Speaker 1: What's up you guys. It is Freddie Brinds Jr. And
Speaker 1: we're back with another episode of Wrestling with Freddie. Last
Speaker 1: week we got pretty deep into the promo classes and
Speaker 1: some of the cool exercises and the successes and failures
Speaker 1: of them. So if you haven't heard that, please go
Speaker 1: back because this is a continuation episode. But this episode
Speaker 1: we'll touch a little bit more on what I thought
Speaker 1: is like the most heartwarming moment I ever had in
Speaker 1: w W. Either weren't many, um, but this time we're
Speaker 1: going into the ice storm. I have built this story up,
Speaker 1: so without further ado, the Ice Storm on Wrestling with Freddie.
Speaker 1: Now stuffing up to the mic. The host of Wrestling
Speaker 1: with Freddie, Freddie Prince Junya. All right, you guys, I'm
Speaker 1: on the highway with a makeup artist from uh Friday
Speaker 1: Night SmackDown back then, even though we shot it on Tuesdays,
Speaker 1: and we're driving I think from Memphis to Atlanta, and
Speaker 1: if that's about a four hour drive then I'm right.
Speaker 1: If not, it was another town. So we're on the
Speaker 1: freeway and we're cruising down and it's late at night,
Speaker 1: probably probably about ten thirty eleven o'clock. At night. We're
Speaker 1: on the highway. It's winter and there's snow on both
Speaker 1: sides of the road, and there are no cars anywhere
Speaker 1: because we left much later than everyone else. Usually you
Speaker 1: would like pass other wrestlers, or wrestlers would pass you.
Speaker 1: This was before I was on the jet. So so
Speaker 1: we're cruising down. That's getting late. We haven't seen anybody,
Speaker 1: and she's getting sleepy. Right, So I'm cruising, but we
Speaker 1: have a map that remember there's no map quest, there
Speaker 1: was no app on a phone that told you I
Speaker 1: have We would print out maps at the end of
Speaker 1: the show, and that's how the rookies like me would
Speaker 1: get from town to town before I was, thank god,
Speaker 1: on the black and Red jet. So we're cruising, I
Speaker 1: have my map. She's getting sleepy and uh. As we're
Speaker 1: driving down the road, it's been about twenty minutes, maybe
Speaker 1: thirty minutes. Like I said, there's snow everywhere. I see
Speaker 1: some smoke down the highway. I'm like, what the hell
Speaker 1: is that? Man? So I'm driving cruising down this curve
Speaker 1: and now I see this like fire and smoke and
Speaker 1: in the middle of the snow, and so I slow
Speaker 1: the car down and I'm almost pulled over at this point,
Speaker 1: and the loss of speed wakes up the makeup artist
Speaker 1: and I go, what the hell is that? And it's
Speaker 1: this gigantic tree that's fallen over. The roots are uprooted,
Speaker 1: and it's on fire, straight, just burning in the middle
Speaker 1: of nowhere. There's nobody around it. There's no cars, there's
Speaker 1: no tire tracks anywhere. It's just a tree that's it
Speaker 1: looks like it's been struck by lightning. There's no lightning,
Speaker 1: at least not to my knowledge, during a snowstorm in
Speaker 1: the South. Maybe maybe I'm wrong. Um hit me up
Speaker 1: on social So I'm slowing down and now I pulled
Speaker 1: the car all the way over and I go, what
Speaker 1: the hell is that? And she goes, I don't know.
Speaker 1: And I go, I'm gonna go check it out. She goes,
Speaker 1: the hell you are? She because it's freezing outside. We're
Speaker 1: going to Atlanta. I go, no, I just want to
Speaker 1: see what it is. She No, you're not going over there.
Speaker 1: Get back in the car. I've opened the door. Get
Speaker 1: back in the car. We're gone. I go, okay, okay, okay,
Speaker 1: I go with that's some crazy ship. She goes, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's crazy ship. Let's go. It's freaky, okay, So I
Speaker 1: closed the door. We're driving, she passes out. Nothing else
Speaker 1: spooky or no Poulter Guy's nothing like that. But the
Speaker 1: road starts getting kind of sketchy, and uh, I have
Speaker 1: the radio on and I'm scanning the A M channels
Speaker 1: because I mean when I mean sketchy, like there's ice
Speaker 1: now on the roads and we're getting we're in Georgia,
Speaker 1: we're getting just outside Atlanta. And on the radio, I
Speaker 1: hear the mayor of Atlanta, and you could check this out,
Speaker 1: you can figure out what year it is, has just
Speaker 1: declared a state of emergency and he's basically closed the
Speaker 1: city because of an ice storm. The roads are unsafe
Speaker 1: to drive on, and everybody is like, not quarantine, but
Speaker 1: it's a curfew, like stay home. You go on the roads,
Speaker 1: you're gonna die. So we're close to the airport. Our
Speaker 1: hotel is at the airport, and uh, I cruise up
Speaker 1: there and I mean we're sliding everywhere like I'm on
Speaker 1: ice skates. Okay, We're not in a four world drive automobile.
Speaker 1: I mean like a like a little four door rental sedan.
