David Arquette redeemed himself among pro wrestling fans by nearly bleeding out in a death match
Aux Features David ArquetteDavid Arquette, the actor who played Dewey in the Scream movies, exists in the eyes of many as a living symbol of the death of WCW, the professional wrestling outfit that gave WWE a run for its money in the late ‘90s before folding in early 2001. The company’s death knell came much earlier, however: In April of 2000, Arquette won the WCW World Heavyweight Championship while promoting the forgettable comedy Ready To Rumble. It was a dumb choice that came to epitomize WCW’s many dumb choices, all of which tended to favor spectacle and publicity over character, story, and athleticism.
Well, being loathed among the majority of wrestling fans wasn’t enough to turn Arquette off from sports entertainment. He’s been training in earnest of late, and returned for his most high profile match yet at GCW presents Joey Janela’s L.A. Confidential this past Friday. There, he wrestled not a normal, scripted wrestling bout, but a “death match” with GCW world champion Nick Gage, an ex-con and terrifying lunatic whose spilled blood in rings all over the world.
Arquette was game for the majority of the bout, and even delivered some shocking moments of offense that had spurned fans cheering the actor. Unfortunately, the match took a scary turn when a shot in the head from a light tube saw Arquette’s neck cut open, causing the actor to visibly panic in the ring before leaving, returning, and appearing to take some genuine swings at Gage.
Watch the footage of it below, but please note that it is very, very NSFW.
There was ample confusion in its aftermath as to Arquette’s culpability in the injury, as well as what the actor’s state of mind was during the bout. Early Saturday morning, he tweeted, “Turns out Death Matches aren’t my thing.” On Monday, he clarified things, taking full responsibility for the injury and saying that he “did not know the extent of what I was participating in.” See his full statement below.
Despite the match’s messy ending, the online wrestling community seems to have absolved Arquette of his past sins, and one can imagine his indie bookings are about to go way, way up. Maybe a role in GLOW’s upcoming third season is also in the cards?
33 Comments
I have to admit… I actually kinda enjoyed Ready To Rumble. I’d definitely rank it higher than the Hangover movies.I certainly don’t blame him for WCW shooting themselves in the dick.
Hardly anyone did, he was vocal about not wanting to win the title, he only agreed to is so he could donate the proceeds to the families of several wrestlers who had died.
God are deathmatches fucking awful…
Maybe a role in GLOW’s upcoming third season is also in the cards?(Yeah, that’s my 2nd “Boo” gif in 2 days, but that’s just the appropriate sentiment in both cases.)
This is almost always an appropriate sentiment. Please, keep using it with reckless abandon.
WCW failed because it sucked and it was 4 full hours of suck played twice for the east and west coast suck feed. The matches were, not just repetitive, but defiantly repetitive. As if they were told to mix it up the stories a little, but instead dug in deeper and gave us Booker T vs. Dean Malenko Best of Fucking 20 Series of Matches over 4 Months. Goldberg’s entire story arc was literally Do The Same Thing Over and Over! Drama was generated by wondering if Goldberg was going to do the same thing again, or will someone stop him? Don’t worry. He does it again. He does it 174 times in a row. Hurray. The whole NWO thing was absolute shit. They had every final match for two years and they all ended the same way: NWO cheats and wins, Sting chased everyone off with a baseball bat, and the crowded starts throwing garbage into the ring.Even their celebrities sucked. People honestly blame Dewey for WCW? The same WCW that put Dennis Rodman in a tag team with Evil Hulk Hogan? The same WCW that teamed Diamond Dallas Page with Jay Leno to defeat Evil Hulk Hogan and Eric Bishoff? The Insane Clown Posse? Dewey was probably the best one of the lot.
Also, not for nothing, the ship had sailed, capsized, and started to burst into flames LONG before Arquette was a factor.
They deserved to fail alone on how bad the entrance music was. DDP, American Males, Hulk Hogan WCW, the only worthy original music was Harlem Heat.
And Harlem Heat’s music was library music! It’s in at least one of Kids in the Hall’s Bruno Puntz-Jones/Francesca Fiore sketches.
YES! THANK YOU! No one else knows what I’m talking about when I say that!SCOTT THOMPSON’S LAUGH IS IN IT, FFS!
