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The six-part documentary docu-series, titled “Mr. McMahon,” is set to air on Sept. 25.
The world of pro wrestling is eagerly awaiting the premier of a Netflix documentary about Vince McMahon, founder and former chairman and CEO of World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), that promises to “pull back the curtain” on one of sports entertainment’s biggest names.
The six-part documentary series, titled “Mr. McMahon” — set to air Sept. 25 — is a yearslong project that began production prior to a series of sexual assault allegations and a pending lawsuit forced McMahon out of the company. The new angle, per Netflix, is one that purports to “chronicle the rise and fall” of McMahon in light of these recent developments, which have shaken the wrestling industry to its core.
An expert who studies pro wrestling fandom says the timing of the documentary is “curious,” not least because it comes as the streaming platform is set to take over the WWE’s weekly flagship program, “Raw,” beginning January 2025. The $5 billion deal gives Netflix the streaming rights to “Raw” over the next 10 years, marking the first major programming shift for the show since its inception in 1993.
Steve Granelli, associate professor of communication studies at Northeastern University, says the McMahon rumor mill had been churning out unsavory stories about McMahon for decades.
However, it wasn’t until a series of events in 2022 — an internal investigation into a $3 million settlement for an alleged affair, a Wall Street Journal report showing that McMahon agreed to pay more than $12 million to four women over 16 years to “suppress allegations of sexual misconduct and infidelity” — that McMahon’s public image began to unravel.
Granelli says the documentary, which is reportedly based on more than 200 hours of interviews with McMahon, his family and wrestling insiders, was announced when McMahon was still owner and head of creative control of the WWE.
He says the producers had to do a complete 180: originally intended as something of a retrospective on McMahon’s life and business, it now could be seen as an opportunity to mark a new beginning for the company, fans and the industry.
That is, Granelli expects that the documentary will be “a full takedown” and “repudiation” of Vince McMahon.
“I believe this will be used by the WWE and Netflix to signal a permanent severing of that relationship,” he says, “so that when the WWE does debut on Netflix in December, they can somehow restart — and this is very hard to do in wrestling — without Vince McMahon being in any way connected to the product.”
The WWE has weathered a series of scandals and tragedies during its more than four decades of programming, from the so-called steroid trial to the deaths of various superstars; but none more damning than the lawsuit from a former employee alleging, among other misdeeds, sex trafficking and abuse.
In addition to digging into the events of the last several years, Granelli says “Mr. McMahon” will look back at the more than three decades of wrestling programming as it grew to become a prominent feature of American culture — peaking in popularity just before the turn of the millennium.
The WWE’s explosive growth throughout the 1990s is largely attributed to McMahon.
“So much has happened,” Granelli says. “[McMahon] went from being this young, brash promoter who was very confrontational, to then embracing this on-screen character of Mr. McMahon, where he was at once the owner and a ring announcer and an on-screen character or persona on top of it.”
Over time, fans began to suspect that Mr. McMahon, his fictionalized persona, was closer to who Vince McMahon was in real life, Granelli says.
“He then transitioned into this older grandfatherly figure,” he says. “[McMahon] would kind of come out and the crowds would give him his flowers. Around that time, maybe five years ago, people still had their concerns, and there were still stories and rumors about his behavior.”
Granelli says it’s unclear exactly to what extent McMahon was involved in the Netflix/Raw streaming deal.
The director of the documentary spoke to Netflix about the evolution of the project as producers responded in real time to the legal developments surrounding McMahon.
“Over the four years of production, the story evolved in truly shocking ways, culminating in some extremely harrowing allegations,” director Chris Smith said. “The final product is a revealing documentary that we believe offers a rich and nuanced portrait of the man and the complex legacy he left behind.”
The lawsuit is currently on pause pending a federal investigation into McMahon.
A spokesperson for McMahon previously described the lawsuit as “replete with lies, obscene made-up instances that never occurred and a vindictive distortion of the truth.”