Speaker 1: It wasn't built for the snow. So we're at the
Speaker 1: airport because we know the hotel's close to there, and
Speaker 1: I see one of those like rental car transport vans
Speaker 1: and it's running and there's this black dude inside, and
Speaker 1: so I go up to him and I go, hey, man,
Speaker 1: I'm trying to get to my hotel. Can you help
Speaker 1: me out? And he says, well, what's the name of it?
Speaker 1: And I don't remember what it was. It was it's
Speaker 1: the Ice Storm Hotel. Will color you know, the Ice
Speaker 1: Storm Hotel. And he goes, oh, it's down that way.
Speaker 1: You're just gonna make a right and just keep going
Speaker 1: straight and you'll see it. You'll see the big sign.
Speaker 1: It's down a big driveway. I go, okay, So I
Speaker 1: drive down there and we get to the driveway and yeah,
Speaker 1: the driveway goes down, but it's deep and it goes
Speaker 1: straight into the hotel lobby. If I take this car
Speaker 1: down this hill, I'm not stopping. It's gonna go through
Speaker 1: the front of the building. So I drive back to
Speaker 1: the airport guy and I say, hey, man, is there
Speaker 1: is there another hotel around here? Because we couldn't find
Speaker 1: any other ones um or can I stay in the
Speaker 1: can I stay in the airport. I can't get down there.
Speaker 1: And he's just Jamaican dude, and he's like, you stay,
Speaker 1: oh dear, you're gonna die. Mind, you better find a
Speaker 1: way to that hotel. It's like, all right, the airport's closed.
Speaker 1: They're not gonna let me in. So I drive back
Speaker 1: and now we're parked at the top of this hotel's
Speaker 1: driveway and the and the makeup artist is looking at me,
Speaker 1: and I'm looking at her, and she goes, how the
Speaker 1: hell are we gonna get down there? She goes, I
Speaker 1: can't walk down it. It's all it's all ice. I go, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't know, but I'm not gonna have
Speaker 1: like a headline in the paper tomorrow by Freddie Prinz Jr.
Speaker 1: Found with a makeup artist frozen dead in a car.
Speaker 1: I was like, the stories they would ride would share
Speaker 1: my family for the next generation. I said, we're getting
Speaker 1: down this damn hill. So I'm looking around. I don't
Speaker 1: see any way down outside of you know, horrible accident,
Speaker 1: I get sued or dead or or someone else dies. Right,
Speaker 1: So finally, because I'm an idiot, all right, And I'll
Speaker 1: preface this by saying I've done a lot of dumb
Speaker 1: stuff as a kid, and slid down a lot of
Speaker 1: hills I shouldn't have slid down. So I go to
Speaker 1: the trunk. I'll freezing to death, y'all. I'm a California kid.
Speaker 1: My blood is thin. I surf if the waters, you know,
Speaker 1: below seventy I'm wearing a wetsuit. It's how cold as hell.
Speaker 1: I'm not dressed properly. I grabbed my suitcase. I said
Speaker 1: it at the top of the thing. And now I'm
Speaker 1: just staring down the hill at this hotel, at the
Speaker 1: Ice Storm Hotel, and she comes up to me. She
Speaker 1: gets out of the car. She goes, what are you doing?
Speaker 1: And I don't even look at her. I say, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna slide down this hill on my suitcase. She goes, what.
Speaker 1: I go almost slide down my hill and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: slide down the cell on my suitcase, and so are you.
Speaker 1: She goes, I'm not doing that. I said, you're gonna
Speaker 1: get your ass on your suitcase and you're sliding down
Speaker 1: this hill with me. I'm not gonna leave you in
Speaker 1: a car to die. This is the only way down.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it wasn't, but I'm not a genius, so
Speaker 1: this was the best way I could think of. I said, so,
Speaker 1: I'm going down with you, and you're not gonna get hurt.
Speaker 1: Don't worry. I'm certain of it in my head. I'm
Speaker 1: certain of it. Sara, Are you ready? She goes now,
Speaker 1: I go, well, we're going. I said, I'm not going first,
Speaker 1: We're going together. She's she doesn't want to. She gets
Speaker 1: her suitcase. What are the I mean you, we have
Speaker 1: an option. Get down this hill. That's the option. So
Speaker 1: she gets her suitcase. Every word that I'm telling you
Speaker 1: in this story is actual. Well I'm about to go
Speaker 1: t l C. It's actual and factual. Every sorry, every
Speaker 1: word I'm telling you it's a true and every word
Speaker 1: i'm telling you you will not believe. And I'm okay
Speaker 1: with that. So I get on my suitcase. I lay
Speaker 1: it down and I'm sitting on it the way you
Speaker 1: would have sled, and my feet are on the snow
Speaker 1: so that I can have my heels to dig in
Speaker 1: to slow me down. I tell her to do the
Speaker 1: same thing. She sits on the suitcase. I think I
Speaker 1: have like a to me, right, it's like black traveled
Speaker 1: to me. That was big enough to get all your crap,
Speaker 1: but small enough to get in an overhead bind. One
Speaker 1: of those. And she has like a hard case one
Speaker 1: because she's got like makeup and crap. Right, So she
Speaker 1: sits on her suitcase. I sit on mine. I said,
Speaker 1: are you ready? She goes, oh, god, I guess so.
