While it can be argued that a miniscule handful of professional wrestlers matched Andre?s in-ring achievements (Gorgeous George back in the ?40s and ?50s, perhaps; Dusty Rhodes in the ?70s, and Hulk Hogan, without a doubt, in the ?80s), no other wrestler ever matched his exploits as a drunkard. In fact, no other human has ever matched Andre as a drinker. He is the zenith. He is the Mount Everest of inebriation. As far as great drunkards go, there is Andre the Giant, and then there is everyone else.
The big man loved two things: wrestling and booze?mostly booze?and his appetites were of mythic proportion.
First, consider the number 7,000. It?s an important number, and a rather scary one considering its context, which is this?it has been estimated that Andre the Giant drank 7,000 calories worth of booze every day. The figure doesn?t include food. Just booze. 7,000 calories. Every day.
Andre might make $15,000-$20,000 for a single appearance at Madison Square Garden, and a substantial amount of that went to settling the bar tabs he piled up as he boozed his way up and down Manhattan until sunrise. Andre?s generosity matched his size. He often invited a gang of fellow wrestlers along for the ride, as he disliked drinking alone, and picked up some truly staggering tabs.
Worried about his headliner, Vince McMahon Sr. assigned a ?handler? to the Giant?long-time wrestler, manager, and road agent, Arnold Skaaland, whose only job when Andre was in town was to keep him out of serious trouble and get him to the arena in time to wrestle. Skaaland was an old-school drinker in his own right, but Andre blew his mind. On one occasion he could only watch goggle-eyed as Andre went about demolishing a dozen or so quarts of beer as a ?warm-up? for a match.
A very green rookie wrestler named Hulk Hogan toured Japan several times with Andre and witnessed the Giant?s alcohol consumption first hand. According to Hogan, Andre drank, at a minimum, a case of tall boys during each bus ride. On one tour, Andre?s Japanese sponsors rewarded him with a case of expensive plum wine. Andre settled down in the back of the bus and started drinking. Four hours later, the bus arrived at the next venue, and Andre was polishing off the last bottle of wine. Sixteen bottles of wine in four hours is a considerable feat, but it gets better. Andre proceeded straight to the ring and wrestled three matches, including a twenty-man battle royal. The 16 bottles of plum wine had no discernible effect on Andre?s in-ring ability.
Another time, in the ?70s, Andre was holding court at a beach-front bar in the Carolinas, boozing it up with fellow wrestlers Blackjack Mulligan, Dick Murdoch, and the inimitable Ric Flair. They?d been drinking with gusto for hours when Flair goaded Mulligan and Murdoch into some slap-boxing with Andre, who had poured over 60 beers down his gullet. One of the two ?accidentally? sucker-punched Andre. The Giant became enraged, grabbed both Mulligan (6?5?, 250 lbs.) and Murdoch (6?3?, 240 lbs.) and dragged them into the ocean, one in each hand, where he proceeded to hold them under water. Flair intervened, and Andre released the men, assuring them he was only playing around. Murdoch and Mulligan, who had nearly drowned, weren?t so sure, but neither messed with Andre the Giant again. They also picked up the tab.
On another occasion, Andre was touring the Kansas City territory and went out for drinks after a show with Bobby Heenan and several other wrestlers. When the bartender hollered last call, Andre, slightly annoyed, announced that he didn?t care to leave. Rather than risk an altercation with his hulking customer, the bartender told Andre he could stay only if he was drinking, imagining, surely, that he would soon be rid of the big fella. Andre thanked the man, and proceeded to order 40 vodka tonics. He sat there drinking them, one after another, finishing the last at just after five in the morning.
When ill health forced Andre to largely quit wrestling in the late ?80s, he accepted the role of Fezzik in Rob Reiner?s movie The Princess Bride. Everyone on the set loved the big man, with the possible exception of Reiner himself. Ever the sociable fellow, he kept fellow cast members Mandy Patinkin and Carey Elwes out night after night, drinking and otherwise goofing around. As a result, they often showed up on set still loaded or suffering from the sort of hangovers that make death seem a pleasant alternative. The shooting schedule required Andre to be in England for about a month. When his part wrapped, Andre checked out of his suite at the Hyatt in London and flew back to his ranch in North Carolina. His bar bill for the month-long stay? Just a shade over $40,000.
You won?t find it in the Guinness Book of World Records, but Andre the Giant holds the world record for the largest number of beers consumed in a single sitting. These were standard 12-ounce bottles of beer, nothing fancy, but during a six-hour period Andre drank 119 of them. It was one of the few times Andre got drunk enough to pass out, which he did in a hallway at his hotel. His companions, quite drunk themselves, couldn?t move the big man. Fearing trouble with cops, they stole a piano cover from the lounge and draped it over Andre?s inert form. He slept peacefully until morning, unmolested by anyone. Perhaps the hotel people thought he was a piece of furniture.
Think about it: 119 beers in six hours. That?s a beer every three minutes, non stop. That?s beyond epic. It?s beyond the ken of mortal men. It?s god-like.
Unbeelievable.
