May 25, 2022 • 29 mins
When I first started writing for WWE, I had the privilege of working with Lord William Regal. His mere presence commanded respect in and out of the locker room. Now he is a part of All Elite Wrestling (AEW), where he manages the Blackpool Combat Club stable.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
M M. What's up, everybody. Welcome back to another episode
of Wrestling with Freddy, and I'm so glad to have
you here on another Wednesday or whatever day you got
to listen to this on. If you're in your car,
if you're at work, I won't tell your boss. If
you're in your car, I hope the traffic is not
too too horribly awful. If you're watching old wrestling matches
(00:23):
while you're listening to this, shout out to YouTube. And
if you're just tuning in for the first time, you
can catch all our previous episodes at the same spot
you're listening to this one right now. And uh, come
with us on the journey. Welcome to the Federation, and
welcome Wrestling with Freddy. Now stuffing up to the mic,
the host of Wrestling with Freddy, Freddie Prince tune. All right,
(00:48):
you guys, we're gonna do another deep dive. I really
enjoyed the Dolf Ziggler deep dive. I like going in
and re examining the careers of people I was lucky
enough to work with while I was there and see
them grow despite speed bumps, or see them grow even
with the greatest push of all time. It's just it's
fun to dive into that. So we're doing it again,
(01:09):
only this time we're doing it with an old school
legend Ziggler and old school he just old. Oh. Anyway,
today's episode, I'm gonna deep dive on someone who affected
me deeply while I worked there. And if you're familiar
with this show, we've talked about him a little bit
in some of the acting classes. Today's episode is all
(01:30):
about Mr William Regal. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, we're
going British today. We're going to be very proper. There
will be no cursing on this episode, although the Brits
can curse. Boy, But this was a guy I learned
a lot more from than he realized when I was there.
I think he's heard since then because I've I've told
enough people. But I love this guy and I want
(01:53):
to share a couple Well, first I want to share
the reasons why, and then as a kid, and then
why I learned to respect him as a rational. Oh
but we're side questing right away before we get into
any of this, so check this out. You guys know
that I love wrestling very much and I'm and I'm
not sensitive about it, but I'm very protective about it.
When I first took the job at w w E,
(02:13):
I said, look, I'm not trying to to change the business.
I'm not trying to do anything like that. This was
the second time I went there. I said, let me
just help build a wall and and help protect it.
So I get very protective of wrestling sometimes, and when
I see people aren't taking it seriously, it's bothersome to me.
I've been asked on social media, Hey, would you go
(02:34):
back and write for w w E, And the answer
is always no. But the reasoning and this is the
most honest I I can possibly be. It's a job
that requires one hundred percent and if you're not well,
and this is my opinion, this is what worked for
me when I was able to give ad and not
focus on family or friends or anything else. I was
(02:57):
really really good when I When I wasn't able to
do that, it just wasn't where it deserved to be.
There are other people. They're depending on your ideas and
your words sometimes if they're not able to come up
with their own. And if you're half assent, how we
already cursed you, shouldn't you shouldn't be working with them.
(03:20):
So it's I those are the things I get protective about.
And so I got this weird email from the friendly
people at Twitch. And for those who don't know what twitches,
it's a streaming service that started with I think it
was called justin TV, and it was kids playing video
games and you could watch them while they were playing
(03:41):
a game. And people like to watch for various reasons.
Maybe the person is just sick at the game and
getting headshots on everybody and never dined. They're getting like
forty kills and two deaths or sometimes even no deaths,
and if you're a kid or grown up that's into
video games, that might be exciting for you to watch.
Sometimes they were just great storytellers or trash talkers. They
(04:02):
would they're they're The way they would express themselves when
they would die or get kills really got them a
lot of popularity. Sometimes people just thought they look cool
or thought they were hot, and we're like, yeo, I'm
just gonna follow this first. I don't like video games,
but they're talking to me, so that's cool. I get
to interact, and that was a big thing. There was
an interaction there between the audience. You could read their chat,
(04:25):
and when it first came out, it blew people away.
So I attempted to work with which a long long
time ago, and we started a game channel there where
I would play video games and talk to to fans
and and uh and tell stories kind of like what
we're doing now. And it transitioned into what really my
love was, which was tabletop stuff. And I pitched him
(04:47):
a bunch of like tabletop stuff, video game stuff, all
kinds of things, and one of them was a wrestling podcast,
so to speak, a wrestling show. I think I called it.
I don't. I don't even think I knew what a
podcast was then. So I hit them with all these ideas.
They rejected everything categorically and then let me know that
(05:07):
I was not the talent that they were looking to
work with at Twitch. I guess I was too old, right,
I guess, or I don't know what it was. They
didn't give me a reason, but they let me know
that that, uh, I wouldn't be receiving the support that
that I was looking for. So I was like, all right,
I'm not the kind of guy who's gonna ask the
same girl out twice if she said no, So I
(05:29):
left started my own thing. Did my own thing well.
Twitch emailed me and get this, not only did did
they ask if I would be interested in doing a
podcast for them, as they called it, which clearly they
didn't know I was already doing one. But the offer
was hysterical. They're they're so not committed to the wrestling business.
(05:50):
They said, we would love to offer you affod to
eight or eight to ten weeks trial run of a
wrestling podcast, payment based off your numbers. Right, And I'm
sitting there reading this, I'm like, this is like a
record deal in two thousand five, where record companies forgot
how to build stars and or didn't have employees that
could build them anymore. So you had to have your
(06:12):
own following on social media and that was the only
way you could get signed, whether you were good or not.
So I emailed this this nice guy back and he
for sure did not work there when I was there,
and I started the message with that. I said, hey, man, um,
I'm definitely not the right guy for this. I said,
I already have a podcast and we're doing quite well.
