by Matt Wright
The Lakeland Chamber of Commerce had its monthly meeting today (July 28, 2021) at Stonebridge Golf Course and it included two very special guests. Jerry “The King” Lawler and Dave Brown were the guest speakers and they entertained the crowd with Memphis wrestling nostalgia for nearly an hour.
Wil Ashworth, President of the Chamber, started the meeting as attendees enjoyed a BBQ lunch and introduced the speakers, including their long list of career accomplishments. Soon after, Dr. Ted Horrell, Superintendent of Lakeland School System, gave each of the VIP guests a Lakeland Prep baseball hat and reminded Mr. Lawler the new high school would open next year. “We’re actually looking for a wrestling coach,” Dr. Horrell said. He joked, “Let me know if you’re interested.”
Mr. Lawler was already familiar with Lakeland, remembering the old amusement park on Garner Lake. “In fact, I wrestled once in Lakeland. I believe Rick Dees (famous radio disc jockey) was the special referee maybe? We wrestled at the Lakeland amusement park.” Mr. Brown said that would have been around 1975, not long before the amusement park closed.
Dave Brown, the longtime meteorologist from WMC Channel 5, is also an icon to many in the wrestling world as the color commenting partner of Lance Russell. Brown and Russell partnered together for nearly 30 years. Mr. Brown would do the weather each weeknight on Channel 5 and then host the TV wrestling studio show on Saturday morning with Mr. Russell. Dave Brown is also a long-time Lakeland resident who’s lived on Garner Lake for many years, but it wasn’t Dave that invited “The King” to Lakeland today. That honor went to Kevin Bailey of Fireworks City. “Oh yeah, I’ve known Jerry for 31 years when he started filming TV spots for Fireworks City,” Mr. Bailey said. He continued, “As a board member (for the Lakeland Chamber) we’re always looking for speakers and I thought about Jerry. After he agreed, Dave Brown gave us a perfect combination of speakers because of their history.”
And a great combination they were. Much like a great tag team, they worked the microphone together, something they have done 1,000 times before. They told stories about the popularity of wrestling in Memphis back in the 1970s and 1980s and how for many it was must-see TV. “To show you how big, we would receive a 7 out of 10 share for TV,” Mr. Brown said with Mr. Lawler adding clarity “that means 70% of the TVs in the market were tuned in to wrestling.” Mr. Lawler said that was even higher than Oprah Winfrey, which is an amazing accomplishment. Mr. Brown told the crowd that Memphis was basically like AAA wrestling back in those days and almost every wrestling star came to Memphis to learn the business. Stars like “The Macho Man” Randy Savage, The Undertaker, Hulk Hogan, and Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson all started their careers in Memphis. “You made a lot of people stars because you told people (in Memphis) to believe in them,” said Mr. Lawler to Dave Brown.
The King also mentioned today was the anniversary of his appearance on the David Letterman show with Andy Kaufman. Mr. Lawler reminded the crowd how big of a celebrity Andy Kaufman was at that time from his show Taxi, the number one show on Television. But Mr. Kaufman also loved wrestling and wanted to be involved so he was told to go to Memphis “Because they will try anything in Memphis,” as Mr. Brown said. That time period in 1982 eventually became a plotline of a major motion picture called Man On The Moon starring Jim Carrey. The Kaufman/Lawler feud lasted for weeks in Memphis and eventually led to an appearance on the David Letterman show. The segment between the two, which can be watched on YouTube, is infamous because Mr. Lawler and Mr. Kaufman were supposed to apologize to each other on the show and makeup, but unbeknownst to anyone else, including David Letterman, it went the exact opposite way. “I’ve watched that probably 1,000 times and to this day it’s like watching someone else. It was an out of body experience,” Mr. Lawler told the lunch crowd. “My feud with Andy was good for business and we didn’t want that to stop,” Mr. Lawler said. He said Andy Kaufman called him in his hotel room before the show taping and said what if you “slugged me” instead of apologizing to each other on air. Mr. Lawler said he absolutely could not do that because he was concerned he might get arrested. He also insisted to Andy that it would never be aired anyway if he hit Mr. Kaufman during the show. Mr. Lawler relived that memory for the Lakeland crowd saying, “At the end of the 2nd segment, we had not apologized to each other and it was pretty uncomfortable, so I just stood up in front of Andy and I slapped the taste out of his mouth!” As Mr. Kaufman fell backward out of his chair and off the stage, he said David Letterman just looked straight ahead and clearly did not know what to do. “Dave said it’s the only time he ever lost control of his show,” said Mr. Lawler.
After an hour of questions and answers, the capacity crowd of approximately 50 people was told the questions would need to stop so everyone could get back to their work schedules. But the two speakers did not disappoint, leaving the crowd wanting more. “We enjoy having great food while listening to great speakers (like Dave Brown and Jerry Lawler) and networking with our great community business members,” said Brittney Buchanan, Director of the Lakeland Chamber of Commerce. She added, “If you haven’t been to a Chamber luncheon, you are missing out!”
