Author: Dr. Mike Lano

I was totally floored today, as many were just learning today about Valerie Boesch’s death. She passed away on March 23rd, 2020. None of us knew until now, which is heartbreaking. I would’ve Zoomed to Texas to pay love and respect forward for this Great Wrestling Lady. Many others, upon hearing the sad news, soon began grieving her passing online. As we’re celebrating wrestling’s longtime heart, Valerie Boesch. Since her husband Paul’s death in 1989 at their adopted longtime home of Sugar Land, Texas, she had devoted her life to taking care of their son Joey. Val and Paul were…

Our latest CAC Life Member, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, continues to make near-daily news worldwide (I’ve been the club’s board photographer since the late ’80s). Perhaps because he’s still the biggest movie and tv star in the world for two+ years running, while his Jungle Cruise ride adventure film arrives soon from Disney Films, he’ll be seen next in perhaps his biggest and most expensive blockbuster. “The hierarchy of Power in the D.C. comic book and the graphic novel universe is about to change. I’ll be joining an epic and first of it’s kind D.C. Fandom fil(set to start filming…

Some of wrestling’s top indie refs around the U.S. in no particular order begin with two longtime friends in the late/great Brian Hildebrand (who managed in Philly/Jersey as Evil Dr. Mean Mark Curtis and Scottie Dickenson of the Boston area. Whenever I came to shoot/cover Dennis Coralluzzo’s shows, or those of ECW’s predecessor Joel Goodhart’s TWA or later ECW or any Philly/Jersey area indies (my second home) – both Brian and Scott were usually there for our hardcore midnight till dawn VHS tape watching parties of Sayama/first and best Tiger Mask vs. Dynamite Kid, Funks vs. Sheik/Abby (also in Japan),…

I can’t speak for everyone else ever, but watching some of Vice Network’s second season of Dark Side Of The Ring at times was pretty hard. Particularly with subjects I was close to—some real characters like Owen Hart and Herb Abrams. Owen Hart was really was an example of Heaven on Earth. I spent significant time with Owen Hart. First in Japan in the early ’90s, when he shined over there with an incredible Juniors division. The one led by Jushin Lyger/Keichi Yamada and his famous workhorse dojo that was separate from NJPW’s overall one. Owen was always serious about…

Pausing the great “pit” fight match with Matt Riddle and Timothy Thatcher last Wednesday on NXT, I had to laugh when the announcers continually claimed Riddle knocked out “two” of Thatcher’s teeth, just because they saw several tooth pieces on the mat. Not knocking Mauro, who’s always a pro. He just doesn’t know dentistry, but to his credit, he does know our slang for central and lateral incisors we do call “chicklets.” Pausing on the close-ups of what was there and handed to the ref, as well as Thatcher’s mouth; only central incisor #9 was broken and out, with enough…

Recent CAC (Cauliflower Alley Club) honorees Booker T Huffman and Mark Henry had already been lending their credible voices to Black Live Matter issues leading our industries to charge on various general mainstream news programs the past week-plus. Legendary SouthEast wrestling legend Sputnik Monroe has to be smiling down on our current guys for doing the right thing. Sputnik’s still recognized as helping integrate African-American fans so they could sit anywhere they wanted. This was primarily at wrestling matches in the South and courageously challenging then discriminatory Jim Crow Segregation Laws. His strong voice transcends the biz, making national news…

I’d known Shad Gaspard, who we lost last week, from taking pictures of him ringside for the magazines I’ve always worked for soon after his WWE debut to current. Got to know him, obviously not on the level of JTG, Cena, or Ezequiel Jackson. But I had dinner with him soon before the pandemic hit. He talked with pride about his family and how his acting career was going. And the many future projects he was jazzed about. Shad Gaspard was heroic without ever trying to be one. He was getting better at body surfing along the California coast. He…