(06:33):
Thank you very much to all of you who are
who listen and give us that love. That also made
it feel extra special, and that's because of you guys,
not me. Um, But I wrote, I said, I'm definitely
not the right guy for this. You know I tried
this once before with with you guys, and uh, I
didn't have much success. And to put in the offer
you're only gonna give it eight to ten weeks, let's
(06:54):
me know that you guys aren't committed, and for you
not to be fully committed and me to be as
committed as I if you guys suddenly don't like the
show because of expectations that you didn't inform me of
weren't met, or because you're simply not as big a fan,
which you clearly aren't. If it's eight to ten weeks
of wrestling as I am, then all of a sudden,
the show has gone. I can't take it with me,
(07:15):
and then you damage me in my brand. And then
I followed it, and I thought this was important, and
I know I'm putting them on blast, but this is
just called constructive criticism. This isn't hating on anyone. I said,
I'm sure, and I'm sure I don't know any of them,
but I'm sure they're out there. I wrote, I'm sure,
you have dozens of streamers right now for Twitch that
(07:37):
do this exact thing that you're looking for, and if
you just gave them a little bit of direction, because
all shows need a little direction, or we can get
carried away with ourselves like my side quists. They need
a little direction, a little support, and some financing. And
I think you guys could get a great show with
great numbers. But you should look internally before you start
(07:58):
looking externally for talent. That's just a cool way to
run a company. I said. I know you're not in
charge of the business model and the business structure over there,
but always look internally first. Otherwise the person that comes
in is gonna be hated by all the people that
already exist there, and they'll start campaigning to for you
not to listen to that show. That's not the way
you want to do things when your business depends on
(08:20):
the artist. It was awesome to get to tell them no.
The reason I get to tell them no is because
of y'all listening. So this is more just an ode
to to the federation. I appreciate you guys very much.
You guys and gals, thank you for tuning in each week.
(08:43):
So I'm working at w w E, I'm writing, and
I meet William Regal, and I'm so impressed to meet
this man, because when I was a kid, I was
not the Goldberg guy. I did not like Goldberg. I
didn't like the fact that he was running through everybody.
I didn't like the fact that legends, and not maybe
not legends, but people who I grew up loving to watch,
(09:05):
we're just getting mowed down. And it just seemed like
everything they had done in the past didn't matter. And
for those of you who don't know, Goldberg was like
an x NFL guy who came in and got the
single greatest push of all time. He literally, I think
it was like a hundred and thirty seven and oh
or a hundred thirty two, some crazy number of victories,
(09:27):
and no matter who it was, you just knew they
were getting smashed. So the matches to me, weren't exciting,
and a lot of guys that I felt were better
wrestlers and who deserved a good run and opportunity, we're
just getting owned and smashed. Enter William Regal. Behind the scenes,
there were a lot of wrestlers who did not like
the way Bill Goldberg were protecting his partner in there
(09:52):
was not always his first priority, and I believe it
was simply because he was new and didn't necessarily know how.
It wasn't like I don't leave. I've never heard anyway
that he was maliciously trying to hurt people. It's just
he didn't have a lot of experience, and he wrestled stiff,
which is the term they use, which means harder than
you should, although some guys prefer that nowadays, especially in Japan.
(10:15):
William Regal supposed to come in and he's supposed to
lose to this man. For whatever reason, he decides not today.
Not today. I'm gonna I'm gonna do the work I'm
supposed to do, and the person who's supposed to win
this match is going to win the match. But there
will be a lesson before I go down for a
(10:37):
one to three, and damn was there. I would like
all of you go on to YouTube and type William Regal,
although it might have been Steven Regal back then, but
either way, William Regal versus Goldberg w c W and
you will see what I saw when it actually happened.
(10:58):
And my mind is just getting blown because not only
is he giving this man a lesson? He is winning
the match. He is he is working Goldberg all around
the ring, tossing him, throwing him, swinging him, walking and
running him, just schooling this man until the time is up.
(11:20):
I don't know. Maybe the ref was like, what are
you doing? Bro? Are you crazy? What the you gotta
take the fall? I don't know what happened. Again. I
would love to have him on and hear this story,
if he could break it down. It's it's it's long
enough now that I feel like it's okay to talk about. Eventually,
he does the work he's supposed to do, and Bill
Goldberg goes over one to three and all my friends
(11:43):
get together that night at Dion's Pizza in Albuquerque, New Mexico,
and it's all we're talking about. And my friends that
were hip to the internet were like, Oh, you don't
even know, dude. Oh my gosh. People are freaking out.
People are tripping out of there. William, he might get fired.
What's gonna Everybody was like, you know, speculating and gossiping
the way little old ladies at the grocery store or
(12:04):
at the beauty salon in the eighties would right it was.
It was this magical moment for all of us. So
here I am getting to meet him and he knows
I'm a writer there and he's wanting to talk to
me about story, something that we could get him on
on TV. And he was so self aware, humble and
(12:29):
confident all at the same time. And I remember him saying,
I'm not looking for a for a you know, a
massive investment of time on television. But I believe there's
some young men that I can help and we can
put a story behind it and make the match means
something as opposed to just a match where I lose
that doesn't help me or him. And no one had
(12:53):
said that to me before, no one, no no one
in the in the brass had said it. No one.
And I don't just mean about Regal, I just meant
the way he broke this down. And so I worked hard.
It was it was inspiring to me, and I I
remember I was writing stories and this was when like
(13:14):
n X t IF, it was like a show on
sci Fi and they had mentors and and such, and
we were trying to work stories into there. And I
just kept hitting brick wall after brick wall, and I
and I didn't know. I didn't know why. I still
don't know to this day. And I would talk to
him and said, hey, man, my story didn't make TV
(13:35):
for you. I'm sorry. Can we you know, can we
talk about something else next week? And so every three
weeks or so we I would listen to his ideas.
I would try to process some stuff, put some stuff
on the table, and I could never add. Like most writers,
this wasn't just with with Regal. This was with most talent,
and with most writers, it was very difficult not to
write a long term story to get one on TV,
(13:58):
and then to maintain it less it was a top
dog right. It was easy to write edge Dolf stuff
because that was over the World Heavyweight Championship. It was
much more difficult to write a low key storyline, even
one n x T and oh my gosh, I was there.
Here's another side quest. I was there when Loki one.
