Hitman My Real Life in the Cartoon World (50 page)

And Vince was the man who had brought pro wrestling out of smoky halls and small arenas and made it into family entertainment that crossed age, economic, gender and national boundaries. We were now heroes, with our own action figures. Not only was it good for the fans but, even with the merciless schedule and being treated as a disposable commodity, the life I led now beat nickel-and-dime payoffs and traveling packed like a sardine in a frigid van with the sting of fresh gig marks carved into my forehead. If Vince went down, where would any of us be then? Sure, there were a lot of legitimate gripes, but I wished the energy that went into concocting far-fetched accusations could have gone into solving some real issues.

I spent my four days off drawing a poster-sized montage of every WWF wrestler I could think of as a special send-off gift for Hulk. By all indications he’d be riding into the sunset after WrestleMania VIII, heading for Hollywood. With his reputation as a hero to kids severely damaged and a ton of money in the bank, I didn’t think he’d be back. Hogan off steroids would leave him looking much too mortal.

To me Hulk, like Vince, had taken the business to its highest peaks, and seeing Hulk fading out without any glory seemed wrong.

Stu, Helen, Georgia, Julie and all the kids came to Indianapolis for WrestleMania VIII. Julie bitched constantly once she arrived, trying her hardest to ruin the entire experience for me. The higher my career went the more my marriage bottomed out: Julie acted as if she resented my popularity. The night before WrestleMania VIII we wound up in a bar near the hotel with my red-headed Italian fan-turned-friend Carlo, who’d come down from Toronto. Vince’s son Shane walked in—he was on the road doing various jobs, setting up the ring and refereeing, learning the business so that someday he could take over the reins from his dad. I’d always done my best to watch out for him, and he liked me for it. As he approached, a startled Julie jolted toward me. When he greeted me with a handshake, I smiled and said, “Let me introduce you to my wife.” Shane turned beet red. There was an awkward silence. Julie seemed furious—and I had no idea why. Carlo whispered, “He just goosed Julie big time!” Obviously Shane hadn’t had a clue who she was. Shane quickly took a stool at the other end of the bar. I was inclined to forget it, but when I looked over at him, I noticed he was studying me with puzzled defiance. I thought, Okay, he knows I know what he did and thinks that since his daddy owns me, I won’t do anything. He was wrong.

Because it was the night before a big match, I wasn’t drinking. And Julie’s foul mood had made me even more testy. I slammed my boss’s kid against the wall, telling him through clenched teeth that if he ever touched my wife again, I’d rip his head off. I never would have hurt him, but I had to let him know I wasn’t afraid of who he was. Then Carlo pried me away, Shane still protesting his innocence.

The next day all the Harts crammed into a black stretch limo to go to my big match with Roddy. Stu was up front with my mom, and all of the rest of us were squeezed in back as fans screamed and surrounded the car. Blade, who was wearing a black miniature version of my ring jacket, looked like a tiny replica of me and was laughing hard as he slapped his little hands on the window. Beans told me she didn’t want “Rolly Pepper” to hurt me. She never liked watching me get beat up. Jade was nine now and still riding herd on Dallas, who was at that age where he was starting to suspect that wrestling might not be real. I hoped they could forgive me, someday, for being gone so much. As the limo pulled away everybody was as excited as I was about my big match with Roddy—except for Julie.

Backstage at the Hoosier Dome, I passed around the drawing I’d done for Hulk and made sure every wrestler signed it before I gave it to him. Hulk loved it. I wondered whether he’d ever be back.

As I put on my gear, it dawned on me that I didn’t get nervous for matches anymore. Even this one, where Roddy and I had planned that we were going to go against Vince’s policy just this once. I was going to get a little juice: our babyface match desperately needed it if we were going to steal the show. In a toilet stall I carefully snipped and taped up my blade. With 68,000 fans in attendance and hundreds of thousands more watching at home on pay-per-view with VCRs going, four WWF

cameras, not to mention all the wrestlers, I’d have to be a real pro to make the blood look accidental.

When Roddy and I came nose to nose in the ring for the opening stare down, I had to look away or else I’d have cracked up. We’d worked a shoot, and the fans believed this match would be like no other, especially since The Hitman and Roddy Piper had never really worked before.

