10 Times Vince McMahon Allowed Smoking On WWE TV

4. The Godfather

Before WWE morphed into a kid-friendly product and the rise of political correctness, there was the chaotically entertaining Attitude Era. Nearly two decades after it ended it’s still held in high regard with fans looking back on it as a creative asylum for wrestlers to push the envelope and fully express themselves.

I mean the Era got away with a lot. Goldust/X-Pac dabbling in blackface, Val Venis’s choppy choppy pee pee, Mae Young stripping/sagging, a few casual crucifixions etc. Another thing it absolutely got away with was The Godfather and his fluency in weed references.

Superstars at the time had reasonable free reign to speak and curse as overly scripting promos and micromanaging talent wasn’t a thing yet. Not only was he (beloved for) pimpin’ with plenty of hos in tow on national television, his vest was covered in marijuana slang – ‘4:20’, ‘Legalise it’ and ‘Don’t hide it. Take it out and light it!’. He’d come to the ring and proclaim “Light a fatty for this pimp daddy, light up that blunt and say pimpin’ ain’t easy.”

Rob Van Dam was doing similar things in ECW with the big difference being Paul Heyman knowing and wanting RVD to be edgy. According to Wright, he was able to do it because Vince and the network execs had no idea what he was talking about.

Godfather explained “I got away with talking about weed so openly on TV because the network executives had no idea what I was saying. They didn’t understand the slang. They had no idea what a fatty or a blunt was, so I was able to say all this stuff and they had no clue. My friend in Cypress Hill said he was amazed at the s**t I got away with.”