I went back because I wanted to write specifically for him,
(14:21):
and they knew that, and then they debted his whole story,
his whole storyline. It was a storyline that I wrote
and changed it to him challenging instead of for the
world title for the Inner Continental, which made no sense.
If you have a golden ticket to cash in for
any title you choose, why would why wouldn't you choose
the main one? To quote the late great Scott Hall,
(14:43):
nobody gets in that business to aim for the middle.
And that literally was the reason I walked away the
second time, because I thought that storyline was so ridiculous.
But back on track, it was difficult to maintain consistency
and even to get the lesser characters if there wasn't
a title in both. It was just so so difficult.
It was so so difficult. So as sort of a
(15:07):
way for him to meet me halfway, he started putting
over my promo class that the acting class that we've
talked about a bunch and I mentioned in I mentioned
in there in in one episode and if you haven't
heard it, please go back and jump in. He had
this promo where we did repetition back and forth. You're
(15:29):
locked into the dialogue that one other person says. And
Fred Rosser was there, who was wrestling either in Japan
or on the indies somewhere right now, and he's he's
an openly gay wrestler, and William Regal is explaining to
him why he doesn't belong in the w w E.
And I remember this so specifically now doing this podcast.
(15:53):
It's so this part is so ingrained in my brain.
Rosser at the end of of William Regals promo, which
was challenging Fred, which he was supposed to do. Fred
explodes and I mean explodes, and he screams out I
belong and there's tears in his eyes. And I remember
(16:20):
looking at this dude and being like, where is that
coming from. This is a guy, I mean looks like
black John Cena. He's a good looking I mean, we
joked that he was the black John Cena. John even
cracked a joke on Raw that his dad might have
stepped out because this dude looks so much like him.
He was a good looking dude, he had the body,
he could he could work at least to the to
(16:41):
the to the lame person's eye. So I'm sitting there
in that like what what where is that? Because it
was not active, something came out, something came out, and
that was the real moment that he came out. He
just didn't say the words. I've worked in Hollywood long enough,
I've seen enough people who are afraid to come out
(17:04):
because they're afraid men won't believe them as a leading
man in a movie anymore, and they fear more the
studios won't believe that, so they keep their stuff private.
And it's only in certain moments where that insecurity, that
fear comes out. Because we can't just live a lie
our whole life, right like, it has to escape sometimes.
(17:25):
That's why I always say, just get it all out there.
My mom used to say, people are gonna find a
reason reason to hate you for something, whether it's your
fault or not. So just like what you like and
don't worry about all that other stuff. So I'm seeing
(17:47):
this huge moment, and I don't even think Regal knows
that he's partially responsible for that, that sort of release
of pain and fear. And I remember Fred held his
head so high in his check was out, and he
just looked so proud, you know, like say one more,
say I don't belong here, sad, I wish you would,
(18:07):
And Rigo just looked at him and smiled and nodded.
He said, well, perhaps I'm wrong, and everyone just it
was dead silent, and they just erupted, erupted right, and
I went up and I thanked him afterwards, and I
just remember being like, man, that was like the most honesty,
the most truth that anybody's thrown out there since his
(18:28):
since his class started. And he asked me, this is
so crazy. He didn't have to ask. He's William Regal.
Would you mind? Would you mind? He has this great
British accent? Would you mind terribly if if next week
I came in and Pops did a monologue from Shakespeare?
And I'm like, wait, what you know? You know Shakespeare?
(18:49):
You're you're supposed to be the villain, like you punch
guys when they're not looking you. What do you mean
you know? Shaky? He's like, oh yeah, and he starts
talking to me about various monologues from Shakespeare. When I
was in acting class and auditioning to get agents, you know,
we would pick monologues and I didn't know anything about
Broadway or off Broadway or anything. I knew zero theater,
(19:14):
so I thought all the monologues just came from Shakespeare. Right.
So that's all I worked on from age eighteen to
like nineteen and a half, and I had a good
six or seven of them on the lock. Right. So
this dude comes in the very next week and I
haven't said anything. There's probably eighteen to twenty young wrestlers
(19:36):
in there. Natty nine Heart's in there, Um, Harry Smith,
that's a bulldogs boy, the whole t J was there,
Eve Torres, Gracie was there, Molina was there, Beth Phoenix,
like we we were squad squad deep at that point.
He comes in there and he kind of looks at
me and I said, hey, RIEGO wants to go up.
(19:57):
He's gonna he's gonna cut of promo and my man
and stands up there and he's dressed night. You know,
he's dressed well. And he looks out at everyone and
before he even speaks, he just takes in the room
and he gives eye contact to every single wrestler in there,
and it's just he's taking his time and he's showing
(20:19):
them like when you're in the ring. Take it in.
Allow your confidence to make silence a comfortable place that something.
Actors here a lot right silence, Allow that to be
comfortable with silence, or like Uma Thurman says in Pulp Fiction,
I'll cuss, but you know what she said. Everybody's seen
the movie. So he takes it all in and he's
(20:42):
like smiling at them, right, so it's a pleasant moment.
And then he hits him and he says, this is
from I think the Tempest. He hits him with you fools,
I and my fellows are ministers of fate. The elements
of whom your swords are tempered may as well wound
the ould winds or with bemock that stabs kill, the
(21:04):
still closing waters as diminished one down. That's in my plume,
and it's this ill he doesn't better than me. I'm
not kid of the Brander, but yeah, that's Arials. That's
Arials monologue from the Tempest. And he's talking smack to
these guys that come at him right and basically saying, like, yo,
(21:25):
those swords that are that you have are are are
built from the things I control. You can't. You can't
touch me. Like swinging that is like swinging your sword
in water. It'll hurt the water long before it takes
one feather off my hat is like the American translation basically,
and it goes on and on and on. I don't
remember the whole thing I got. I got the first
(21:47):
deadlines of every monologue. That's it, and everyone is I
mean Stone sober as a judge, dead silent. It's like
listening to the greatest closing argument in a courtroom ever.
