Lanny Poffo

**Lanny Mark Poffo** (December 28, 1954 – February 2, 2023), better known by his ring names **"Leaping" Lanny Poffo** and **the Genius**, was a Canadian-American professional wrestler, motivational speaker, poet, and actor.

Poffo was a second generation professional wrestler, his father being Angelo Poffo. His brother Randy Savage was also a professional wrestler. He found the greatest success of his career in the WWF.

## Professional wrestling career

Lanny Mark Poffo began wrestling in the NWA territories in the 1970s before becoming a star in his father's promotion, International Championship Wrestling, where he held the promotion's title. Over the course of his regional career, Poffo both tag teamed and feuded with older brother Randy.

Both brothers, along with their father, Angelo, were extremely popular in the Maritime provinces of Canada in Emile Dupre's "Atlantic Grand Prix Wrestling" which had a weekly television spot on ATV and toured the Maritimes doing shows seven days per week with some days hosting two shows in two different towns.

Upon the ICW's folding in 1984, he joined Randy in the CWA before traveling with him again to the World Wrestling Federation in June 1985. The brother angle was never worked in the WWF and the relationship was never mentioned on-air.

While Lanny was not a headlining WWF star like his brother, he built a niche for himself, wrestling as a babyface. In his first role, as **Leaping Lanny Poffo**, he would bring frisbees to the ring, read a short poem written on one of them that he himself had penned, and then throw the frisbees into the crowd.

Each poem typically ridiculed the heel that he was about to wrestle against, or infuriated the heel by building heat for the face with whom the heel was feuding at the time. During his early career in the WWF he was not a main-eventer and wrestled primarily as enhancement talent on television shows.

However, rather than being squashed like most jobbers at the time, he was typically allowed a greater amount of offense in his matches, and won some matches (usually against other enhancement talent). He found great success on house shows, where he frequently defeated other undercard wrestlers.

Poffo performed an agile, high-flying style at a time when big, heavy wrestlers still dominated the promotion. He was one of the first wrestlers in North America to use moves like the Senton Bomb, and particularly the moonsault, though the announcers of the time referred to the latter as a "leaping backflip". He attained some infamy in late 1986 and early 1987 by competing in a series of Bunkhouse Battle Royals in full knight's armor.

He also was noted for competing in a Battle Royal on *Saturday Night's Main Event* at the Joe Louis Arena in Detroit in 1987, where he was headbutted and eliminated by André the Giant, causing him to bleed heavily all over the floor and have to be carried out on a stretcher. André, in his first televised match as a heel, had accidentally caught Poffo on the bridge of the nose with his headbutt and stitches were required to close the resulting wound.

On March 18, 1989, still known as "Leaping Lanny", Poffo turned heel. He berated the local Boston sports teams, insulting them in his poetry, and instantly drew heat from the rowdy Boston crowd. Poffo was subsequently re-introduced as **The Genius**, a highly intelligent, arrogant heel who wore an academic cap and gown to the ring. His poems now ridiculed the face wrestlers, and he adopted an exaggerated effeminate, showboating manner (much as Adrian Adonis had a couple years prior), to draw heat from the crowd.

During his matches, the Genius would often write a mathematical equation on a clipboard that would tilt the balance of the match in his favor. In addition, the Genius also served as "executive consultant" (and occasional tag team partner) for Mr. Perfect.

On the November 25, 1989 edition of *WWF Saturday Night's Main Event*, The Genius faced WWF Champion Hulk Hogan and spent much of the match taunting Hogan and drawing heat from the crowd with his absurd antics. Several minutes into the match, Mr. Perfect appeared at ringside where he goaded Hogan and defaced the championship belt by sticking chewing gum on it. Poffo then tricked Hogan into following him outside of the ring resulting in Mr. Perfect striking Hogan with the championship belt and Poffo climbing back into the ring and winning the match by countout.

Later in the show, Mr. Perfect and Poffo destroyed the stolen belt with a hammer. Shortly after WrestleMania VI, Bobby Heenan became Mr. Perfect's manager. Poffo then wrestled in the undercard until the fall of 1991 when he became the manager of the Beverly Brothers (Mike Enos and Wayne Bloom). He would leave the WWF shortly after Survivor Series 1992. After a nineteen month absence, Poffo returned in May 1994 and defeated Koko B Ware on two house shows in Florida. His final WWF match was a loss to Mabel on June 11 at an event in Richmond, Virginia.

Poffo signed a WCW contract in 1995, but may have wrestled only once during his time there (two sites record him as having defeated a preliminary wrestler in a dark match at a WCW Saturday Night taping on October 14, 1997, in Fort Myers, Florida). In a later shoot interview, Poffo explained that he was contacted by his brother (Randy Savage), who was wrestling in WCW at the time, with the guarantee of a contract. Savage, who had purchased the Gorgeous George gimmick, offered the character to Poffo, feeling that his brother would generate heat as a heel.

Poffo signed the contract with WCW, began an intense training regimen, and bleached his hair blonde in preparation for his return to the ring. As he recalled, despite being under contract for five years and receiving regular paychecks, he was never contacted with any bookings. His own repeated calls to the office went unreturned, and he was simply never used by WCW. Ultimately, Savage gave the Gorgeous George moniker to his then-girlfriend and valet Stephanie Bellars.

After a six-year sabbatical from professional wrestling, Poffo returned to be a part of Wrestle Reunion in Tampa, Florida, on January 28–30, 2005, and defeated "The Royal Stud" Adam Windsor at that event. Poffo toured the independent circuit for the rest of his career, touring the East Coast of Canada with UCW, wrestling in Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. After that tour, Poffo also wrestled in Poland and Florida, as well as a show in England. On September 3, 2011, Poffo won a 25-man battle royal for the vacated Great North Wrestling Canadian Championship in Hawkesbury, Ontario. He dropped to title to Jeremy Prophet three weeks later in Perth-Andover, New Brunswick.

On March 28, 2015, Poffo returned to WWE at the 2015 Hall of Fame induction ceremony to induct his late brother, Randy Savage. He read poems and shared memories of Savage, before representing him the next day with the other inductees at WrestleMania 31.

On September 1, 2018, Poffo appeared at All In in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, accompanying "Black Machismo" Jay Lethal as Lethal successfully defended the ROH World Championship against Flip Gordon. Lanny also appeared on ROH telecasts announcing the action, doing commentary from ringside using his extended vocabulary that he made famous during his Leaping Lanny days of the past. Poffo wrestled his last match on March 5th at The Reena Rumble in Toronto, alongside wrestlers Papa Shango, Virgil, Brooklyn Brawler and local stars The Megan Boys Buck Gunderson and Mysterion the mind reader.

Outside wrestling, Poffo published two books. One is a collection of poems and limericks, most of which were related to drug and alcohol awareness, directed toward children. Poffo was a vocal opponent of tobacco smoking and published an anti-smoking book of limericks entitled *Limericks from the Heart and Lungs!*. He appeared in infomercials as an endorser of Tony Little's Gazelle Freestyle exercise machine, and was a credit counselor and motivational speaker. In 2018, Poffo released a biographical comic titled *The Genius Lanny Poffo*. He also launched a weekly podcast called *The Genius Cast with Lanny Poffo* which ended its run on January 21, 2019.

## Death

On February 2, 2023, Poffo died from heart failure in New York City at the age of 68.