steps with their gear bags, you know, because we used to have like an open tryout and they would work with the boys and a lot of them would leave crying, which was horrible to see. I hated it, but you know there there. When people left, it just opened up a spot for one of the younger guys to move up. So you know, it's a

completely different group, yeah, you know. I mean that's when you have your Danny Dorian Roadkills in there, Chili Willie, who I love. Chili Willy is awesome, easy money, you know. And then you got guys that moved on into different spots. You know, C. W Anderson sends and you know it's the even nova on his own. I mean like that, there's a lot of changes. Well, I hate when people say we started to lack the lack of star power, and it's just like creating new stars exactly. That's what

Paul did. You know. It was like there were a couple of people in the beginning that already had names, but most of us were We weren't known anywhere, right, you know, and he made us these larger than life figures. I feel, you know, in my opinion, I think the company left its footprint on the business. Oh yeah, absolutely, you know, And I hate what we're referred to as this little indie company. We weren't an indie company. You know, there's a difference. We had television, we had pay per views.

There's just poor money management. Yeah, you were the numbers. We were the number three out of the big three, but on the heels of two and one the whole time, and each company made their changes because of that. Yeah, we were. We were at the at the heels of WCW for sure. For sure. I mean there was a point when we were getting numbers. At least I was told that we were out drawing them at house shows.

Oh I believe that at one point, and we were just like yeah, so like they started Channing were number three. As a joke, we're number two. We're number two, you know what I mean, just being silly, But we all worked very hard, no matter if there was ten people or a million people, we just worked hard and gave it one hundred percent every show and just wanted to make it a good experience for everyone who paid for

a ticket. Yeah, and that night main eventing in the corner of just incredible against Steve Carino and the Sandman. So two thousand, that's in two thousands, So you made your impact. You know, you're in the three prominent matches on three of these shows, So you made you mark on ECW Holiday Hell. And I love little theme shows like that, you know, whether it's like a season's beatings or you know the Holiday Elt or I forget what, oh god, I think what did the WWF call it?

They had another one that was kind of like in the same vein. I just always love those theme shows because when they would be promoted, they'd have the cool graphics with it, everything would be catered to, you know, whatever the holidy was. I just did little little things from a production standpoint that I that I absolutely love. But yeah, just talking about that you know, this is what we'll cover on the ECW extra. But I'm going to get Francine the footage of what we're talking about

so you can see it. Shoot it at me. Do you know? Really quick to add that I was studying the production end when I worked there. I've heard you say that that's intriguing to me. Yes, it's an interesting world and it's so different from what you were probably learning then to now, unbelievable. First of all, you know rob a phone. We were in Ron's parents' house, a den which is probably as big as some Boddy's bathroom, a large bathroom, but a bathroom, a narrow, large bathroom,

and all the equipment was there. So I would go up on like Mondays and watch Paul because I said, Paul, I want to learn. I want to know what you're doing because I can't be in front of the camera my whole life. Maybe someday i'll be behind the camera. And I'm intrigued. And he said, well, you're welcome to calm. So I'd drive up to New York and I'd sit

there and i'd watch him at it the show. And I did that several times, several times, and I remember they would let me sleep on the couch, and so you're waking up in the morning, and sometimes we would have to film on airs at like six am because Joey Styles would come in before he went to work, so I'd be up at like five point thirty trying to get me And a lot of times that's why I have sunglasses on in these promos, because it was so freaking early in the morning and I didn't feel

like doing my face at that time. But I'd sleep on the couch and you here, Franccene, wake up because they're Italian, wake up. And I'd look up and there's the mom. You want some breakfast. I'm okay, you know it's fine thirty where I'm dying. They always made us food. They were always welcoming and gracious. We would shoot in the basement. There was the banner that you always saw. It was downstairs in the basement. The mom sometimes would be ironing, yeah, and we'd be like on the other end.

If you watch the documentary Beyond the Mat, you can see that. But yeah, I was so intrigued by how Paul put that show together, and I just wanted to learn. So there's a little timboit for you. I guess. Yeah, that's very cool. I've been meaning to ask you about that since they heard you say that in something I was I was checking out. So yeah, we'll wrap it up here. But again, we will add this show in twenty twenty. It's probably gonna be about the same duration.

You know, you're fifteen twenty minutes, but it's just a little extra, just a little something. But we're gonna have Francine review whatever we're gonna talk about. And that's not just because you can't remember. That's just because I want you to actually see things because I wanted to toggle the memory, so don't so don't think I'm now losing faith in your memory skills. Thirteen weeks. Oh god. Yeah.

And if there's something that you guys want to see, or an incident that happened that you're curious about, leave it, leave a comment for us and we'll look into it for you and maybe we'll talk about it on a future episode. Yep, absolutely all right. So for the Queen of Extreme Francine, this is the old chadst And as we will sign off here for another week, I will catch you on the flip side