He has captivated me and every single man and woman
(22:08):
in that room. Nobody's breathing. And then he stops and
he nods us in and he says thank you very much,
so quietly and humbly, and he sits down. He sits
down like a student. Then in amongst the other students
and everybody's like, no, screw that, and they all stand
up there clapping and they're like, oh my god. And
(22:28):
I'm like, the first one up. I'm blown away. I
love when people can communicate a language I don't understand
and make me understand it. Does that make sense? Shakespeare
can be very complex. It's such an old, beautiful way
of speaking, and we've butchered the English language with words
(22:49):
like dude, gnarly, sick and I'm guilty of these things.
But it can be hard to understand if you're just
reading it off a page. But when somebody who it
connects with starts to execute those lines for you. It
was sort of, I said Kenneth Brown earlier, sort of
when Kenneth Branna played Gilderoy Lockhart in Harry Potter. Right,
(23:09):
you're sitting there and you're like, uh yeah, no one
else should be doing that ever again. And if it's
in a play, the guy who has to follow that
is gonna suck. And when he executed this promo, like
I legit said, don't worry, no one else has to
do a promo today. We'll just do scene work. And
I just had stuff from like previous weeks that maybe
(23:30):
didn't work, and we would work on those segments and
either rewrite them or if I felt they were well
written by some of the other people, sometimes even Vince,
we would get another shot at it. Right, so the
next time they got something that was phrased and worded
that way, they would have more experience executing it, feel
a little bit more confident about it. It was all
about confidence for that. So now let's talk about the
(23:52):
present day. William Regal he's left w W E or
was let go? He was basically the character that was
running an XT when it was the Black and Gold brand,
and it had a lot of love and respect and
then behind the scenes, I don't know if he was
running it. A lot of people say that that was
that was triple h and I don't I don't know
(24:13):
like the inside stuff or anything like that, but I'm
sure his his opinion was respected and listened to. So
he debuts in a e W a few months later
in the middle of this conflict between John Moxley and
Daniel Bryant, and I love Daniel Bryant. He can somehow
(24:34):
pull off this smirky heel character without being the typical here.
It's it's just unique. There's something special about him when
he goes hell. Everybody loves him as a baby face. Yes, yes, yes,
that's what got on the championship, but I always preferred
him as this sort of I don't even know how
to describe the type of heel he is. It's just
this confident screw you No, it's I don't even know
(24:59):
he could. I'm not as good as him, so I
can't explain it. But he had this great conflict with Moxley,
and they both have connections to William Regal from when
they were young wrestlers coming up and training and learning
the ropes. He had an influence in both their lives.
All the smart fans in the audience know this. All
the fans in the audience at this a e W
(25:21):
show love William Regal the way I love William Regal,
because everyone except Bill Goldberg loves William Regal. This man
comes out, the crowd goes crazy. He gets in the
middle of the ring and he's basically berating both men,
why are you fighting each other when you if you
work together, you could take over this entire company. And
(25:44):
they both kind of get in his face, or Moxley does,
and Regal slaps him right across it like the way
a father in the sixties slaps his son, and Moxley
takes it because it's like a relationship of father in
the sixties. And now Daniel Bryant's smirking and laughing like
you don't talk snack to the boss, bro Bow. Regal
(26:06):
smacks in and his reaction is twice as good as Moxley's,
and all of a sudden, the crowd is just they
love They love this because he's a real dude, a
credible dude, a e W still growing it and it
to have his face there is just this feel good, yes,
we're moving in the right direction kind of thing. No
(26:28):
one's ever said a bad thing about Regal, and if
they have it's time. It's them issue, not a Hymn issue,
or it was early in his career as as a
veteran and behind the scenes producer. He is a gem
of a human being. And I know people who know
(26:48):
him to this day, who have worked with him to
this day, and he is a gem of a human beings.
So if you ever hear anything bad about William Regal,
you let me know. You let me know, and I
will handle it and would love to. We've had Look,
we've had Tony conn on the show. We got to
reach out to Tony. We gotta get Regal on the show.
I would love to get his reaction to some of this.
(27:10):
Maybe he remembers it differently. I don't know. Oh, here's
here's the side quest. This is the stupidest side quest ever.
All right. I was telling you, I know wrestlers that
that no Regal and and they speak highly of him,
and I pitched this idea. So I want to preface
this by saying this was a joke. All right. I
(27:32):
texted my buddy, I said, A do you think if
I did a bunch of steroids and human growth hormone
and up my calorie intake to like forty five to
five thousand calories a day, but only did legs? Would
only my legs get huge? And follow up question, how
(27:55):
much would you pay to watch that guy wrestle? So
these are see serious. Even though it's a joke, there's
serious questions. Would my legs get super jacked like Wiley
Kyote in the road Runner cartoon when he takes the
leg vitamins vitamins just for your legs and his legs
got hella swolt And my finisher would just be a
drop kick, just a regular drop kick, but you have
(28:18):
but my legs are so buffed you would have to
sell it like it was the sickest wrestling move that's
ever been hit. Ever, you could call me King quads,
Baby King quads. So that's what I'm gonna do, you guys,
I'm not joking. I'm deadly serious. I'm gonna take everything,
the growths, the steroids, the guerrillas, sweats, the I'll rub
(28:39):
deer antlers all over my quads every night before I
go to sleep, and they'll grow exponentially at night, and
I'll become King Quads. Now, granted, there may not be
a brand out there promotion willing to hire me, but
I'll create my own damn brand and the drop Kick
is making a comeback people. That's the dumbest story I've
ever told. And I've never really into an episode on
(29:00):
sort of a huh kind of feeling, and I feel
like we've done a great job of that today. So
thank you for listening, and we're gonna do an episode
that's totally dedicated to y'all, which have made this podcast
so much fun and I'm so proud of it. I
really am. I'm so proud of it, and I know
we're doing good when weirdos out there who don't give
(29:21):
a crap about wrestling are like, hey, do you want
to do something about wrestling? Yes, I do. I'm already
doing it, and I'm doing it with you guys the Federation.