The story built slowly, the wily veteran and the hungry kid giving no quarter. When the time was right the ref stopped me and told me to fix my loose shoelace. While I leaned over to tuck it into my boot, Roddy blindsided me with a fist to the face, and I crumpled to the mat, covering up to spit the blade out of my mouth. Roddy kicked me several times in the face, never touching me. I cut a one-inch slice right over my right eyebrow, deep enough to convince all the boys afterwards that it was the real deal or risk being exposed. At first the blood was barely noticeable, but soon my face was a mess.

Soon enough, a crazed Piper had knocked the referee down and stood over me holding the ring bell high over his head as he prepared to brain me like a seal hunter delivering the final blow. He hesitated while I groped and clawed my way to my knees. With my head covered in blood, I gave Roddy my baby-seal eyes. Roddy expertly milked it. Feigning a change of heart, he seemed to come to his senses just long enough to toss the bell out to the timekeeper in disgust. Pulling me to my feet, he blasted me with a punch. I leaned and swung back at him with a desperate, wild blow that he easily ducked under as he clamped me in his finishing move, the sleeper. The captivated crowd was hanging on every move. I spun toward the corner flailing for the top rope, but my escape was just out of grasp and I began to sink. Supported by Roddy I jumped up and kicked off the top corner pad, knocking us both backwards with all my weight, crashing on top of Roddy, who couldn’t use his arms to break his fall. It had to hurt, the way we landed with a thud!

I rolled backwards holding his elbows tight. Piper was pinned beautifully. The ref came back to life on cue for the one . . . two . . . three! With the crowd cheering loudly, Roddy gave me a hug, and I told him, “Thanks, cuz, I’ll never forget what you did for me today!” Roddy said, “I love ya, brother,”

and buckled the IC belt around my waist.

Now for the real work.

I came through the curtain pretending to be concerned that I was going to need stitches. Chief, Lanza and a bunch of the boys gathered around me to see how bad it was. Chief brushed my hair away. “Maybe a stitch, Bret, but you’ll be all right.” Roddy was there, concerned, apologizing, and we both knew we’d fooled them all.

Little did we know that Flair and Randy, who went on right after us, had secretly planned to get juice too. Flair was so obvious as he cut himself repeatedly that when he came back with several long, bloody cat scratches on his forehead, an angry Vince fined them each $500 for blading. He never said a word to me because he thought that mine was legit.

After WrestleMania VIII came three long days of TVs. My match with Piper not only stole the show, but many felt it saved the pay-per-view altogether. And so began my second reign as IC champion.

Four days later I was in Munich. I loved being back in Germany! As I rode on the bus down cobbled streets I listened to my Walkman thinking about how in 1936 Hitler watched in disgust as the black American runner Jesse Owens sprinted to win the gold medal at the Berlin Olympics. I thought back to 1981 and my old Hanover days, with Jim, when I was the biggest loser of the tournament. Well, Axel Dieter, you old pimp, take a look at me now!

Fans were pounding on the sides of the bus for blocks before we finally pulled up to the back of the arena, where an even bigger crowd excitedly waited for us. Owen had told me I was really big in Germany, and judging by all the signs being held up, it appeared to be true. When I stepped off the bus girls screamed and cried uncontrollably, some even fainting.

In the dressing room Chief told me I was the opening match. I argued that I was the Intercontinental champion and that as I understood it I was very popular in Germany so it was therefore crazy for me to be first match. But Chief had his orders, so I did go out first. I think I made my point though. As soon as I came out, my music blaring, the sell-out crowd exploded. Teenaged girls overran barricades and leaped past security guards, who were helpless to stop them; they literally knocked me down, hugging and kissing me. I’d never seen or heard anything like it, not even for Hogan at the height of all his glory. Hulkamania was a phenomenon, but the reaction I got was more like Beatlemania! It wasn’t just teenaged girls, there were older women too, and even men and boys reached out to me.

Flowers flew at me from everywhere, and boxes of chocolates, wrapped gifts, and lots and lots of teddy bears! I gently pulled myself up, smeared with lipstick, and made my way through the crowd to the ring. I did my strut to all four sides, and the crowd exploded each time. When I dropped down to give my shades to a little girl, thousands of people sighed, ahhh.

As I got set to take on Dino Bravo, he said, “You’re over, brother.” They cheered for every move. As I sold, they chanted my name so loudly that I could barely hear myself think. When I beat Bravo, the place came totally unglued.

