10 Wrestling Moments You Didn’t Know Were Totally Ripped Off
4. Marlena
Before the Women's Revolution, WWE patterned much of its female talent after "women in swimsuit models John Laurinaitis jerked it to," but before that, the company took a classier approach.
Marlena was an underrated component to Goldust's mesmerising act, for her mere presence opened up a further layer of mystery: everything about Goldust's particular brand of psychology sought the cheapest of panicked heat, and yet this buxom bombshell complicated and enhanced the fan reaction. Goldust was a performer who made the heterosexual males squeamish and jealous. In terms of performance, Marlena - who sold a ragdolling with such painful-looking conviction that it still hurts your neck, that Chyna GIF - cast also a sultry figure, chain-smoking with the detached, alluring confidence of a Golden Age film star - Marlene Dietrich, to be precise.
Dietrich, who stopped smoking long enough to star in several Hollywood classics, was also a transgressive figure who toyed with breaking sexual societal norms. In addition, both Dietrich and the woman behind Marlena, Terri Runnels, were/are committed humanitarians. But, where Dietrich received several honours from the U.S. and elsewhere for her wartime efforts, Runnels found herself embroiled in a fraud scandal.
Still, she didn't go full Stephanie McMahon, and elsewhere barely publicised her less controversial efforts, so we'll let her off.