In 2000, David Arquette, coming off “Never Been Kissed” and the third “Scream” film, co-starred in a comedy called “Ready to Rumble,” which attempted to satirize the hyperbolic freak show of professional wrestling.
To promote the movie, Arquette got woven into World Championship Wrestling storylines, mostly as a comic foil — after all, he wasn’t a real wrestler.
But a few weeks into the film’s release, in a setup bogus enough to shame Andy Kaufman, it was arranged that Arquette would win a fight to become the WCW Heavyweight Champion.
Which he did (his reign lasted all of 12 days).This was a stunt so outlandish that wrestling fans considered it a bridge of fakery too far.
Some said that Arquette’s championship had ruined the sport.
So even though Arquette, a wrestling aficionado from way back, was just riding the cross-promotional PR train and doing what he’d been told,
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