Speaker 1: So we kind of do the scooch like our feet
Speaker 1: are in the snow like a one and it's too
Speaker 1: and three and my feet are in the snow instantly.
Speaker 1: The moment that it gets steep, there's no more snow
Speaker 1: for my feet to dig into. It is hard ice.
Speaker 1: It is a good inch thick, and they're probably not
Speaker 1: an inch thick, but you get the point. Like it is,
Speaker 1: there's no attraction. So I hit terminal velocity within about
Speaker 1: two and a half seconds, and I'm I mean, I'm flying.
Speaker 1: I looked to my right because it's it's too fast
Speaker 1: for me. I looked to my right, and she's bailing out.
Speaker 1: It's too fast, okay, So she bails out to her
Speaker 1: left towards me right. But now she has nothing. Now
Speaker 1: it's just her body. So she's just gonna keep on sliding.
Speaker 1: But it's not with any sort of control. So she's
Speaker 1: going upside down, she's going horizontal, she's going to the left.
Speaker 1: She's on her left hip, she's on her belly, she's
Speaker 1: sliding everywhere. It looks like breaking two electric boogaloo, like
Speaker 1: a deleted scene, right. She breakdancing all the way down
Speaker 1: the sizes and I'm flying, okay, So I get down first.
Speaker 1: She kind of curved off to the side into the
Speaker 1: snow drift by the curb, but she's okay. She gets up,
Speaker 1: she's solid, makeup, good to go, case not destroyed. I
Speaker 1: slide all the way down to basically where the valet
Speaker 1: is and onto the brick entry way of this hotel,
Speaker 1: about four ft away from the double sliding doors. The
Speaker 1: entire staff of the hotel that was in that area
Speaker 1: had been watching us since we were on top of
Speaker 1: the hill, wondering how we were gonna get down. And
Speaker 1: they're literally cheering for me because I literally just did
Speaker 1: my evil kinevil shit. I just went like a hundred
Speaker 1: twenty seven miles per hour done this driveway, and they're cheering,
Speaker 1: and I get up and I'm laughing, and she's laughing.
Speaker 1: Everybody's still in a good mood. And the guy literally
Speaker 1: tells me. He goes, dude, we didn't know how you
Speaker 1: ever going to get down, that was so sick. So
Speaker 1: we go to check in. They don't have her room.
Speaker 1: So she gets my bed and I crashed out on
Speaker 1: the couch and then we wake up and the ice
Speaker 1: they've now salted and done all this stuff. And the
Speaker 1: next day we got on the plane and uh we
Speaker 1: flew back to wife flew to New York City, and
Speaker 1: she flew to wherever, to wherever she lived. But that
Speaker 1: is the ice storm, and that's the fastest that I've
Speaker 1: ever gone and something that wasn't a vehicle or a jet. Oh,
Speaker 1: by the way, I flew in the jet. This isn't
Speaker 1: wrestling related, but the like the dead commander at Nellis
Speaker 1: Air Force Base in Las Vegas was Borto Rican dude,
Speaker 1: and he loved my dad and my buddy who lives
Speaker 1: out there. Ran a construction company and gave him some
Speaker 1: equipment to help him do his house and uh, his
Speaker 1: off his off base house and uh there in Las Vegas,
Speaker 1: I think it was Henderson, Nevada. And so he was
Speaker 1: like he saw a picture of me and Brian, my
Speaker 1: buddy Brian, and he goes oh, you know Freddie Prince Jr.
Speaker 1: Man I loved his dad. And he goes, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's a good friend of mine. And he goes tell
Speaker 1: him if he ever wants to fly in the jet. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's on me. He goes, no cameras, nothing. I was like,
Speaker 1: and so my buddy Brian calls me, and I was like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean like a jet jet? He goes, yeah,
Speaker 1: I go to Oh, dude, I'm in. I drove from
Speaker 1: l A to Las Vegas at night at like eleven
Speaker 1: thirty at night, drove as fast as I could, and uh,
Speaker 1: we have the date. I get there and I think
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna fly on the jet. No, it's like
Speaker 1: an eight hour class on how to breathe because you're
Speaker 1: gonna be pulling so many cheese. And I'm in my twenties.
Speaker 1: I'm cocky. I'm like, whatever, man, I'm half listening, right.
Speaker 1: So they put me in the two seater and forgive me,
Speaker 1: this is over twenty years ago. I don't remember. I
Speaker 1: think it wasn't F sixteen. I don't know what the
Speaker 1: two seater was. It might have even been like a
Speaker 1: F one oh something. I don't know. But we get
Speaker 1: in I've done my like my test, and they make
Speaker 1: you do this like it's like I don't want to
Speaker 1: breathe in the mic because it'll sound weird, but it's
Speaker 1: like labor breathing. Okay, So I get in the jet,
Speaker 1: we take off, just the take off my borderline tap out. Okay,
Speaker 1: this dude, I tap out twice. And this isn't even
Speaker 1: from tricks. Just turns were literally like, he goes, if
Speaker 1: it feels good, you're not breathing. I said, what do
Speaker 1: you mean? He goes if it starts to feel good,
Speaker 1: if you feel high, you're not breathing, right, I said, okay,
Speaker 1: And that basically is in jiu jitsu, like they say
Speaker 1: tap when you when it feels good, that means you're
Speaker 1: about to go to sleep. Twice I had to tap
Speaker 1: because I forgot to breathe, and the breathing is the
Speaker 1: hardest part. At one point in the air, I said,
Speaker 1: how long would it take us to get to l A.
