by Topeka Capital-Journal

Whether it is standup comedy, country music or whatever kind of entertainment professional wrestling offers - sport? soap opera? cartoon? - it will be available this weekend for those not completely lost to March Madness.

Carlos Mencia

In the NCCA Tournament isn't your thing, laugh it off by attending comedian Carlos Mencia's concert at 8 p.m. today at the Topeka Performing Arts Center, 214 S.E. 8th.

Mencia, who built his fan base with four successful seasons of "Mind of Mencia" on Comedy Central, where he also starred in his own comedy specials, is back on the standup comedy circuit as he considers his next career move.

Billing himself as an "equal opportunity offender," nothing is off limits to the 41-year-old's barbs as Mencia often pushes the envelope on matters racial, ethnic and cultural.

Born in Honduras the son of a Mexican mother and Honduran father, Mencia grew up in East Los Angeles with an aunt and uncle. He dropped out of college where he was pursuing an electrical engineering degree after he made an audience laugh at an open mic night at a comedy club.

Although Mencia's concert will start at 8 p.m., the comedian himself will be in the lobby of TPAC hawking his own CDs and other merchandise starting at 7 p.m., the venue said.

?Road to Wrestlemania'

Although Landon Arena at the Kansas Expocentre had its share of March Madness as the site of the State 5A Basketball Championships, the spotlights will focus this weekend on a different kind of action.

The road to "WrestleMania XV" stops at 7:30 p.m. Saturday in a rink erected in Landon Arena where stars of all three WWE brands - "Raw," "SmackDown" and "ECW" - will battle and build hype for the April 5 pay-per-view extravaganza.

Although dismissed as a waste of time and brain cells by some, millions of fans watch it every week.

Alex Marvez, who writes a syndicated pro-wrestling column for Scripps Howard News Service, recently reported two February episodes of "Monday Night Raw" on USA Network averaged 6 million viewers, the first time consecutive shows reached that threshold since April 2002.

While the viewing audience is down from when WWE's "Smackdown" aired on CW, Marvez said recent Friday-night shows are averaging almost 4 million viewers on myNetworkTV. "ECW" gets roughly 2 million fans for its weekly Tuesday-night telecasts on Sci-Fi Network.

Starting next month, "WWE Superstars" will air at 8 and 11 p.m. Thursdays on WGN starting in April.

Small-screen popularity has translated to big-screen opportunities for some WWE stars. Former heavyweight champ John Cena, who will take on the reigning titleholder Edge at Landon Arena, is making the talk-show rounds promoting his newest action-adventure movie, "12 Rounds," which opens March 27 nationwide.

Joe Nichols

Country music will be the other live entertainment alternative to basketball Saturday night when Joe Nichols performs at the Golden Eagle Casino.

Nichols is booked for shows at 7 and 9 p.m. in the showroom of the casino, which is about 45 miles northeast of Topeka on K-20 highway between US-75 and Horton.

Nichols, 32, started turning heads in country music in 2002 when his single "The Impossible" reached No. 3 on the country charts and became, according to Billboard, the 10th most-played song of 2003.

The Rogers, Ark., singer followed up with his platinum-certified second album, "Man with a Memory," which helped earn Nichols a Top New Male Vocalist award from the Academy of Country Music and three Grammy Award nominations.

Following a successful holiday album, "A Traditional Christmas," in 2005, Nichol's gold-certified "III" included his biggest hit to date and his second No. 1 single, "Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off."

"Real Things," released in 2007, has yielded two Top 10 singles, ""Size Matters (Someday)" and "I'll Wait for You," and next month Nichols' newest single, "Believe," will be released to radio as he prepares for issuance of his latest album.

Bill Blankenship can be reached at (785) 295-1284 or bill.blankenship@cjonline.com

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