FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING
(FADEIN: To a brick wall with hot lights hitting it in certain places - no doubt it’s been production-set. A banner hangs in the background - it’s Eddie Mayfield’s early Red/Blue monochrome ‘HEEL’ image, with his smirking face . . . smirking. Standing in front of it, is a ring-ready ‘Hot Property’ Eddie Mayfield, a Camel Red dangling out of his mouth, hanging on for dear life as he does a ‘smokers grimace’, contorting the left side of his face. He’s wearing warmup pants with a white racing stripe on the sides, and a red t-shirt with the classic ‘red box’ DUNGEONS & DRAGONS image on it, a single warrior playing a forced game of peek-a-boo around a rock with a red dragon(!). MAYFIELD’S hair is short and tousled, 12-day heel beard is GO, and his wrists and forearms are wrapped in white tape “CM Punk-style” [I used to call it Indy/ECW style, but you get it by now - JN] with no Xes on the back of the hands, but on the left forearm are notes written in red - shopping lists, video game codes, locker combinations, we’re not sure which. MAYFIELD takes a long drag off of his cigarette and blows smoke out of his nose like a dragon as he looks around)
MAYFIELD: “Well damn, it’s like I never left. (Smiles) HELLO AND HOW DO YOU DO! Wrestling world, you may remember me - They call me EDDIE. (smirks) They also call me [BLEEEP!]hole, Mister President, Mister “I need a push can you help me out”, Some people nastily call me DENNIS, hell-you can call me Mister Tibbs for all I care, but the only one that matters is that you call me THE ORKIN MAN, because Hot Property is back, and I’m putting on that red hat, and strapping pesticide canisters to my back. I’m here (mockingly salutes) to get rid of a little INFESTATION. It’s name, is the WINDHAM CLAN. (Takes another drag, wincing)
(Exhaling) “If you were me (and you are not), you may be wondering if this is the smartest thing in the world to do - be the figurehead and day-to-day executive leader of the world’s largest wrestling promotion, and then decide that he’s gonna moonlight, put back on the boots and tape the hands wrists and forearms and come out here and drop people on their heads. ‘WHY EDDIE WHY!?’, well, if you were one of those guys in the locker area, you may be licking your lips and VIBRATING with excitement, dreaming about in vivid, full-color HD detail punching me in my face, or throwing me down a flight of stairs, for the ‘wrongs’ I’ve committed to you. To the ‘slights’ I’ve put your way. To your ‘anti-pushes’ and general malaise about not being world champion and having to share a locker room with P. King Duk, (who I hear is a Windham now, and will have to get dealt with!) Well, this is what I have to say to all of you guys out there - (waves at the camera) HAI HATERZ!
“You see, over four years ago when I took over this company, I told you all that I DID NOT LIKE THE GUYS IN BACK. Not that you’re like, not nice people, but that they were simply not GOOD ENOUGH to carry the NFW flag. I told people to Shape Up or SHIP OUT. I told you guys that I was NOT Playing around, and that NFW can only move forward if we cut the dead weight and become the #1 company in this business in action, and in model. You do NOT become the #1 ANYTHING when your locker area looks like a Kingston, Jamaica weed spot. You do NOT excel globally when people are waving dildoes around and having CGI wizards cast fireballs in the ring and murder the cast of Saved by the Bell. THAT, is NOT NFW 2012. And you know why? (pops his shirt) You can blame me all you want, but EVERY ONE OF YOU IN THE LOCKER ROOM SHOULD BE KISSING MY ASS RIGHT NOW, but instead you HATE ME. When I walked out here some odd-years back and stood in the ring against (coughs) Dan Ryan, one of the legit biggest names in this business, and he had just just slept-walked his way into becoming NFW world champion, as his first title defense, I looked in the back, and saw several benches full of losers, addicts, no-shots, unsellable, unmarketable screw-ups. Guys who were COASTING on the NFW name, dragging it down! I didn’t see ANYBODY back there WORTHY of putting asses in seats. Of spiking TV rates. Nobody had any god-[BLEEEP!] JUICE, so I stepped out of my Revelucion BDUs and I WRESTLED DAN RYAN MYSELF. ME, not the Bad-News Bears of NFW. ME, not the Major League Willie Mayes-Hayeses. Instead of nodding and understanding that I did it for YOU - for YOU to step up and BE GREATER THAN YOU EVER THOUGHT, you sat back on your hands and/or folded your arms and pouted. (shakes head) Yasee, if you’re real small-minded, you’ll look at that as (whiny voice) “Here comes Eddie Mayfield, putting himself over again” “Here comes Ol’ Eddie, Captain Screwjob” but NO - I told the WORLD when Craig Miles handed me this job, I was going to DO RIGHT, and I DID THAT. I took off the wrestling boots, and I put on the tie and moved into the office.