Speaker 1: He said about fifteen minutes, and I literally was just like,
Speaker 1: oh my god. So anyway, I like going fast, we
Speaker 1: fly back, I go back and uh, and now I'm
Speaker 1: back ready to go to work. Talking events about the promo,
Speaker 1: class who I like, who I don't. And the storyline
Speaker 1: going on at the time was the Nexus, and this
Speaker 1: was Wade Barrett and uh and Michael's something I can't remember,
Speaker 1: but it was a big group that came up to
Speaker 1: like take on kind of like how the Shield took on,
Speaker 1: like the Current Stars. This was they were taking on
Speaker 1: that here's current Stars. So they were going after Randy,
Speaker 1: who was a heel, and John who was a baby face,
Speaker 1: and John sold big for like horror movie cells, right,
Speaker 1: because they were really trying to get this group over.
Speaker 1: They thought they had a couple of solid bangers in there. Right.
Speaker 1: So I'm doing my promo class and I have a
Speaker 1: lot of these guys and and uh and girls in
Speaker 1: there now, and we're getting to use like really big rooms,
Speaker 1: like sometimes even the cafeteria because we have so many
Speaker 1: people in there. And I got these Nexus cats, right,
Speaker 1: And there was this one dude named Fred and y'all
Speaker 1: if you watch then then he wrestled under the name
Speaker 1: Darren Young. His real name is Fred Rosser and uh
Speaker 1: he's now out of out of the closet, and and
Speaker 1: everyone knows that that Fred is a gay wrestler. And
Speaker 1: I think was the first one to come out while
Speaker 1: under the employee of w w E, but certainly not
Speaker 1: the first gay wrestler in the w w E. If
Speaker 1: you know about Pat Patterson, everyone in the company knew
Speaker 1: Pat was. He was very open about it um and
Speaker 1: everyone embraced him. So at this point in time, though
Speaker 1: Fred was not out, he was a young wrestler. He
Speaker 1: was coming up and uh so now I think he's
Speaker 1: a new japan wrestling now. So if you're a big
Speaker 1: wrestling fan, he's built from stone, looks gray eight solid us, right,
Speaker 1: and we just call him black John Cena because he
Speaker 1: looked just like John Cena. But if John was black,
Speaker 1: even his face, it was crazy. You put him side
Speaker 1: by side and it looked like the exact same dude.
Speaker 1: I think John even cut a promo on it, uh,
Speaker 1: in like an actual storyline where he's like, maybe we
Speaker 1: did have the same father, but I hate you anyway.
Speaker 1: I'm fighting for justice, so uh start doing the promo
Speaker 1: classes and it's a lot of you, you going against
Speaker 1: me because Vince likes that, right, So it's we're going
Speaker 1: to have a fight, and you're gonna give me a
Speaker 1: reason to watch like that. If you remember the dog story.
Speaker 1: You're a dog, and you're a dog. Now make me
Speaker 1: want to watch you fight. So a more productive way
Speaker 1: to accomplish that is to give them a reason to fight,
Speaker 1: like I did with Kia Stevens and with Beth Phoenix. Um.
Speaker 1: If you remember from last week's episode, so William Regal
Speaker 1: also known as Stephen Regal, is and was one of
Speaker 1: the single most helpful human beings while I worked at
Speaker 1: that company. He would warn me about people. He would
Speaker 1: help show me what wrestlers strengths were and to write
Speaker 1: my promos to fit the type of wrestler they were,
Speaker 1: because I was not doing that. Um, you don't want
Speaker 1: to write a luchad or like a big man. You
Speaker 1: don't want to write a big man like a high flyer.
Speaker 1: There's a different attitude. When you're seven ft tall. You
Speaker 1: don't have to say as much. Your seven ft tall
Speaker 1: I kind of equated to Darth Vader. You don't have
Speaker 1: to give Darth Vader a lot of a lot of dialogue.
Speaker 1: And you notice he only moves when he has to.
Speaker 1: There's no wasted movement with Darth Vader, which was the
Speaker 1: same crap I would hear in the production, not crap
Speaker 1: this is good crap um. The same stuff I would
Speaker 1: hear in the production meetings when they would talk about,
Speaker 1: you know, tell these guys, the big guys, to slow down.
Speaker 1: Less is more And there's something I know a lot
Speaker 1: of people disagree with that, but I tend to agree
Speaker 1: with it. It's more. It's what made Frankenstein so scary,
Speaker 1: right is It's why Pepper lepu we were amazed with him, like,
Speaker 1: how could someone as slow always catch always catch him? Right?