Leaving the building was another frenetic scene. An astounded Chief met me at the top of the ramp,

“You were right, Stu. They love you! I’ve never seen anything like that—ever!” That night the hotel was overrun with Hitman fans, many of whom had camped out in the lobby.

In Dortmund it was worse, if that’s any way to say it. I loved it!

The only other wrestler to get a huge response was The Undertaker, who was greeted everywhere we went by hundreds of kids dressed in black with rings under their eyes.

Then we stormed the U.K. In London, Birmingham, Sheffield and Glasgow the reception was as incredible as in Germany. As I’d predicted, Vince had stumbled onto a gold mine. American wrestling was huge in Europe, and all the WWF wrestlers were household names.

27

“LISTEN TO ME, AND I’LL CARRY YOU”

MAYBE IT WAS HAVING had a steady diet of adulation that caused me to stick my head up a little higher than I normally would when Vince called a meeting at TVs at the end of April. If anyone had anything they wanted to say, Vince offered, we should feel free to speak up. After a number of minor questions were posed, I put up my hand. Steroids had aided a lot of wrestlers in recuperating from injuries, I said, and now that we were all clean, maybe Vince could consider giving us a lighter schedule. Many of us were on the road three hundred days a year, and, in the dressing room, complaints about the grueling pace were constant. Vince got annoyed at me and said, “If you can’t handle it, then maybe you should consider doing something else.”

“You told us to speak our minds, so that’s what I’m doing.”

Vince scowled across the room. “You’re the only one complaining,” he said. The unspoken reality in the room was that we were all working so hard for a lot less; Vince’s beloved World Bodybuilding Federation was fast becoming a financial disaster, kept alive only by the proceeds from the WWF.

I looked around and asked, “Okay, everybody, who has a complaint about the schedule?” and raised my hand. Only Hawk and Knobbs raised theirs in support. The rest of the boys stared at their feet. I lowered my hand. All we ever did was complain, but it seems only to one another.

Typically, after the meeting, various wrestlers thanked me for speaking up, explaining that they hadn’t joined in because they were scared to lose their jobs, as they had good reason to be. A lot of the steroid freaks were now missing from the roster, the latest casualty being Davey Boy, who had just that day got a six-week suspension for testing positive for steroids.

That night, while being interviewed by Mean Gene Okerlund, I did one of my first shoot interviews, in which the real Bret Hart talked through the Hitman character. “For all the times my father’s been in my corner and for all the times that he’s backed me up,” I said, “I want to dedicate my IC title win to my dad. Happy seventy-seventh birthday! This is for you!” Bending reality into my storylines was becoming a trademark of mine.

The birthday party was held a few days late, on May 5, so that Owen and I could make it. Ellie was up from Florida to surprise Stu, and they hadn’t seen each other in a while. There was such joy in Stu’s eyes when Ellie walked in.

If the stories were right, back in Tampa, Jim had a serious cocaine problem and was blowing all the money he’d won from his lawsuit, riding around on his brand-new Ninja motorcycle with what was left of his riches stuffed into his fanny pack. An exasperated Ellie had finally left him to his own undoing.

Rumor had it that Vince had big plans for SummerSlam 1992. J.J. Dillon, Vince’s talent coordinator, whose job was basically doing Vince’s dirty work when it came to fining, firing and delivering other bad news, let slip that the pay-per-view was possibly going to be in either Washington, D.C., or London, England. I went to see Vince. If he still wanted me to drop the belt to Shawn Michaels, I had an idea for that match that I wouldn’t even tell him until he promised me that he’d never use it for anyone else. Vince agreed, so I told him about the concept of a ladder match. The more I told him the more he liked it.

Also, if SummerSlam was held in England, I suggested, why didn’t I drop the IC belt to Davey there, and Davey could, in turn, drop it to Shawn shortly thereafter. The pop in the U.K. would be huge because Davey was a homeboy. Vince told me he liked both ideas. At the next TVs, he asked me to show him a ladder match. I could do it with Shawn, I said.

I rang Davey as soon as I left Vince’s office to tell him, but he was so down about his suspension that he showed little enthusiasm. Even though it was three months away, the match with Davey soon became almost all I thought about, piecing it together move by move in my head. I’d kept an old but terrific finish of Leo Burke’s tucked away in my head for just the right moment, and this would be it.