Every time I saw evil Hulk Hogans beard I wanted to scream and shake someone at WCW to just know WHY THE FUCK ARE THEY DOING THAT TO HIS FACE WHAT HIS HAPPENING AND WHO THINKS THIS IS A GOOD IDEA???
See, at least Goldberg’s initial streak drew money. He was a big star- at a certain point, inarguably their biggest. He was on magazine covers, not just wrestling magazines but stuff like EW.
So what did WCW do? Took the belt off him at the height of his popularity and never let him win it again. Seriously from 1999 to the bitter end Goldberg never holds the strap (except for Russo’s first PPV where he seems to win it but it’s overturned the next evening) and is sent down the card while Hogan and Nash and so on continue to dominate.
I remember my first Goldberg fight. It was on a 1am WCW show. Not Nitro or Thunder. The matches took place in a studio about the size of Maury’s show. It was Goldberg vs. Marty Jannetty. I’d never heard of Goldberg, but of course Jannetty was a welcome site. It went Ding, Spear, Jackhammer, Pin. Something like 15 total seconds. I think the streak was at 4 or 5 at the time. It was easily the coolest thing I’d ever seen on WCW. Goldberg could have been the next Sting for WCW honestly.
Part of the problem was that they had him punch through a car window for a bit. But it wasn’t candyglass – it was a real freaking windshield. So, of course, he cut up his hand for real and they had to put his whole arc on old for several months.
And then, when he came back, they turned him heel.
This is a Bad Take.
That was barely NSFW.
Please don’t watch this video if you are bothered by blood – Well, fine.hardcore wrestling – Go at it.profanity – We’re all adults here.or David Arquette – TOO FAR!
People on r/SquaredCircle, THE pro-wresting sub on Reddit, loved this so much that they feel David Arquette should be involved in WWE’s Royal Rumble. (Which, if you don’t know, if a 30-man battle royale where the gimmick is someone comes in to fill the ring every 90secs.)And…yeah, I’d be down for that. I think Arquette is a great guy and he’s more than made up before this match. Plus there’s always a gimmick entrant with these Rumbles (a comedy spot if you will) so I see no reason why he couldn’t just go in and out.
Ready to Rumble is a classic case of a movie that knows exactly what it is and leans heavily into its niche. It worked for me. I knew during the opening fantasy sequence, where David Arquette gets into a wrestling match with Ahmed Zappa in a convenience store with Macho Man Randy Savage, I knew that I would love the movie no matter what followed. And I was right to do so, because it is really, really good at what it does. I can understand most people not liking it, but those of us who do, we love it. Thank you for reading this far and have a happy Thanksgiving!
glad to see there was a doc RIGHT THERE!
For that shit? Kinda has to be. It’s aggressively, stupidly dangerous.
His whole response is self deprecating and gracious and encourages others to support their interest in wrestling. If anything, this makes me like him better.
I thought WCW died because it was awful, but thankfully we now have dozens of podcasts featuring Eric Bischoff and Vince Russo to tell us that, in fact, WCW died because of….I don’t know, something else maybe, but Dave Meltzer was behind it, that’s for sure.
Arquette has been vilified by manbabies for years about a movie nobody really remembers cuz Russo and the dumbasses at wwe insisted on hiim taking the belt. But he is a champion of this silly art form and it’s my understanding that he did the damn thing. As a smark, i salute you, David.
edited cuz it was WCW***** but you get it. wrestling fans are fucking weird.
*who’s
Thank God. I don’t know how he lived so long without the esteem of wrestling fans.
Weird: Bixenspan said he would have loved to write about this match but there would be no interest…
That family is batshit crazy. The Roberts brood is crazy mean (I know they weren’t mentioned but I wanted to mention their fuckery) and the Arquettes are batshit crazy. Hollywood royalty!
I saw Arquette at an NEW show a couple of weeks ago. While he all did there was a run in in a forgettable “local promotion guy against celebrity/wrestling legend” match that also featured Jerry Lawler and Mick Foley , dude was ripped and actually acquitted himself pretty well.
This article is misleading. Most wrestling fans I know in my daily life and online hated that he was in a death match because they are simply too dangerous and stupid for trained wrestlers let alone a actor with a few hours in the gym. Shane helms on Twitter even talked about how it wrong that the promoters took advantage of David.
Screw You! It’s a fun movie.