Speaker 1: So it may be dated, but with the big guys,
Speaker 1: they don't want them, you know, flying around everywhere. Vince
Speaker 1: doesn't want his guys and his girls getting hurt, which
Speaker 1: is why that w W E style is less exciting
Speaker 1: because he feels it prevents injuries. So Stephen has been
Speaker 1: getting me hip to it. And he asks me if
Speaker 1: he can come in and uh and cut a promo
Speaker 1: and I'm like, yeah, man, you want me to pick something?
Speaker 1: He goes, oh no, no, no, I have something. I said,
Speaker 1: all right, dude. So he comes in and I it
Speaker 1: was either the Saint Crispin's Day from Henry the Five,
Speaker 1: which is no joke, or it was from Hamlet, and
Speaker 1: I feel like it was from Hamlet. Otherwise. I don't
Speaker 1: know why I remember this line, but I feel like
Speaker 1: I remember Stephen saying the world is nothing more to
Speaker 1: me but a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors, and
Speaker 1: that I know for sure is from Hamlet, so I
Speaker 1: think it was Hamlet. So he cuts this, and then
Speaker 1: he's trying to explain why he chose this to all
Speaker 1: these young wrestlers, and he said he was talking about
Speaker 1: the iambic pentameter, which is sort of the rhythm and
Speaker 1: cadence required by by Shakespeare. He's trying to explain that
Speaker 1: you can tell a story whether you speak English or not.
Speaker 1: There are a couple of Japanese wrestlers in the room
Speaker 1: at the time. You can communist cad to story whether
Speaker 1: you speak Spanish better than English, the same way he communed,
Speaker 1: those communicated those feelings from that monologue to everyone in there,
Speaker 1: and everyone knew exactly what he was saying. When you
Speaker 1: say someone, this world has nothing more to me but
Speaker 1: a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors, I'm communicating a
Speaker 1: message to you with a whole bunch of words that
Speaker 1: neither one of us will ever use again in our
Speaker 1: entire life. But you know exactly what I'm talking about.
Speaker 1: You go, whoa, Freddie's a little depressed, ok you do?
Speaker 1: And that message has been communicated beautifully, right, So I
Speaker 1: think Funaki was in there. And by the way, I
Speaker 1: got a great Funaki story. Kung should we do a
Speaker 1: Japanese side quest? Should we do a side quest? All right,
Speaker 1: we're doing a side quest? Okay. So it's a SmackDown.
Speaker 1: It's over and Shane Hurricane Helms and some of the
Speaker 1: writers and my buddy Angelo the writer, We're all having
Speaker 1: like a beer at the hotel, and you know, after
Speaker 1: a couple in, Shane goes, man, I wish we could
Speaker 1: get I wish we'd get Funaki over again, and Angela
Speaker 1: was like, yeah, well, let's let's think of something. He goes, oh,
Speaker 1: then they wouldn't buy anything we do. And he goes
Speaker 1: to we could think of something. And this is all
Speaker 1: credit to Shane. Okay, I think he even wrote the
Speaker 1: song that our truth saying to him later on, but
Speaker 1: he goes, what about what if it was kung fu
Speaker 1: KNOCKI and all the writers are drunk and they're like,
Speaker 1: wait what He goes, yeah, like kung fu? He we
Speaker 1: could sing the song Everybody loves Kong Fu Knack that
Speaker 1: dude can't drink some sacking and he had like this
Speaker 1: whole freestyle jam that they all fell in love with.
Speaker 1: And I was in the writer's room one day and
Speaker 1: they're pitching this and I'm like, yo, wait what And
Speaker 1: Shane comes in and they go, Shane, what about Kung Funaki?
Speaker 1: And Shane just looks at the board and he sees
Speaker 1: how we booked and he goes, that's pretty fucking funny,
Speaker 1: and he just walked out of the room. And that's
Speaker 1: when we gave Funaki the Daniel Son Crane kick, and
Speaker 1: m VP sold it better than Johnny Lawrence did in
Speaker 1: that movie Are You Kinda May Come Home Baby? Sound
Speaker 1: for the Wind? So anyway, that's the Japanese side quest.
Speaker 1: So um, we're back in promo class and Sir William
Speaker 1: Regal is in there. Gotta call him sir, even if
Speaker 1: he's not a real knight, he should be Darren. Young
Speaker 1: Fred gets up and he wants to He wants to
Speaker 1: do a promo scenario then cutting on each other, and
Speaker 1: so Regal says, I'll stop my friend, and he says,
Speaker 1: this is I'll never get this man. He says, you
Speaker 1: don't belong here and you're going to quit, And Rosser
Speaker 1: comes back and he goes, don't and he does repetition.
Speaker 1: He goes, I don't belong here. Do you think I'm
Speaker 1: gonna quit? And Rigo just looks back at him and
Speaker 1: he goes, I've seen it a million times before, my friend,
Speaker 1: you're going to quit and you know you don't belong
Speaker 1: And Fred gets this like emotion and cuts like the
Speaker 1: promo of It's a shame I didn't film any of these.
