So when Sable quit WWE several years ago and filed a lawsuit against it, a spectator couldn’t help but wonder whether it was all part of the show.

According to a 1999 Associated Press story, Sable sued WWE (then known as the World Wrestling Federation) for “$110 million, complaining it wanted her to participate in a lesbian storyline, expose her breasts on TV and appear in sexually degrading photos.”

The story went on to say, “The lawsuit ... charges that professional wrestling has become increasingly ‘obscene, titillating, vulgar and unsafe.’ ”

Keep in mind that this is a sport where referees have been known to break in on matches involving female wrestlers and demand that they strip down to bra and panties.

In the interim between her two WWE stints, Sable became one of Playboy Magazine’s most popular and oft-featured celebrity models.

Accounts of Sable’s career on wrestling fan Web sites are such an undifferentiated mix of fictions written for the bouts and the facts of Sable’s life that it’s impossible to tell what’s true.

But the reporter got a clue as to the veracity of the lawsuit when he asked Sable about it.

A WWE press flak, apparently listening to the phone conversation, broke in and said, “I’d appreciate it if we could steer the conversation away from that particular topic.”

Case closed.

Sable returned to WWE late last year. She said she missed the immediate gratifications of performing live.

“I just enjoyed performing in front of the fans,” she said. “I didn’t get the same feeling of excitement elsewhere.”

Even though she is back in the fold, Sable is still outspoken about sexism in the wrestling industry.

She says the most gifted female wrestlers get passed over because they lack a certain California finish.

They’re not weight-training Barbie, in other words.

“Men aren’t hired on looks,” she says. “Some of the most talented women are not blonde-haired, blue-eyed women.”

Of course, Sable’s good looks haven’t exactly been a non-issue in the course of her career.

She is extremely proud of her status at Playboy and says the photo shoots were liberating for her.

“I love being sexy,” she says. “But I also want to be thought of as an intelligent woman.”

Sable says female wrestlers are held to a higher performing standard than men. And they’re held to a different moral standard as well.

“The men in this business are able to have families because they have wives who stay home. The women have to choose. There are more difficulties as a woman. There are more sacrifices we make.”

Sable says women who leave their families to go on tour are judged much more harshly than men.

And women are generally not part of the management structure at WWE.

“I know women who know as much about this business as any man,” she said.

Wrestling has fallen on hard economic times of late and Sable says it still suffers from a sideshow stigma.

Sable said she believes people need to be more aware of the combination of athleticism, thespianism and charisma that goes into having a successful career in wrestling.

“In this business, it is many years before you find a mix of style and character that connects with the fans. The fans have to buy into it.

“The most talented wrestlers are not as popular as The Rock and ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin because the fans have to buy into it.”

And the most popular female wrestlers are not nearly as popular as the male icons.

But Sable says she has faith that this will change.

“We are starting to think that people may want to find out more about us,” she said.