Thanks y'all. Peace. This has been a production of I
Hearts Michael podcast Network. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,
visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows. H
M M. What's up, everybody. Welcome back to another episode
of Wrestling with Freddy, and I'm so glad to have
you here on another Wednesday or whatever day you got
to listen to this on. If you're in your car,
if you're at work, I won't tell your boss. If
you're in your car, I hope the traffic is not
too too horribly awful. If you're watching old wrestling matches
(00:23):
while you're listening to this, shout out to YouTube. And
if you're just tuning in for the first time, you
can catch all our previous episodes at the same spot
you're listening to this one right now. And uh, come
with us on the journey. Welcome to the Federation, and
welcome Wrestling with Freddy. Now stuffing up to the mic,
the host of Wrestling with Freddy, Freddie Prince tune. All right,
(00:48):
you guys, we're gonna do another deep dive. I really
enjoyed the Dolf Ziggler deep dive. I like going in
and re examining the careers of people I was lucky
enough to work with while I was there and see
them grow despite speed bumps, or see them grow even
with the greatest push of all time. It's just it's
fun to dive into that. So we're doing it again,
(01:09):
only this time we're doing it with an old school
legend Ziggler and old school he just old. Oh. Anyway,
today's episode, I'm gonna deep dive on someone who affected
me deeply while I worked there. And if you're familiar
with this show, we've talked about him a little bit
in some of the acting classes. Today's episode is all
(01:30):
about Mr William Regal. That's right, ladies and gentlemen, we're
going British today. We're going to be very proper. There
will be no cursing on this episode, although the Brits
can curse. Boy, But this was a guy I learned
a lot more from than he realized when I was there.
I think he's heard since then because I've I've told
enough people. But I love this guy and I want
(01:53):
to share a couple Well, first I want to share
the reasons why, and then as a kid, and then
why I learned to respect him as a rational. Oh
but we're side questing right away before we get into
any of this, so check this out. You guys know
that I love wrestling very much and I'm and I'm
not sensitive about it, but I'm very protective about it.
When I first took the job at w w E,
(02:13):
I said, look, I'm not trying to to change the business.
I'm not trying to do anything like that. This was
the second time I went there. I said, let me
just help build a wall and and help protect it.
So I get very protective of wrestling sometimes, and when
I see people aren't taking it seriously, it's bothersome to me.
I've been asked on social media, Hey, would you go
(02:34):
back and write for w w E, And the answer
is always no. But the reasoning and this is the
most honest I I can possibly be. It's a job
that requires one hundred percent and if you're not well,
and this is my opinion, this is what worked for
me when I was able to give ad and not
focus on family or friends or anything else. I was
(02:57):
really really good when I When I wasn't able to
do that, it just wasn't where it deserved to be.
There are other people. They're depending on your ideas and
your words sometimes if they're not able to come up
with their own. And if you're half assent, how we
already cursed you, shouldn't you shouldn't be working with them.
(03:20):
So it's I those are the things I get protective about.
And so I got this weird email from the friendly
people at Twitch. And for those who don't know what twitches,
it's a streaming service that started with I think it
was called justin TV, and it was kids playing video
games and you could watch them while they were playing
(03:41):
a game. And people like to watch for various reasons.
Maybe the person is just sick at the game and
getting headshots on everybody and never dined. They're getting like
forty kills and two deaths or sometimes even no deaths,
and if you're a kid or grown up that's into
video games, that might be exciting for you to watch.
Sometimes they were just great storytellers or trash talkers. They
(04:02):
would they're they're The way they would express themselves when
they would die or get kills really got them a
lot of popularity. Sometimes people just thought they look cool
or thought they were hot, and we're like, yeo, I'm
just gonna follow this first. I don't like video games,
but they're talking to me, so that's cool. I get
to interact, and that was a big thing. There was
an interaction there between the audience. You could read their chat,
(04:25):
and when it first came out, it blew people away.
So I attempted to work with which a long long
time ago, and we started a game channel there where
I would play video games and talk to to fans
and and uh and tell stories kind of like what
we're doing now. And it transitioned into what really my
love was, which was tabletop stuff. And I pitched him
(04:47):
a bunch of like tabletop stuff, video game stuff, all
kinds of things, and one of them was a wrestling podcast,
so to speak, a wrestling show. I think I called it.
I don't. I don't even think I knew what a
podcast was then. So I hit them with all these ideas.
They rejected everything categorically and then let me know that
(05:07):
I was not the talent that they were looking to
work with at Twitch. I guess I was too old, right,
I guess, or I don't know what it was. They
didn't give me a reason, but they let me know
that that, uh, I wouldn't be receiving the support that
that I was looking for. So I was like, all right,
I'm not the kind of guy who's gonna ask the
same girl out twice if she said no, So I
(05:29):
left started my own thing. Did my own thing well.
Twitch emailed me and get this, not only did did
they ask if I would be interested in doing a
podcast for them, as they called it, which clearly they
didn't know I was already doing one. But the offer
was hysterical. They're they're so not committed to the wrestling business.
(05:50):
They said, we would love to offer you affod to
eight or eight to ten weeks trial run of a
wrestling podcast, payment based off your numbers. Right, And I'm
sitting there reading this, I'm like, this is like a
record deal in two thousand five, where record companies forgot
how to build stars and or didn't have employees that
could build them anymore. So you had to have your
(06:12):
own following on social media and that was the only
way you could get signed, whether you were good or not.
So I emailed this this nice guy back and he
for sure did not work there when I was there,
and I started the message with that. I said, hey, man, um,
I'm definitely not the right guy for this. I said,
I already have a podcast and we're doing quite well.