Speaker 1: He cuts like the promo of the Universe. And he's
Speaker 1: straight up his fist ball up and you can hear
Speaker 1: his knuckles crack. And we've already established there's no there's
Speaker 1: no punching, right, and Fred didn't come off the type
Speaker 1: to do it. And there's his eyes start to well
Speaker 1: up and I'm sitting there watching and regals so cool man.
Speaker 1: He's like a gun slinger in the wild West. He's
Speaker 1: gonna let you draw first and still be fastinough like
Speaker 1: he didn't even blink. But this is the guy that
Speaker 1: smashed on Goldberg to let people know like what time
Speaker 1: it was back in the day, right, Like he does
Speaker 1: not care but he was a good giving man at
Speaker 1: this point in his career. He probably was his whole career,
Speaker 1: but in this moment especially, and Darren Young just screams
Speaker 1: and tears come down his face. At the same time,
Speaker 1: it's like the like Denzel Washington does the perfect tear
Speaker 1: right like He'll hold it for a whole scene and
Speaker 1: then drop it out right at the end, and everyone's like, oh,
Speaker 1: like that's the next level technique. This was just wrong.
Speaker 1: Came out and he screams, I do, my lord, and
Speaker 1: then there's like a ninety second promo of the sacrifice,
Speaker 1: the fear that this that that, And while he's saying this,
Speaker 1: I shit you not. I literally was like, Yo, Fred's gay.
Speaker 1: You could just I mean, I'd work in Hollywood, man.
Speaker 1: I know a lot of people to this day that
Speaker 1: aren't comfortable with who they are based on the reaction
Speaker 1: that that society is gonna have. Right. So, and I'm
Speaker 1: not trying to say this to like, oh, look, how
Speaker 1: smart I knew, Like I was like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: Fred Fred's gay. And I didn't say anything. I never did,
Speaker 1: and he's out now, so it's not a secret. And
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone else knew except maybe William who
Speaker 1: kind of had this like glint in his eye, and
Speaker 1: as as Darren Young. Although this was all Fred Rosser
Speaker 1: finished his promo. You know how like British people, like
Speaker 1: when you do something sick in America, we'd give you
Speaker 1: that head nod right, like people do memes of it,
Speaker 1: like Robert Redford as Grizzly Adams or whatever. They're like
Speaker 1: nod in his head. Well, British people do this smile
Speaker 1: and it's like a half only half their face works,
Speaker 1: and it's this rye sort of half smile. And Rigo
Speaker 1: just gives in this that smile already hits him with
Speaker 1: it and he goes and uh. And Roster finishes his
Speaker 1: promo with I'll Never Quit, and Rico just looks at him.
Speaker 1: He says, my mistake, lab, maybe you do belong And
Speaker 1: everybody was, I mean balling man balling and Fred was
Speaker 1: to and Regal gives him this big hug man and
Speaker 1: you can see like Rosster squeeze him hard like that
Speaker 1: there was hurt and pain in there. And right after
Speaker 1: that we wrote this promo for him. And you'll forgive
Speaker 1: me if I don't remember what show it was for
Speaker 1: it I believe it was an x T, like he
Speaker 1: got moved down to an x T when it was
Speaker 1: like rookies and someone maybe or maybe it was right
Speaker 1: before that, and uh, and he gave him this promo
Speaker 1: where he didn't feel like he should even be there.
Speaker 1: And I said, do you remember when you screamed I
Speaker 1: do belong? He said yeah. I said, I wanted it
Speaker 1: wasn't my promo, someone else's, but he was struggling with it.
Speaker 1: I said, I want you to feel that when you
Speaker 1: say I wrestled John Cena and he goes, yeah, okay, okay.
