McMahon doc heading to Netflix
October 30, 2020
By Nik Roseveare
WWE’s CEO and Chairman Vince McMahon is set to feature in a multi-part, biographical series on Netflix.
Nick Khan, WWE’s Chief Revenue Officer, confirmed the news, saying: “In a groundbreaking deal, we have sold a multi-part documentary with Netflix on the life of none other than our very own Vince McMahon. By groundbreaking, I mean one of the highest budgeted docs in Netflix’s history.”
Bill Simmons, who worked on the award-winning HBO documentary about wrestler Andre the Giant, will serve as an executive producer on the documentary. Chris Smith, who directed Netflix’s Fyre Festival documentary, will direct the series. Smith and WWE Studios will also be producers.
McMahon, aged 75, is a controversial figure. He is credited with seeing the commercial potential of monopolising the wrestling industry in the early 1980s, which previously operated in separate territories across the US. This ultimately led to the creation of the WWF (now WWE) entertainment behemoth, and the development of the annual PPV event WrestleMania, which has become the most successful professional wrestling event in history. McMahon faced stiff industry competition from Ted Turner’s WCW in the 1990s, but eventually purchased the company in 2001 after a long power struggle, and also purchased the assets of the defunct ECW in 2006.
McMahon has embarked on a number of WWE-related ventures; in 2014, he launched the WWE Network, an over-the-top video streaming service. McMahon also owns other WWE subsidiaries related to multimedia such as film, music, and magazines, as well as a professional wrestling school system. Outside of wrestling, McMahon joint-owned and operated the XFL, a football league, twice; both iterations folded after a single season (it was recently purchased by former colleague Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson). He also headed the short-lived World Bodybuilding Federation (WBF), and co-owns the clothing brand Tapout.
McMahon also worked as a part-time wrestler and on-screen personality known by the ring name Mr. McMahon, using a gimmick based on his real-life persona. He is a two-time world champion.