(06:33):
Thank you very much to all of you who are
who listen and give us that love. That also made
it feel extra special, and that's because of you guys,
not me. Um, But I wrote, I said, I'm definitely
not the right guy for this. You know I tried
this once before with with you guys, and uh, I
didn't have much success. And to put in the offer
you're only gonna give it eight to ten weeks, let's
(06:54):
me know that you guys aren't committed, and for you
not to be fully committed and me to be as
committed as I if you guys suddenly don't like the
show because of expectations that you didn't inform me of
weren't met, or because you're simply not as big a fan,
which you clearly aren't. If it's eight to ten weeks
of wrestling as I am, then all of a sudden,
the show has gone. I can't take it with me,
(07:15):
and then you damage me in my brand. And then
I followed it, and I thought this was important, and
I know I'm putting them on blast, but this is
just called constructive criticism. This isn't hating on anyone. I said,
I'm sure, and I'm sure I don't know any of them,
but I'm sure they're out there. I wrote, I'm sure,
you have dozens of streamers right now for Twitch that
(07:37):
do this exact thing that you're looking for, and if
you just gave them a little bit of direction, because
all shows need a little direction, or we can get
carried away with ourselves like my side quists. They need
a little direction, a little support, and some financing. And
I think you guys could get a great show with
great numbers. But you should look internally before you start
(07:58):
looking externally for talent. That's just a cool way to
run a company. I said. I know you're not in
charge of the business model and the business structure over there,
but always look internally first. Otherwise the person that comes
in is gonna be hated by all the people that
already exist there, and they'll start campaigning to for you
not to listen to that show. That's not the way
you want to do things when your business depends on
(08:20):
the artist. It was awesome to get to tell them no.
The reason I get to tell them no is because
of y'all listening. So this is more just an ode
to to the federation. I appreciate you guys very much.
You guys and gals, thank you for tuning in each week.
(08:43):
So I'm working at w w E, I'm writing, and
I meet William Regal, and I'm so impressed to meet
this man, because when I was a kid, I was
not the Goldberg guy. I did not like Goldberg. I
didn't like the fact that he was running through everybody.
I didn't like the fact that legends, and not maybe
not legends, but people who I grew up loving to watch,
(09:05):
we're just getting mowed down. And it just seemed like
everything they had done in the past didn't matter. And
for those of you who don't know, Goldberg was like
an x NFL guy who came in and got the
single greatest push of all time. He literally, I think
it was like a hundred and thirty seven and oh
or a hundred thirty two, some crazy number of victories,
(09:27):
and no matter who it was, you just knew they
were getting smashed. So the matches to me, weren't exciting,
and a lot of guys that I felt were better
wrestlers and who deserved a good run and opportunity, we're
just getting owned and smashed. Enter William Regal. Behind the scenes,
there were a lot of wrestlers who did not like
the way Bill Goldberg were protecting his partner in there
(09:52):
was not always his first priority, and I believe it
was simply because he was new and didn't necessarily know how.
It wasn't like I don't leave. I've never heard anyway
that he was maliciously trying to hurt people. It's just
he didn't have a lot of experience, and he wrestled stiff,
which is the term they use, which means harder than
you should, although some guys prefer that nowadays, especially in Japan.
(10:15):
William Regal supposed to come in and he's supposed to
lose to this man. For whatever reason, he decides not today.
Not today. I'm gonna I'm gonna do the work I'm
supposed to do, and the person who's supposed to win
this match is going to win the match. But there
will be a lesson before I go down for a
(10:37):
one to three, and damn was there. I would like
all of you go on to YouTube and type William Regal,
although it might have been Steven Regal back then, but
either way, William Regal versus Goldberg w c W and
you will see what I saw when it actually happened.
(10:58):
And my mind is just getting blown because not only
is he giving this man a lesson? He is winning
the match. He is he is working Goldberg all around
the ring, tossing him, throwing him, swinging him, walking and
running him, just schooling this man until the time is up.
(11:20):
I don't know. Maybe the ref was like, what are
you doing? Bro? Are you crazy? What the you gotta
take the fall? I don't know what happened. Again. I
would love to have him on and hear this story,
if he could break it down. It's it's it's long
enough now that I feel like it's okay to talk about. Eventually,
he does the work he's supposed to do, and Bill
Goldberg goes over one to three and all my friends
(11:43):
get together that night at Dion's Pizza in Albuquerque, New Mexico,
and it's all we're talking about. And my friends that
were hip to the internet were like, Oh, you don't
even know, dude. Oh my gosh. People are freaking out.
People are tripping out of there. William, he might get fired.
What's gonna Everybody was like, you know, speculating and gossiping
the way little old ladies at the grocery store or
(12:04):
at the beauty salon in the eighties would right it was.
It was this magical moment for all of us. So
here I am getting to meet him and he knows
I'm a writer there and he's wanting to talk to
me about story, something that we could get him on
on TV. And he was so self aware, humble and
(12:29):
confident all at the same time. And I remember him saying,
I'm not looking for a for a you know, a
massive investment of time on television. But I believe there's
some young men that I can help and we can
put a story behind it and make the match means
something as opposed to just a match where I lose
that doesn't help me or him. And no one had
(12:53):
said that to me before, no one, no no one
in the in the brass had said it. No one.
And I don't just mean about Regal, I just meant
the way he broke this down. And so I worked hard.
It was it was inspiring to me, and I I
remember I was writing stories and this was when like
(13:14):
n X t IF, it was like a show on
sci Fi and they had mentors and and such, and
we were trying to work stories into there. And I
just kept hitting brick wall after brick wall, and I
and I didn't know. I didn't know why. I still
don't know to this day. And I would talk to
him and said, hey, man, my story didn't make TV
(13:35):
for you. I'm sorry. Can we you know, can we
talk about something else next week? And so every three
weeks or so we I would listen to his ideas.
I would try to process some stuff, put some stuff
on the table, and I could never add. Like most writers,
this wasn't just with with Regal. This was with most talent,
and with most writers, it was very difficult not to
write a long term story to get one on TV,
(13:58):
and then to maintain it less it was a top
dog right. It was easy to write edge Dolf stuff
because that was over the World Heavyweight Championship. It was
much more difficult to write a low key storyline, even
one n x T and oh my gosh, I was there.
Here's another side quest. I was there when Loki one.
I went back because I wanted to write specifically for him,
(14:21):
and they knew that, and then they debted his whole story,
his whole storyline. It was a storyline that I wrote
and changed it to him challenging instead of for the
world title for the Inner Continental, which made no sense.
