Triple H Talks Physical Hall of Fame

A long-envisioned World Wrestling Entertainment Hall of Fame/attraction business still may come to fruition, a company executive said at last week's opening of the WWE Performance Center in Orlando.

But if one is built, it wouldn’t be like any other hall of fame. “I don’t want a hall of fame or some other attraction to just be something where people see some guy’s shorts,” said Paul Levesque, WWE (NYSE: WWE) executive vice president of talent and live events, as well as the WWE personality Triple H. “We are the WWE and we are big, so whatever we do needs to be the same.”

Levesque was in Orlando on July 11 for the opening of the 26,000-square-foot WWE Performance Center where the firm’s future athletes will be trained. He also was there to address questions about the company’s growing presence in Central Florida, which already consists of regular broadcasts of the WWE NXT program at Full Sail University.

“If I were to go out on a limb, I would say Orlando is the first place we’d look” for an attraction or WWE Hall of Fame, said Levesque to media at the July 11 event.

Later, he told me if the WWE green-lit an Orlando attraction, he’d expect it to consist of major interactive experiences. “If I were to say what it could be, think of it as something that has shows or live interactive things for fans. For example, something like a 4-D experience where the fan would come face-to-face with a 3-D Andre the Giant — something along that scale.”

The company has yet to announce any plans for an attraction, which experts said could be a $100 million investment.

An attraction of that scale would succeed if the WWE makes it interactive, said Dennis Speigel, president of Cincinnati-based International Theme Park Services Inc.

Hall of fames tend to have a tough time because they typically don’t garner enough attendance or provide lasting experiences, he said. That’s why if “WWE has the gun power to develop an attraction that’s state of the art where you come see some of the WWE stars participating in matches or just around the area, it could work.”

But the WWE also must make sure it stays up with the latest technology in the tourism industry to keep up with what the major theme parks are using to market themselves, Speigel said.

source: orlando business journal