Inspirational wrestler portrayed in new light

It is rare when a pro wrestler is considered a transformational figure for society.

But author John Capouya makes such a case in “Gorgeous George,” compiling a list of personalities George Wagner influenced, including singers James Brown and Bob Dylan, filmmaker John Waters and boxer Muhammad Ali.

Gorgeous George’s emergence coincided with that of television’s. Wrestling equaled cheap network programming in the late ’40s, and more and more people were getting TVs. What a nation of viewers saw was a unique, flamboyant creation that Capouya calls an “ultimate narcissist,” a gender-bender who was “neither completely manly nor wholly feminine.”

With his bleached-blond hair (which became a staple for wrestling bad guys), elaborate robes, arrogant attitude and villainous in-ring actions, Gorgeous George was someone many fans despised but still had to see.

That fact was picked up on by Ali, who said, “I saw fifteen thousand people comin’ to see this man get beat. And his talking did it. I said this is a gooood idea!” Capouya claims that many of the chest-bumping, trash-talking actions of athletes today can be linked to Gorgeous George.

As is often the case with transformers, Gorgeous George eventually fell hard from his pedestal. The “Toast of the Coast,” who died in 1963 at age 48, was a heavy drinker who had problems with his liver, gambling, infidelity and separating the real him from his persona. He went through two wives and was hard-up enough for money at the end of his career that he agreed to a match in which his famed blond locks were cut when he lost.

Capouya does a good job of capturing all that made up Gorgeous George. He makes a convincing argument that the legacy of Gorgeous George spread far from the “squared circle.”