If you have a golden ticket to cash in for
any title you choose, why would why wouldn't you choose
the main one? To quote the late great Scott Hall,
(14:43):
nobody gets in that business to aim for the middle.
And that literally was the reason I walked away the
second time, because I thought that storyline was so ridiculous.
But back on track, it was difficult to maintain consistency
and even to get the lesser characters if there wasn't
a title in both. It was just so so difficult.
It was so so difficult. So as sort of a
(15:07):
way for him to meet me halfway, he started putting
over my promo class that the acting class that we've
talked about a bunch and I mentioned in I mentioned
in there in in one episode and if you haven't
heard it, please go back and jump in. He had
this promo where we did repetition back and forth. You're
(15:29):
locked into the dialogue that one other person says. And
Fred Rosser was there, who was wrestling either in Japan
or on the indies somewhere right now, and he's he's
an openly gay wrestler, and William Regal is explaining to
him why he doesn't belong in the w w E.
And I remember this so specifically now doing this podcast.
(15:53):
It's so this part is so ingrained in my brain.
Rosser at the end of of William Regals promo, which
was challenging Fred, which he was supposed to do. Fred
explodes and I mean explodes, and he screams out I
belong and there's tears in his eyes. And I remember
(16:20):
looking at this dude and being like, where is that
coming from. This is a guy, I mean looks like
black John Cena. He's a good looking I mean, we
joked that he was the black John Cena. John even
cracked a joke on Raw that his dad might have
stepped out because this dude looks so much like him.
He was a good looking dude, he had the body,
he could he could work at least to the to
(16:41):
the to the lame person's eye. So I'm sitting there
in that like what what where is that? Because it
was not active, something came out, something came out, and
that was the real moment that he came out. He
just didn't say the words. I've worked in Hollywood long enough,
I've seen enough people who are afraid to come out
(17:04):
because they're afraid men won't believe them as a leading
man in a movie anymore, and they fear more the
studios won't believe that, so they keep their stuff private.
And it's only in certain moments where that insecurity, that
fear comes out. Because we can't just live a lie
our whole life, right like, it has to escape sometimes.
(17:25):
That's why I always say, just get it all out there.
My mom used to say, people are gonna find a
reason reason to hate you for something, whether it's your
fault or not. So just like what you like and
don't worry about all that other stuff. So I'm seeing
(17:47):
this huge moment, and I don't even think Regal knows
that he's partially responsible for that, that sort of release
of pain and fear. And I remember Fred held his
head so high in his check was out, and he
just looked so proud, you know, like say one more,
say I don't belong here, sad, I wish you would,
(18:07):
And Rigo just looked at him and smiled and nodded.
He said, well, perhaps I'm wrong, and everyone just it
was dead silent, and they just erupted, erupted right, and
I went up and I thanked him afterwards, and I
just remember being like, man, that was like the most honesty,
the most truth that anybody's thrown out there since his
(18:28):
since his class started. And he asked me, this is
so crazy. He didn't have to ask. He's William Regal.
Would you mind? Would you mind? He has this great
British accent? Would you mind terribly if if next week
I came in and Pops did a monologue from Shakespeare?
And I'm like, wait, what you know? You know Shakespeare?
(18:49):
You're you're supposed to be the villain, like you punch
guys when they're not looking you. What do you mean
you know? Shaky? He's like, oh yeah, and he starts
talking to me about various monologues from Shakespeare. When I
was in acting class and auditioning to get agents, you know,
we would pick monologues and I didn't know anything about
Broadway or off Broadway or anything. I knew zero theater,
(19:14):
so I thought all the monologues just came from Shakespeare. Right.
So that's all I worked on from age eighteen to
like nineteen and a half, and I had a good
six or seven of them on the lock. Right. So
this dude comes in the very next week and I
haven't said anything. There's probably eighteen to twenty young wrestlers
(19:36):
in there. Natty nine Heart's in there, Um, Harry Smith,
that's a bulldogs boy, the whole t J was there,
Eve Torres, Gracie was there, Molina was there, Beth Phoenix,
like we we were squad squad deep at that point.
He comes in there and he kind of looks at
me and I said, hey, RIEGO wants to go up.
(19:57):
He's gonna he's gonna cut of promo and my man
and stands up there and he's dressed night. You know,
he's dressed well. And he looks out at everyone and
before he even speaks, he just takes in the room
and he gives eye contact to every single wrestler in there,
and it's just he's taking his time and he's showing
(20:19):
them like when you're in the ring. Take it in.
Allow your confidence to make silence a comfortable place that something.
Actors here a lot right silence, Allow that to be
comfortable with silence, or like Uma Thurman says in Pulp Fiction,
I'll cuss, but you know what she said. Everybody's seen
the movie. So he takes it all in and he's
(20:42):
like smiling at them, right, so it's a pleasant moment.
And then he hits him and he says, this is
from I think the Tempest. He hits him with you fools,
I and my fellows are ministers of fate. The elements
of whom your swords are tempered may as well wound
the ould winds or with bemock that stabs kill, the
(21:04):
still closing waters as diminished one down. That's in my plume,
and it's this ill he doesn't better than me. I'm
not kid of the Brander, but yeah, that's Arials. That's
Arials monologue from the Tempest. And he's talking smack to
these guys that come at him right and basically saying, like, yo,
(21:25):
those swords that are that you have are are are
built from the things I control. You can't. You can't
touch me. Like swinging that is like swinging your sword
in water. It'll hurt the water long before it takes
one feather off my hat is like the American translation basically,
and it goes on and on and on. I don't
remember the whole thing I got. I got the first
(21:47):
deadlines of every monologue. That's it, and everyone is I
mean Stone sober as a judge, dead silent. It's like
listening to the greatest closing argument in a courtroom ever.
