Wrestlers With Acts to Grind

It wasn’t until I saw pro wrestling at the Ventura Theatre that I realized I might have a future in the squared circle.

“Weighing in on issues of countywide importance, the Ink-Stained Wretch.”

Or maybe “The Deadliner” would be more intimidating.

Either way, I know there is a place for me, along with the Coroner, Phenomenal Phil, Cincinnati Red and the rest of the hopeful maulers and brawlers, in the United Independent Wrestling Alliance. You’ve probably never heard of the UIWA. Let’s just say, if pro wrestling has a farm team, the UIWA is it.

Looking to capitalize on wrestling’s popularity, Cal State Northridge business student Scott Harvey founded the alliance in February.

“Ever since I was 5 years old, I’ve loved it . . . [but] I’m not big enough to be a wrestler,” said Harvey, who signs autographs as league commissioner “Trent Taylor.”

Harvey still has a few kinks to work out of his show. The Sunday night I watched the UIWA action, the fog machine barely misted. The crowd taunted the wrestlers with lame jabs scrawled on scraps of cardboard. Several of the wrestlers weren’t much bigger than I am, which is pretty puny.

But hey, even Jesse “The Body” had to start somewhere.

Phil Lander caught the wrestling bug when he was little, back in the early ‘80s when guys like Andre the Giant--may he rest in peace--helped pro wrestling explode on late-night and cable TV. Now 20 and a film student at UCSB, he goes by “Phenomenal Phil” when he’s in the ring.

Articulate and well-versed in wrestling’s soap-operatic lore, Lander’s gimmick--what makes him “Phenomenal”--is pretending to be a spoiled, vain college student with a Jheri curl.

“I’m a very shy, mellow guy, but when I’m in the ring, I’m a total [jerk],” said Lander, who sells Phenomenal T-shirts asking “Who Do I Think I Am?”

“You have to combine elements of your own life with your id, I guess.”

Pretty insightful thinking for a spoiled, vain college kid. Maybe Phil is short for Philosopher.

In Ventura, Lander wrestled pretty boy Rick Sadist in a match he and his opponent had mapped out beforehand.

Yes, it’s true--and I know you’re shocked and maybe even hurt--pro wrestling is not entirely real.

Messrs Lander and Sadist had decided that Lander would take a fall, crowning Sadist the victor. But after protests from Lander and his manager, the referee would find a disqualifying metal rod in Sadist’s kneepad.

Sure enough, that was exactly how it went down for the count. But between the first and last bell, “Phenomenal” said, very little was planned.

“You have to improvise like mad in the ring,” said Lander. “The theater of the absurd--that’s what this is.”

Also on the bill in Ventura was “The Coroner,” a 6-foot-9, 320-pound bear from Brea whose real name is Dean. Dean has been trying to make it to the big leagues of the WWF and WCW for 13 years, the last two as the body-bag toting “Coroner.”

“I’m not a dark person,” he told me backstage. “But dark sells.”

“The ‘90s is the time of the anti-hero,” explained Dan Farren, who helped organize the show. “It’s hard to tell who the good guys are anymore.”

Dean handed Farren his business card. To supplement his meager ring earnings--not a whole lot more than gas money--the Coroner spends his days working out payment plans for companies in debt.

“I’m a real good negotiator. I don’t go in like John Wayne,” he said. “I love John Wayne, but that ain’t the way you handle business.”

The night I saw him, Dean the Coroner beat not one but two opponents, a tag team of baby-faced teens known as NC-17 who got the hormones knocked out of them.

A trash can featured prominently in a battle between Prop. 215 poster boy Jonny Hemp, who carried a flag with a marijuana leaf on it, and Nick Beat, “the heppest cat in the world of professional wrestling.” Displaying pre-bout bravado, Beat, who got beat, claimed that his bongo drums were stolen from a Ventura coffeehouse.

“First of all, I want to say this town stinks,” he barked from the ring. Many people booed; a few applauded.

During the match, while Beat’s teenage manager distracted the crowd, I watched Beat discreetly cut his forehead with a razor blade, creating an impressive stream of blood that probably would look great on TV.

“The blood--that’s what makes wrestling popular,” said Venturan Albert Viramontes , 10, who was watching with his father, cousin and a battle royal’s worth of other kids.

*

Several folks in the Ventura Theatre’s audience remembered the days when grapplers drew crowds at Seaside Park. But for years, pro wrestling has been hard to find in Ventura County.

With the arrival of the UIWA, however, the muscle-bound masters of the turnbuckle have returned.

Harvey--oh, sorry--Commissioner Trent Taylor promised more matches here this summer. He reported that the 300-person Ventura crowd particularly enjoyed the night’s “hard-core” action.

One wide-eyed fan popped Skittles into his mouth as he watched the Hemp-Beat match from his dad’s shoulders. It was a charming American scene of father-and-son bonding, until they both raised their sticky middle fingers toward the ring in an obscene gesture.

Where’s Norman Rockwell when you need him?

Massie Ritsch is a Times Community News staff writer. His e-mail address is Massie.Ritsch@latimes.com.