Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
Professional wrestling has had a history filled with wrestlers going on a meteoric rise to the top early in their careers. Goldberg went on an undefeated streak of 173 wins and no losses…The Giant (Paul Wight) won the WCW World title in his pro debut match…Tommy Rich won the NWA World title at age 24…etc, etc…
Such was the case for a brash, young 24 year old wrestler named Marc Copani. An 100% Italian American born and raised in Syracuse, New York who was bestowed the gimmick of an Arab American named Muhammad Hassan.
The gimmick itself, was the brain child of Vince McMachon and Jim Cornette. An Arab American character that would play on the prejudices and fears of most Americans in a post 9/11 world. He wasn’t just a stereotypical Anti-American character like the Iron Sheik…rather someone whose anger and hatred was fueled by people’s own ignorance. As an added layer of authenticity to the Hassan character, independent wrestler Dara Daivari (Renamed Khosrow) was brought in as a sort of reverse interpreter…who would speak in nothing but Persian.
The gimmick immediately went on the “hot seat” as Arab and Muslim groups protested the character…believing it was an unfair portrayal. In early vignettes, Hassan would “Praise Allah” and in some dark matches would bring with him a rug and in the middle of the ring start praying. Those aspects were later eliminated due to pressures from outside groups protests.
In just one short year’s time…from 2004 to 2005…he had a verbal sparring with Mick Foley…intimidated Jim Ross…had a Wrestlemania moment with Hulk Hogan…beat down Shawn Michaels…went on an undefeated streak by defeating the likes of Chris Benoit, Jerry “The King” Lawler and Chris Jericho…challenged John Cena for the WWE title and Batista for the World heavyweight title and assaulted the Undertaker.
All that in less than a year as a pro wrestler on the WWE roster. Hassan was destined for greatness….that is until real life tragedy got in his way.
Smackdown taping: July 4th, 2005
The Undertaker easily defeated Khosrow Daivari…afterwards…Hassan called out 5 masked men dressed in black and camouflage to attack the phenom. The unidentified masked assailants were Val Venis…Paul Birchall…The Shane Twins (Later known as Gymini) and Mike Knox. On any other Smackdown…this would have been looked at as ordinary…the problem was, this taping aired in the U.S. and Canada on July 7th….the same day as the infamous London bombings terrorist attack.
Instead of totally scrapping the segment like they had done in the past…ie..The Darren Drozdov injury…they aired it and as expected a firestorm of disgust came from all over the mainstream media such as Variety and TV Guide. The backlash was so severe, the UPN network decided to get involved.
They gave the WWE an ultimatum. either the Muhammad Hassan character goes or face cancellation of Smackdown. In a surprising move, instead of moving the Hassan character to their cable outlet on Raw or repackaging Copani…..the WWE released Mark Copani outright.
Mark Copani quit pro wrestling altogether, instead opting for the bright lights of Hollywood as an actor and screen writer. He also teamed up with another former WWE wrestler…Shad Gaspard ( Cryme Tyme ) to create a graphic novel entitled “Assassin & Son.”
Copani then finished his education and became a high school Social Studies teacher in New York. He has done only a small number of interviews since his WWE release, but has stated that he looks back fondly with little regrets over his time in the WWE. It is interesting though…Tragedy created the Muhammad Hassan character and tragedy destroyed him.
Superunknown
I remember me and my buddy(who had just come back from Iraq) really thought that Hassan was eventually gonna win the World Heavyweight Championship. He had real, old school wrestling heat that will probably never happen again.
David Fullam
Never ceases to amaze me how tone deaf WWE can be.