Lu-cha! Lu-cha! Lu-cha!

“¡Uno más!”

The crowd cheered on wrestler All Go Nelli Sunday evening as he stepped, one foot at a time, on the taut ropes surrounding the wrestling ring at Mazorca, a family-run Mexican restaurant in Hamden known for its tasty flautas, tacos, and margaritas.

Wait, back up. Wrestling ring? At Mazorca?

You read that right. Courtesy of the Paradise Alley Pro Wrestling school in East Haven, Mazorca’s dining room transformed into a Lucha Libre arena for the night, complete with masked fighters, a bell, and excited fans of all ages. 

It was a highly choreographed show, with fake-outs that turned into somersaults across the stage and ​“hits” accompanied by stomps on a stage amplifying any sound to grandiose proportions. Wrestlers sweated their way to glory in the elaborate dance.

“It’s a nice vibe, very entertaining,” said audience member Rosalinda Ramirez from West Haven. ​“We heard about the shows within our Mexican culture.” Heavy metal music poured into the space as the crowd fell into a steady chant of ​“Lu-cha! Lu-cha! Lu-cha!”

“¡Uno más!”

All Go Nelli hovered one foot in the air before landing it on the next rope. The audience’s energy heightened as it slowly became clear Nelli was about to tightrope-walk all the way around the wrestling ring. He held out one hand to grasp the hand of another wrestler, Bori, dressed in a Puerto Rican flag mask and pants with ​“Boricua” down the side. Bori paralleled All Go Nelli’s walk but on the stable ground of the stage, providing what I thought was support. (The storyline of the show, I would later find out, said otherwise.)

“I’m having a good time,” said Davon Stova, watching from the audience. He lives in East Haven and attends the Paradise Alley Pro Wrestling school. He clued me in to the lore behind some of the fights’ big moments, like when a few wrestlers on stage went back and forth shouting ​“One!” ​“Two!” at each other.

“He only knows how to say ​‘one,’” Stova said about the character saying ​“one.”

I asked Stova about an unexpectedly wholesome moment when four wrestlers, who were supposed to fight to the death in a ​“Fatal Four-Way Match,” instead turned together on their ref, one of them shouting at the end, ​“All of us are one! We can all be referees!” Stova didn’t have too many answers for that one; ​“It’s not canon to our school.”

The wrestlers offered more than just an impressive show of physique. They had plots and personas to maintain. Based on the kind of characters they were portraying, they commanded either the respect of the wrestling fans filling the room or their delighted BOOOOs.

“¡Uno más!”

Bori’s time as a tightrope escort was over. All Go Nelli walked his final rope, then immediately turned to slam his fellow wrestler to the ground. The whole time, it turns out, he was not holding hands with Bori but preventing him from getting away.

The room erupted in cheers.

So, what did Mazorca’s crowd think of the match?

According to 9‑year-old Caroline in the audience, looking cheerfully ahead in a pair of thick headphones, it was ​“pretty scary — and good!”