He has captivated me and every single man and woman
(22:08):
in that room. Nobody's breathing. And then he stops and
he nods us in and he says thank you very much,
so quietly and humbly, and he sits down. He sits
down like a student. Then in amongst the other students
and everybody's like, no, screw that, and they all stand
up there clapping and they're like, oh my god. And
(22:28):
I'm like, the first one up. I'm blown away. I
love when people can communicate a language I don't understand
and make me understand it. Does that make sense? Shakespeare
can be very complex. It's such an old, beautiful way
of speaking, and we've butchered the English language with words
(22:49):
like dude, gnarly, sick and I'm guilty of these things.
But it can be hard to understand if you're just
reading it off a page. But when somebody who it
connects with starts to execute those lines for you. It
was sort of, I said Kenneth Brown earlier, sort of
when Kenneth Branna played Gilderoy Lockhart in Harry Potter. Right,
(23:09):
you're sitting there and you're like, uh yeah, no one
else should be doing that ever again. And if it's
in a play, the guy who has to follow that
is gonna suck. And when he executed this promo, like
I legit said, don't worry, no one else has to
do a promo today. We'll just do scene work. And
I just had stuff from like previous weeks that maybe
(23:30):
didn't work, and we would work on those segments and
either rewrite them or if I felt they were well
written by some of the other people, sometimes even Vince,
we would get another shot at it. Right, so the
next time they got something that was phrased and worded
that way, they would have more experience executing it, feel
a little bit more confident about it. It was all
about confidence for that. So now let's talk about the
(23:52):
present day. William Regal he's left w W E or
was let go? He was basically the character that was
running an XT when it was the Black and Gold brand,
and it had a lot of love and respect and
then behind the scenes, I don't know if he was
running it. A lot of people say that that was
that was triple h and I don't I don't know
(24:13):
like the inside stuff or anything like that, but I'm
sure his his opinion was respected and listened to. So
he debuts in a e W a few months later
in the middle of this conflict between John Moxley and
Daniel Bryant, and I love Daniel Bryant. He can somehow
(24:34):
pull off this smirky heel character without being the typical here.
It's it's just unique. There's something special about him when
he goes hell. Everybody loves him as a baby face. Yes, yes, yes,
that's what got on the championship, but I always preferred
him as this sort of I don't even know how
to describe the type of heel he is. It's just
this confident screw you No, it's I don't even know
(24:59):
he could. I'm not as good as him, so I
can't explain it. But he had this great conflict with Moxley,
and they both have connections to William Regal from when
they were young wrestlers coming up and training and learning
the ropes. He had an influence in both their lives.
All the smart fans in the audience know this. All
the fans in the audience at this a e W
(25:21):
show love William Regal the way I love William Regal,
because everyone except Bill Goldberg loves William Regal. This man
comes out, the crowd goes crazy. He gets in the
middle of the ring and he's basically berating both men,
why are you fighting each other when you if you
work together, you could take over this entire company. And
(25:44):
they both kind of get in his face, or Moxley does,
and Regal slaps him right across it like the way
a father in the sixties slaps his son, and Moxley
takes it because it's like a relationship of father in
the sixties. And now Daniel Bryant's smirking and laughing like
you don't talk snack to the boss, bro Bow. Regal
(26:06):
smacks in and his reaction is twice as good as Moxley's,
and all of a sudden, the crowd is just they
love They love this because he's a real dude, a
credible dude, a e W still growing it and it
to have his face there is just this feel good, yes,
we're moving in the right direction kind of thing. No
(26:28):
one's ever said a bad thing about Regal, and if
they have it's time. It's them issue, not a Hymn issue,
or it was early in his career as as a
veteran and behind the scenes producer. He is a gem
of a human being. And I know people who know
(26:48):
him to this day, who have worked with him to
this day, and he is a gem of a human beings.
So if you ever hear anything bad about William Regal,
you let me know. You let me know, and I
will handle it and would love to. We've had Look,
we've had Tony conn on the show. We got to
reach out to Tony. We gotta get Regal on the show.
I would love to get his reaction to some of this.
(27:10):
Maybe he remembers it differently. I don't know. Oh, here's
here's the side quest. This is the stupidest side quest ever.
All right. I was telling you, I know wrestlers that
that no Regal and and they speak highly of him,
and I pitched this idea. So I want to preface
this by saying this was a joke. All right. I
(27:32):
texted my buddy, I said, A do you think if
I did a bunch of steroids and human growth hormone
and up my calorie intake to like forty five to
five thousand calories a day, but only did legs? Would
only my legs get huge? And follow up question, how
(27:55):
much would you pay to watch that guy wrestle? So
these are see serious. Even though it's a joke, there's
serious questions. Would my legs get super jacked like Wiley
Kyote in the road Runner cartoon when he takes the
leg vitamins vitamins just for your legs and his legs
got hella swolt And my finisher would just be a
drop kick, just a regular drop kick, but you have
(28:18):
but my legs are so buffed you would have to
sell it like it was the sickest wrestling move that's
ever been hit. Ever, you could call me King quads,
Baby King quads. So that's what I'm gonna do, you guys,
I'm not joking. I'm deadly serious. I'm gonna take everything,
the growths, the steroids, the guerrillas, sweats, the I'll rub
(28:39):
deer antlers all over my quads every night before I
go to sleep, and they'll grow exponentially at night, and
I'll become King Quads. Now, granted, there may not be
a brand out there promotion willing to hire me, but
I'll create my own damn brand and the drop Kick
is making a comeback people. That's the dumbest story I've
ever told. And I've never really into an episode on
(29:00):
sort of a huh kind of feeling, and I feel
like we've done a great job of that today. So
thank you for listening, and we're gonna do an episode
that's totally dedicated to y'all, which have made this podcast
so much fun and I'm so proud of it. I
really am. I'm so proud of it, and I know
we're doing good when weirdos out there who don't give
(29:21):
a crap about wrestling are like, hey, do you want
to do something about wrestling? Yes, I do. I'm already
doing it, and I'm doing it with you guys the Federation.
Thanks y'all. Peace. This has been a production of I
Hearts Michael podcast Network. For more podcasts for my Heart Radio,
visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
you listen to your favorite shows. H
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