Speaker 1: And so he did it, and he hit it about
Speaker 1: like eight percent of where I'd hoped it got, but
Speaker 1: he still got the point across. And he's like, but
Speaker 1: it was more of an arrogant take because it needed
Speaker 1: to be. He's like, all, I wrestle John Seen and
Speaker 1: he got kind of a little choked up on it,
Speaker 1: and uh, he was able to kind of bring which
Speaker 1: was a real honest moment to TV. Now. I could
Speaker 1: relate to this because early in my acting class, my
Speaker 1: acting coach gave me this scene. He used to let
Speaker 1: me pick right, but I would always pick really easy stuff,
Speaker 1: and he really challenged me, and I don't remember the
Speaker 1: name of this play, and I don't want to remember
Speaker 1: the name of the play. So even if I say
Speaker 1: words from it that you remember, do not hit me
Speaker 1: up at at real F p j R. On Twitter,
Speaker 1: and do not hit me up on Instagram because I
Speaker 1: have deleted this ship from my mind because it broke
Speaker 1: me in pieces. So my butt hole act I love,
Speaker 1: I love my acting coach, but this was just Oh
Speaker 1: he was right. I was wrong, but man, I hated
Speaker 1: him for this. So he gives me this scene and
Speaker 1: my characters crying right away, And that was my biggest
Speaker 1: fear was I don't I don't know if I can
Speaker 1: do that. I don't know if I can cry. I
Speaker 1: don't know if I can open up like that. Earlier
Speaker 1: in my career, I manufactured every performance I did until
Speaker 1: I was probably almost thirty years old, and it took
Speaker 1: me that long to figure out acting. I'd never I
Speaker 1: didn't start until I was eighteen, so I was learning
Speaker 1: on the job and everything came real, real fast. I
Speaker 1: was not ready and not prepared, so I withdrew and
Speaker 1: pulled back, which is what I always do. And uh,
Speaker 1: when I was thirty, I finally like this actor Gil
Speaker 1: Bellows just I was gonna do this movie. This is
Speaker 1: another side quest, sorry Alexis, but I was doing a
Speaker 1: play in London and he came to watch it because
Speaker 1: I was gonna do a movie that he wrote. And uh,
Speaker 1: we went and had dinner afterwards. My cousin was with me,
Speaker 1: and this dude like broke down my whole performance and
Speaker 1: nailed me on every bad habit I had. And I'm
Speaker 1: sitting there like everything is. Dude is saying it's like
Speaker 1: dead on my cousin. I can feel it's like getting mad,
Speaker 1: like he's not. He's getting pissed at the guy. But
Speaker 1: I'm kind of like feeding off the energy. And we
Speaker 1: finally said our good nights, and my cousin Joe was like, now,
Speaker 1: I thought you're gonna knock him out. I was like, no, man,
Speaker 1: Like I feel like this guy just kind of unlocks him.
Speaker 1: The next night was the greatest performance that I ever
Speaker 1: had in anything I ever did in my entire career.
Speaker 1: It was a Kenneth Lonergan play called This Is Our Youth,
Speaker 1: and uh, it was the first time I ever like
Speaker 1: broke down organically in her performance. So I knew exactly.
Speaker 1: I share that story because I knew exactly what Fred
Speaker 1: was going through. The scene was about my dad with
Speaker 1: the character's dad, but I made it about my dad
Speaker 1: and the moment I allowed myself to do that and
Speaker 1: allow a real feeling that I hated at the time.
Speaker 1: I'm forty five. Now I have kids, UM, so it
Speaker 1: doesn't carry that weight that it used to. Now it's
Speaker 1: just respect and love, um, like on his birthday and stuff,
Speaker 1: I'll miss him. But outside of that, like, I've adjusted
Speaker 1: well to it. But then I applied so much real
Speaker 1: hurt and pain. And my character is supposed to accidentally
Speaker 1: knock over this dish full of cocaine and UH and
Speaker 1: manitol and he freaks out. And my choice was I
Speaker 1: got so mad at myself because I was so stupid
Speaker 1: that I smashed the plate on the table and the
Speaker 1: plate cracked open and it split my left hand open
Speaker 1: and I was bleeding everywhere and I didn't even notice
Speaker 1: I was bleeding until the end of the show. Like
Speaker 1: that's how into the moment I was. And I have
Speaker 1: Gil Bellows to think for that, And so to see
Speaker 1: someone else let something reel out like that, it just
Speaker 1: slap the holy hell out of me. Now that's kind
Speaker 1: of deep and heavy. So we're gonna end on a
Speaker 1: high note, and I'm going to talk about one of
Speaker 1: the funniest promo classes that that we ever had, or
Speaker 1: not maybe scariest, and has to do with Nattie night
Speaker 1: Heart and Harry Smith, Um, who was the son of
Speaker 1: a legend. So I loved him very much because you
Speaker 1: have very big shoes to fill. I was the son
Speaker 1: of a legend, so I have very big shoes to fill,
Speaker 1: and so I connected with Harry a lot, and I
Speaker 1: really wanted to get him in TJ over UM and
Speaker 1: I worked. I worked hard to do it. But we
Speaker 1: just you know, I have plenty of failures. We can
Speaker 1: talk about those two is just the success. Success ones
Speaker 1: are usually cooler and funnier stories. But um, I failed
Speaker 1: those boys. I never I never got over that I failed.
Speaker 1: The USOS to tag team wrestling is tough, man. I
Speaker 1: remember Vince, I was working so hard on building up
Speaker 1: a tag team division and Ben said, Freddie, I gotta
Speaker 1: pay four guys for one fucking match, and I kind
Speaker 1: of went, oh, I had never looked at it like that,
Speaker 1: And again, it's show business, and I was in charge
Speaker 1: of of the Cologne Brothers, I named Primo for crying
Speaker 1: out loud. Um, that was my name. Um, and uh,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like changed my perspective on thing ings
Speaker 1: and change the way I approach storylines. I couldn't pitch
Speaker 1: for for as much anymore. But anyway, or in promo
Speaker 1: class or another side quest completed, you just leveled up. Um.
Speaker 1: And if you make it through the whole podcast, you
Speaker 1: get all kinds of experience. It's great. Um. So we uh,
Speaker 1: we're in promo class and you guys all remember the rules.
Speaker 1: There's no makeout sessions allowed and there's no beating each
Speaker 1: other up. That seems they seem like reasonable requests as
Speaker 1: far as like an acting coach and and the talent
Speaker 1: in that room go. And I feel like everyone should
Speaker 1: be able to follow those rules. Um, but apparently not.
