Ariel Helwani has a new interview posted with WWE Hall Of Famer The Undertaker where Taker talks about his career and what he’s doing now with the one man shows. Here are just a few highlights:
On the origins of him doing his one man shows:
“I think what happened was, you know, I didn’t say much for 30 years outside of The Undertaker character. You only got what I was trying to sell on TV. It kind of started when I started promoting The Last Ride, and you know, the A&E thing when I finally lifted the curtain and started talking about those things. Then The Hall of Fame speech, I screwed up and let people know I can actually talk and the WWE was like, ‘Oh, we got another 30 years out of him now.’ That was the genesis of the whole thing, was The Hall of Fame speech.”
On the talent today not protecting their character:
“I think a lot of our talent, not just our talent, but just in general, they don’t understand any concept of protecting a character or even developing a character enough to want to protect it. They go and do something on TV, and then you go to their social media, and they’re completely different. I’m a dinosaur. I am. I mean my mentality is still 20 years ago, but you know, I guess there’s a reason too why I lasted as long as I did. It’s just like, gosh, just live it a little bit. You don’t have to go to the extremes that I did, but man, just kind of be in real life just a little bit. If you’re going to post something, at least kind of match what you’re trying to convince people that you’re this or you’re that.”
On what he likes about today’s wrestling business:
“I love the athleticism now. I guess it’s the video game era. I’ve gotten a lot of heat over saying the guys play video games too much and they don’t pay enough attention to the work, but, what they can do physically is stuff I couldn’t even imagine doing and these guys are all like human video games. Their dedication to taking care of themselves is far better than what my generation did. There’s a lot less bad habits. They consider themselves professional athletes and conduct themselves that way. The evolution of the athleticism is nuts to me. I just watch sometimes and I’m like, ‘How do you even think that? How do you even think to do that?’ I mean, it’s one thing thinking it and then being able to go out and do it is just like, man I’m glad I can throw a punch.’”
On why he switched from The Undertaker gimmick to The American Badass gimmick during the Attitude Era:
“In that time period, as cool as that Undertaker character is or was, I think it would have really struggled in the Attitude Era because you’re kind of handcuffed in what you can do. You’ve got all these guys cutting these incredible promos and everything’s kind of up in the air. I mean, if you think it, you can pretty much say it in the Attitude Era. I always felt like it was going to be really difficult for me to stay in the confines of what The Undertaker did and try and cut promos against The Rock or Stone Cold and all those guys. It was the wild, wild west right then, so I had to take the parameters off so I could hang and be relevant with that whole new fan base that we got all of a sudden out of that.”
Click below to watch the full interview.
If you use any portion of the quotes from this article please credit Ariel Helwani on BT Sport with a h/t to WrestlingNews.co for the transcription.