“And now fast-forward to now, and The NFW is BAR-NONE the hottest thing in the world. You can’t dispute that. And that is by stacking the place with the best talent in the world. By culling the herd. BY STRATEGIC CUTS. Castor Strife is the Cat’s Meow - hottest commodity in wrestling, wearing MY smoking penny belt. You haven’t seen me power-walk out here dousing the ring with a firehose filled with milk to put myself over - not riding on the back of a ATV with Eddie Mayfield pennants - I’ve done NONE OF THAT. In the points of light, I step back and let the PRODUCT do what it’s supposed to do. Even this tag tournament - SIXTEEN SLOTS and is the talk of wrestling how NFW - GASP - has bought tagteam wrestling back to North America! So now that we’re on an upswing, it’s time to clear out the cobwebs - a little spring cleaning, so to speak. The Windham thing has run it’s course, and Bonnie Mayfield’s only son is here to clean up and close the book. That means, putting JJ DeVille and his crew out to pasture. That means systematically scraping off the Windham Clan barnacles from the underside of NFW. And in a few days, shockingly, I admit, I find myself entered into the EMT Tag Tournament. (Eyebrows raise) Yeah, I’m sure you JUST KNEW I threw myself in this, but the NFW Board of Directors put my name in, and sure, I signed off on it. Why? Well, If you’re not sure of your history, I happen to know a EEENTSY, TEEENSY bit about tag team wrestling. You may say . . . (smiles) I’m a PRO AT IT. Am I here to walk out of this thing with the belts? If that what it takes, sure, but that’s not my number one goal, but I have to start somewhere, don’t I?”
“There’s a ton of guys now who work for me who would love nothing to take a swipe at me - who wouldn’t? If you walked into work tomorrow, and your boss called you in - “Johnson? Come on in and close the door. Go ‘head, I know you wanna - GO ON AND TAKE A SWING AT ME.” You know you’d try to take his head off. Is THAT what you guys want? (blinks back fake tears) Is that what you NEED, Tag Team Tournament? Well consider this. EYE, Eddie Mayfield . . . (Puts hands up, palms out) AM NOT YOUR ENEMY. (hands on chest) I AM A FRIEND. Tatanka. . . BUFFALO. I am YOU. You are ME. Instead, Cameron Cruise, (you piece of crap) Instead of you sliding in the ring and pushing me into an X on the mat and a pile of sandbags drop on my head. . . Instead Jack Harmen, who doesn’t even know the history, the LEGACY of NFW but swears he wants to be champion, If he wants to smoke bath salts and bite me in my midsection, I want you to slow down and THINK about what you’re doing. Do you REALLY want to beat me up? I mean, yeah, I GET IT, but we have a common enemy in The Windham Clan, and if you soldier up behind me, I will eliminate the Clan Once and for All. I cannot do this from a hospital bed, NOVA. I am doing this for YOU. For all of YOU. So consider this a Test of Faith. A testament to the NFW locker room to UNITE against JJ DeVille and his poisoning of NFW. Allow ME to go through this tournament peacefullym unmolested. . . (brushes back his hair with his hands) but if you must, don’t think I won’t defend myself. (Drops to his knees, arms in his lap) Maybe it’s a trust thing you want? DO YOU NOT TRUST ME? AM I NOT MERCIFUL? (crocodile-tear sobs into his hands, comically heaving his shoulders up and down) OH GOD, Will I need someone to protect me . . . protect me from my OWN COMPANY? Someone who will understand that to make cheese eggs and Welches Grape, you need to break some eggs and buy grape juice... WHO WILL PARTNER WITH ME? WHO WILL BE IN MY FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING?
(Just then, out from the back walks a figure, who stands right behind the kneeling MAYFIELD, and he holds in his large, calloused hands a steel chair with the word ‘YOU’ spraypainted on it! He is as wide as he is tall, a frankenstein-cross of John Belushi and Fidel Castro! Nappy brillo-pad beard and sloppy hair, dark skin and a black shirt that reads in white block letters:
COJONES: (In a rough, gravely cuban accent) “SENOR MAYFIELD, YOU HAVE MY CHAIR. I ENTER TOURNAMENT WITH YOU, AND WHEN I HIT YOUR EMPLOYEES . . . WHEN I HIT THE TOURNAMENT WITH CHAIR - ALL OF THEM . . . THEY NO GET UP.”
MAYFIELD (Staring straight ahead, slowly pulling his hands from his face, down to his chin, smiling like a devil) “EXCELLENT.”
