Andrew Lutzke
Presented by Hannibal TV
Barry Darsow starts us off by explaining that he grew up only blocks from Rick Rude. Tom Zenk played baseball with Darsow and eventually they all met Curt Hennig in the area as well.
The Road Warriors, Rude and Darsow all worked as bouncers at the same bar. Former wrestler and future promoter Eddie Sharkey was a bartender and he used his connections to train and break in the four of them.
Rick Rude was a legit tough guy. Animal and Darsow would fight if provoked, but Rude was always game to throw fists.
The Ultimate Warrior pissed Rude off one night and got whacked in the locker room.
Ole Anderson got wind of the young foursome and he plucked several of them to work for him in Atlanta.
Anderson’s role as owner and booker made him a target for a lot of heat from the locker room.
Darsow worked as “Man Mountain” Darsow. Anderson sent Darsow to Bill Watts to develop.
Mid-South had the guys work upwards of 9 matches a week, so you learned how to work in a hurry.
Watts turned him into a Communist and Darsow became a star as he worked with all the top talent in the area.
Darsow worked with Jim Neidhart as Russian sympathizers in Florida. Ric Flair came through as NWA World champ and took note of Darsow’s skills and gimmick. He put in the word to Jim Crockett and Dusty Rhodes that Darsow should join the Koloffs in JCP.
Bill Eadie now joins Darsow for the interview.
Vince McMahon was searching for someone to play his version of the Road Warriors. Randy Colley was given one of the spots and he found Eadie to play his partner. Eadie was not sure about giving up his Japan gig for a WWF run.
Colley had been perennial jabroni Moondog Rex, the fans recognized him and “Demolition” did not get over. Eadie called Darsow and asked if he wanted to come in.
JCP had just shorted Darsow on a payday, so he was willing to leave there for a chance to at stardom.
Darsow took some time off to train and recuperate before the team came together. Eadie worked his contract out in Japan in the meanwhile.
Eadie implies working with the Rougeau Brothers was tough because they wanted to sate their egos and were not as easy going with setting up a match as one would like.
Demolition asked for Mr. Fuji to replace Johnny V as their manager as V liked to cut hokey promos and they wanted to be a blood and guts team.
Fuji would aid them in how to lay out matches and he protected them from being ribbed by others because Fuji was feared for his vicious ribbing himself and no one wanted to trigger his torment.
The Hart Foundation were both good workers and the fact that the Anvil was powerful and Bret Hart was technical made for a perfect team and excellent opponents.
Both men think the “Montreal Screwjob” was possibly fake. Bret, Shawn Michaels and Vince McMahon are among the best workers ever, so they could definitely create some probable doubt for the fans and the wrestlers. The WWF was able to bring back Hart and make money off the heat.
Andre the Giant was the godfather to Eadie’s kids.
Eadie claims Andre drank 101 beers in one sitting to show off for the Japanese press.
Dick Murdoch constantly tried to out drink Andre when they toured Japan together.
Haku and the Barbarian were among the toughest men in the business.
A bar patron once made a racial remark to Haku, so Haku bit the man’s nose off.
Eadie ate too much seafood due to taking so many trips to Japan. His body finally reacted poorly and Eadie had a serious medical issue. His blood pressure dropped and his pulse vanished. Ax had an out of body experience and watched as his wife freaked out over his body. He then watched the paramedics attempt to revive him. He eventually went back into his body and he came back to life.
Eadie’s doctor suggested a book for him to read about out of body experiences. Some stories were suggesting Hell was real, some were peaceful – suggesting Heaven may be real. Eadie read the book on a plane where he ended up sitting next to the author’s husband in an eerie coincidence.
The Rockers were great to work with as they could do anything.
The Road Warriors and Demolition struggled to find any chemistry when they worked together. Reading between Eadie’s words, he seems to imply that the Warriors wouldn’t sell for them, and thus they couldn’t get any proper heat.
Eadie was offered an office position, but then the WWF jerked him around and he ended up just going back to Japan and working.
The WWF gave the Demolition masks and stopped pushing them. Once the WWF killed their heat off, they gave both Crush and Smash a few months off and repackaged them.
Darsow quit the WWF once he realized that the Repo Man was never going to turn babyface and give him a chance to cash in on some merchandising money.
Ric Flair was booking WCW and wanted Darsow to come in with a truck driver gimmick. Arn Anderson came up with the “Blacktop Bully” name.
Mike Graham was working as an agent for WCW and he told Dustin Rhodes and Darsow to bleed for their Uncensored ’95 “King of the Road” match. Bischoff called him up and fired him a few days later. Graham and Rhodes were fired as well. Bischoff tried to be nice and told Darsow he wanted him to return someday. Eventually Darsow returned with a $150,000 a year deal to do jobs on TV.
Eadie laughs at WCW’s stupidity at giving so many guys these big contracts and then not using them very often. He believes WCW should have stayed in the south and worked their big towns instead of trying to be a national force like the WWF.
Andre, Dino Bravo and Gino Brito owned the Montreal territory and gave Eadie a big push when he was a youngster in the 70’s.
Bravo was a good man. Eadie wonders why the WWF took Rick Martel and Bravo and made them heels, and then tried to make the Monteal fans boo them.
Bob Backlund was hard to get a good match of. He lacked charisma and always seemed uncomfortable on the mic.
Babyfaces need to sell to get a match over. If Andre could give the heels heat by selling for them, anyone can sell.
Final thoughts: I enjoyed the content, as both men are well spoken and believable. I couldn’t help but feel a little weird having spent an hour of my life staring at a sixty-something year old man in makeup and underwear.
