Vince McMahon Hates the Undertaker's American Badass Gimmick
“On a recent interview with Wade Keller on the PWTorch Livecast, former WWE Creative Team member Andrew Goldstein revealed one subject he learned quickly you are not to bring up around Vince McMahon when it comes to the Undertaker. Here’s an excerpt of the interview where he talks about learning one of many of the unwritten rules of Vince McMahon and WWE:
“It’s a machine,” he explained. “You just have no perception of how much of a well-oiled machine it is and when you step in there it doesn’t stop for you. It’s a freight train. It keeps going. You come in there on your first day. It’s not, ‘Alright, welcome. Let’s get to know this new guy. Let’s get him up to speed.’
“It’s a freight train and you’re just running along side it and you jump in the side car and you’re just along for the ride and you gotta catch up to speed on your own. They’re not stopping to catch you up on, well, when you have a meeting with Vince don’t bring up Undertaker when he was the American Badass because Vince hates that. Nobody tells you that thing, those picky things that Vince or Stephanie and Michael Hayes [don’t like]. There’s no guidebook. Reality was 100 percent different than I thought it was going to be.
“It’s so funny. I brought it up. I was just like, ‘Oh, I love the American Badass gimmick. I loved hearing Undertaker cut actual promos and come down on the motorcycle and come down with contemporary music and be sort of human.’ Bruce Prichard shot me a death look that said don’t ever bring that up in front of Vince because Vince is so protective of Undertaker’s character and mystique. And rightly so, its money. As Triple H has been saying, there’s equity in the mysterious mystique of Undertaker.”
Keller’s Analysis: This could shed extra light on why WWE doesn’t bring up their WrestleMania 17 match when talking about their matches at WrestleMania 27 and 28. The main reason is the match feels more special if WWE doesn’t talk about it happening ten years ago. They did the same thing by perpetuating the myth that Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant never wrestled before WrestleMania 3 and that Andre had never been bodyslammed before. The idea is to give fans the feeling they’re seeing history being made instead of a rerun from years earlier.
To listen to the free portion of the interview, click here: ANDREW GOLDSTEIN ON PWTORCH LIVECAST”
(Source: PWTorch.com)
