Russo grew up in Farmingville, New York and graduated from the University of Southern Indiana (then known as Indiana State University Evansville) in 1983 with a degree in journalism. He worked for the school newspaper The Shield as an assistant sports editor and later as editor-in-chief. Russo got his start in the wrestling business when he began training under the tutelage of Johnny Rodz at Gleason's Gym in Brooklyn. His family owned two video stores on Long Island, New York and they were known for renting wrestling videos,.

In 1992, Russo was hired as a freelance writer for WWF Magazine following a letter that he had written to Linda McMahon, and would later become an editor in 1994 under the pseudonym of Vic Venom. He was eventually promoted to the WWF Creative Team in 1996. In that same year, Monday Night Raw hit an all-time ratings low of 1.8, as Monday Nitro (Raw's chief competition), was in the midst of an 84-week winning-streak against Raw head-to-head (see Monday Night Wars). With World Championship Wrestling (WCW) eclipsing the WWF, McMahon called upon Russo to make changes to the televised product. Russo contributed edgy, controversial storylines involving sexual content, profanity, swerves or unexpected heel turns, and worked shoots in the storylines. Russo's style of writing came to be known as "Crash TV".  In early 1997, Russo became head writer for the WWF and wrote their flagship show Raw Is War as well as their monthly pay-per-views. With the angles that he created, Russo had a large hand in putting WWF ahead of WCW in the Monday night rating wars during the Attitude Era. Notable story lines that occurred and characters portrayed during Russo's run as head writer include the Stone Cold Steve Austin vs. Mr. McMahon feud, The Undertaker vs. Kane feud, D-Generation X, the rise of The Rock, and the Mick Foley saga. Some of the more controversial characters during this time, often cited by critics of Russo, include Sable, Val Venis and The Godfather. Russo devised the infamous Brawl for All tournament.  In the two years following Russo's promotion to head writer, Raw surpassed WCW's Nitro in head-to-head ratings.

Answer the following question by taking a quote from the article: What was his pseudonym?
Vic Venom.