Speaker 1: And it was little Nattie Nidheart who decided to break it.
Speaker 1: And so her and Harry are in there, and I've
Speaker 1: already told you, like what the state of women's wrestling
Speaker 1: was back then, and we're gonna get into the transition, um,
Speaker 1: which was the Bella's And I have no responsibility and
Speaker 1: take no credit for the women's division. But uh I
Speaker 1: did help bring those girls up, and it was those
Speaker 1: girls who really opened Vince's eyes with their show Total Divas,
Speaker 1: which we'll get into in another episode. Um, and how
Speaker 1: they kind of revolutionized and changed matches from five minutes
Speaker 1: to all of a sudden having multiple commercial breaks, which
Speaker 1: is just so sick. But anyway, we're still in the
Speaker 1: time where the ladies got five minutes, and if they
Speaker 1: had a pay per view match, it usually got clipped
Speaker 1: to about seven to give to give the boys more time.
Speaker 1: So uh as Freebird would say, So they're in there
Speaker 1: and it's a repetition and they're going back and forth
Speaker 1: about you know, I don't even remember. It was like
Speaker 1: you ain't ship, No, you ain't ship. Whatever it was, right,
Speaker 1: they're going back and forth. Michael Tarver was the other
Speaker 1: NEXTUS guy. I was trying to think of that early on.
Speaker 1: He had a sick promo where he just wrapped and
Speaker 1: it was amazing. By the way, there's another side quest. Um.
Speaker 1: So they're in there and they're going back and forth,
Speaker 1: but they're getting closer and closer, and everyone knows that
Speaker 1: they're no chance of any like smooch. He smooched with
Speaker 1: those two because t J's her man like forever um.
Speaker 1: So they're getting closer and closer, and I'm like, this
Speaker 1: is this is weird. I don't know where this is going.
Speaker 1: And at this point we were doing points, so if
Speaker 1: you changed up the sentence, the other person got a point.
Speaker 1: But it wasn't over until someone got three points, right,
Speaker 1: so they change it up and uh. He says something
Speaker 1: to Natty about like that's why you are where you
Speaker 1: are and I am where I am and Natty just
Speaker 1: I mean it looked Richard Bryor had a joke where
Speaker 1: he talks about he wanted to be a boxer and
Speaker 1: he got hit with a hook and he said I
Speaker 1: saw his hands start down in Mississippi. It gains speed
Speaker 1: through Texas. Now I'm watching Natty throw this right hand
Speaker 1: and it's like a John Wi movie. Man, it's full
Speaker 1: slow motion. I'm pretty sure a bunch of doves like
Speaker 1: took flight behind it as it traveled through the air.
Speaker 1: And Harry's hands are down at his hide and he's
Speaker 1: sticking his chin out like what And Naddy's hook comes
Speaker 1: all the way through open hand hook right like like
Speaker 1: the way, Uh, if you saw The Godfather talked about
Speaker 1: how he used to open hand slap people off the stools.
Speaker 1: It's like a Godfather slap what bow And it sounds
Speaker 1: like two four two by four smashing together to simulate
Speaker 1: a gun shot. And everyone in the class, including me,
Speaker 1: at the same time, goes. And then I jump out
Speaker 1: of my seat before I even let the breath out,
Speaker 1: and instead of breathing out, I just go what dof?
Speaker 1: And I curse. Right, I'm trying to control myself, but
Speaker 1: it was a big f bomb. And I'm not mad.
Speaker 1: I'm scared because I mean, it's the loudest shot I've
Speaker 1: ever heard of my life. And Harry looks at me,
Speaker 1: was put a freaking smile on his face. He goes, bro,
Speaker 1: it's so good, like nothing happened. And you know, look,
Speaker 1: I'm an actor. Actors are soft as hell, man. Like
Speaker 1: I've seen dudes not be able to work for two
Speaker 1: weeks just because their feelings got hurt. So this is
Speaker 1: all new to me, man, But this dude took the
Speaker 1: shot of I'm telling you, to this day, I've never
Speaker 1: heard anyone get hit that hard in my life. I'm
Speaker 1: including UFC kicks where you here like an Edison Barboza
Speaker 1: foot slap on that one tall skinny dude's face. Back
Speaker 1: in the day, I was like, Wow, that ain't ship
Speaker 1: compared to this Canadian right hand that literally game speed
Speaker 1: through Alberta and then just made contact in whatever city
Speaker 1: we were in. It was we gotta have Natty on
Speaker 1: the show one day as a guest. I just gotta
Speaker 1: know what she was thinking when he did that, because
Speaker 1: in her eyes, he deserved it. And I ain't gonna
Speaker 1: argue with the girl. So that said, guys made it
Speaker 1: through like five Cyde quests today. So you guys are
Speaker 1: the real winners. And I'll speak with you guys all
Speaker 1: on the next w u F Wrestling with Freddie. This
Speaker 1: has been a production of I Heart Radio's Michael Tura
Speaker 1: podcast Network. For more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit
Speaker 1: the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite show. M h m hmm.