It has been a wild month of announcements for the WWE. First, the company had no intention to cancel its original plans for Wrestlemania 36, and announced the event will carry on for the first time without an audience. Now the situation has gotten even more interesting as Vince McMahon's wrestling company just announced the first ever two-night WrestleMania with a pretty high-profile celebrity host.
It turns out the rumors of former Patriots tight end (and allegedly the White Tiger on The Masked Singer) Rob Gronkowski were true. With that being said, it seems that Gronk won't be signing a WWE Superstar contract but merely hosting this historic WrestleMania.
As Rob Gronkowski said, WrestleMania 36 will broadcast on Saturday, April 4, and the originally scheduled date of Sunday, April 5. Both start times are at 7:00 p.m. ET, and it's assumed that both nights will equal out to the usual runtime for Wrestlemania. With that being said, Part 1 of WrestleMania 36 will replace NXT: Takeover which was scheduled in the time slot. As usual, both installments will air on the company's streaming service WWE Network.
As of now it is unknown how WrestleMania 36 will split its matches between the two nights. When the WWE first announced its plan to film from the WWE performance center, the time allotment on Sunday only seemed to allow for the main matches. With an added night and more hours, it's looking like matches that were previously planned for the pre-show are on the table, or some additional antics that will help make the event as big as it has been in years past.
It'll be a tall order for a audience-less Wrestlemania 36 to overtake the hype of past shows, though bringing in Rob Gronkowski to host should help. Gronk has a history with WrestleMania, and participated in WrestleMania 33 to help his former family friend Mojo Rawley win the Andre The Giant Battle Royale.
Rob Gronkowski is far from the first celebrity to host WrestleMania, but the fact that he's young and willing to get in the ring does add an element to this announcement. It would be great to see if this two-night event ends in Gronk signing a legitimate WWE contract, and becoming a superstar for the brand going forward. There's now time for plenty of surprises with WrestleMania 36 over the course of two nights, so who knows what this wrestling weekend will bring?
As previously mentioned, WrestleMania 36 will air on the WWE Network Saturday and Sunday April 4th and 5th at 7:00 p.m. ET. Continue to stick with CinemaBlend for updates on what's happening with television in 2020, especially as networks and organizations are pressed to make decisions regarding future content.
