No One Died: The Wing Bowl Story premiered to rave reviews at the Philadelphia Film Festival on Tuesday night. An appropriate venue, because the documentary may be the most Philadelphia film of all time.
For those unfamiliar with the Wing Bowl--ostensibly an eating competition--the film's trailer can provide some background. But as Jason Kelce notes at the start, "Nothing you can find online will ever do it justice, how absolutely outrageous and ridiculous it is."
The brainchild of longtime WIP morning show hosts Angelo Cataldi and Al Morganti, the first Wing Bowl was held in 1993 in the lobby of the Wyndham Franklin Plaza hotel. The winner of the small event, Carmen Cordero, was awarded a hibachi grill after eating 101 wings.
But the event grew each year, eventually featuring professional competitive eaters such as Joey Chestnut and Takeru Kobayashi. The spectacle--and, some may say, the debauchery--grew as well, with competitors making glamorous entrances and scantily-clad "Wingettes" entertaining heavily intoxicated crowds.
By the year 2000, the Wing Bowl was held in the arena now named the Wells Fargo Center. Attendance eventually soared to 20,000 in the stands, plus about another 5,000 on the event floor.
And by the time of the final Wing Bowl in 2018, champion Molly Schuyler walked away with a new car, $5,000 cash, and other prizes after devouring 501 wings.
Criticism of the event grew as well.
Frank Petka, the Wing Bowl film's producer, spoke with On Pattison in September. "We wanted to tell this uniquely Philadelphian story," said Petka. "We leave it to others to criticize or defend the [Wing Bowl]."
The film accomplishes just that, documenting the events and challenging viewers to make sense of it all.
But as Pat Taggart, Petka's filmmaking partner and the director of No One Died, has said, "None of it made sense. It still doesn't."
From left to right: Producer Frank Petka, three-time Wing Bowl champion Bill "El Wingador" Simmons, and Director Pat Taggart. At Tuesday's premiere, which had a near capacity crowd at the 446-seat Philadelphia Film Center, guests included Cataldi, former WIP afternoon host and current 97.5 the Fanatic mid-day host Mike Missanelli, Hall of Fame sportswriter Ray Didinger, many former WIP employees (including On Pattison's own Anthony SanFilippo), and a cadre of former contestants, wingettes and plain old fans of the event - including restauranteur Angelo Lutz, who was credited with starting the trend of entourage entrances when he competed as "The Golden Buddha" and showed up with an entire string band.
"When Wing Bowl ended, we were all happy it was over," Cataldi said. "But this documentary was so good, it made me fall in love with it all over again."
The 95-minute trip down memory lane perfectly captures not only the history of the event (from its humble beginnings as a two-man competition held in a hotel lobby to the national spectacle it became at the Wells Fargo Center), but also the spirit of the city during a time when Philadelphia sports teams went 100 consecutive seasons without a championship. The film documents how the Wing Bowl became a surrogate championship celebration for many Philly sports fans.
Interviews with 40 different individuals - from hosts like Cataldi and Missanelli, to former Philadelphia Eagles Jason Kelce and Jon Dorenbos, to many of the characters who made Wing Bowl the greatest radio promotion of all-time - were interspersed throughout the film with tremendous archive footage of the event as it grew bigger - and more out of control - each year.
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Cataldi talking to the crowd after the premiere
One of the most impressive things surrounding this documentary is how it was made without the buy-in of WIP and Audacy.
It was made clear to all involved in the production of this film that the parent company of the radio station wanted to distance itself from anything having to do with Wing Bowl. No current Audacy employees were allowed to participate in the documentary, which is why there are no sit-down interviews with the likes of Al Morganti, Rhea Hughes, Joe Conklin or long-time Morning Show producer Joe Weachter.
Yet, Taggart and Petka had the buy-in from the now-retired Cataldi, and that was the biggest fish to land. All the other former WIP employees are able to fill the gaps to tell the story and the cast of characters they were able to track down added plenty of color.
"We knew that if we were going to tell this story, we needed the central figures," Petka said.
Cataldi with Wing Bowl competitor Michael "Doughboy" MeehanThe film is chock-full of moments that had the audience laughing out loud. But it also does a good job tackling the serious issue of Wing Bowl's biggest star - Bill "El Wingador" Simmons - and his downfall from local celebrity and entrepreneur to prison inmate serving time on drug charges. It also discusses how the radio station - and the venue - started losing control of Wing Bowl as it grew from a wild, annual party to a flat-out, lawless bacchanal, filled with drunken fighting, nudity, and the hurling of dangerous projectiles.
But perhaps most importantly, the film serves a love letter to Philadelphia sports fans, highlighting the unique quirks that many believe make the fans in this city the best on the planet, bar none.
The best example was showing how Philly fans - in their own, special way - embraced local eaters more than those from outside of Philadelphia and celebrated these everyday folks as the city's champions because of their ability to eat fast.
A second showing is slated as part of the Philadelphia Film Festival on Saturday night at the Bourse Theater 2. Tickets are still available. However, Taggart said at a post-show Q and A that the hope is for the film to be available on a streaming service in the near future.
[Disclosure: SanFilippo is one of the 40 individuals who appears in the documentary but was not compensated for his appearance.]
