Joanie Laurer, the WWE Superstar known to a generation of fans as Chyna, died on April 20, 2016, leaving behind a legacy as performer who redefined the role of women in wrestling.
Billed as “The Ninth Wonder of the World,” Chyna was truly a pioneer in wrestling. An imposing physical presence, she joined WWE in 1997, as Triple H’s silent bodyguard, and later became part of the famous D-Generation X stable. She almost didn’t get the role, as people behind the scenes were pushing for Curtis Hughes, while Triple H and Shawn Michaels wanted Chyna. They got their way, and from there, she became a major player in DX, both as an enforcer and a sidekick in their brash antics.
Along with Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock, DX helped usher in the Attitude Era, the grittier and more vulgar wrestling program that came at the turn of the millennium. With it came unrivaled popularity for the WWE. Chyna was both the stable’s only woman and its most fearsome enforcer: standing 5’10” and built like a bodybuilder’s fantasy, she drew your eye no matter what the hell it was she was doing. But there was no fantasy: Chyna’s reign was forever thorny.
There were cruel jokes and insults from both wrestlers and commentators in her early years: they would constantly allude to her lack of sex appeal and her second-rate spot on the roster. But Chyna grew past the role of henchmen into a bonafide star. She was the first woman to ever enter WWE’s Royal Rumble match (the winner of which would headline the biggest show of the year, WrestleMania).
Perhaps more importantly: it wasn’t a novelty; you wouldn’t have been too surprised if she had actually won the Rumble that year. When she took the Intercontinental Championship—the company’s second biggest singles championship—in 1999, she became the first and only woman to ever win a male title in the company.
R.I.P. Chyna, you will be missed. Thank you for the great matches and entertainment.
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