Steve Carrier on March 9, 2018
Jericho welcomes Glenn Jacobs (Kane) to the show.
Jacobs talks about his experience working for Jim Cornette at Smoky Mountain Wrestling in Tennessee. He says that a couple highlights of his time there were when The Undertaker and Shawn Michaels made guest appearances from WWE. He worked with The Undertaker one evening and that was a very cool experience for him at that point in his career. He also credits “Dirty” Dutch Mantel with being a huge help to him early on in his career.
After he finished working for Smoky Mountain Wrestling he decided to live in that area because his wife is originally from there. He’s lived there now over 20 years, and has decided to run for Mayor of Knoxville.
Jericho asks Jacobs how Vince McMahon responded to the news that he was going to run for Mayor. Jacobs informs that McMahon was very supportive of this decision right away. He believes that McMahon gets a bad wrap from people and contrary to popular belief, McMahon really cares about the people who works for him.
Jericho points out that Jacobs has been a very loyal solider for McMahon for many years. Jacobs laughs and mentions that he’s seen many Superstars come and go, and some have come and gone several times during his lengthy run in WWE. He’s in a great spot in his life now to try something different and he’s always been a fan of politics, so running for Mayor felt like a natural move for him.
Jericho mentions that it took his band, Fozzy a long time to prove their worth to music fans because everyone just looked at him as a wrestler. He asks Jacobs if he’s encountered any of these barriers during his run for Mayor. Jacobs says he’s knocked on many doors and lots of people have recognized him. Luckily for him, most of the people who recognize him are fans and were thrilled to see him on their doorstep.
Jericho thinks the two greatest gimmicks in WWE history are Undertaker and Kane. He points out that these two characters have been at the top of WWE for many years, and Kane was able to express emotion even while wearing a mask for many years. Jacobs informs that he’d cock his head from time to time to express certain emotions while wearing a mask, and he says he got that from his dog, who’d cock her head one way or the other to express certain feelings.
Jacobs informs that Jim Ross is another person who was very helpful to him throughout his career. His relationship with Ross stems back to Smoky Mountain Wrestling and it ultimately helped him land a meeting with Vince McMahon. He remembers having a great day as he traveled to New York to meet with McMahon, but then everything came crashing down when McMahon told him his idea for a new character – Isaac Yankem.
Jacobs wasn’t sure about that idea right from the start, but he wasn’t going to argue with McMahon at that time. He painted his teeth to make them look bad, because McMahon thought it would be ironic for the dentist to have bad teeth. Eventually McMahon realized that the character wasn’t working, and Jacobs transitioned into the “Fake Diesel” character.
The “Fake Diesel” character didn’t work either, and soon Kane was born. McMahon was looking for a Superstar to portray Undertaker’s brother, and Jacobs landed that role. A lot of people talk about Kane’s debut being one of the greatest debut of all time, and Jacobs thinks that’s because WWE did such a great job hyping and promoting the Kane character.
He recalls looking at the original character designs for Kane, and it had more of a superhero look than what he was imagining. He informs that he actually wore a cape for his debut and that was the only time he wore it. His mask was hard, moulded leather and he recalls getting cut by one of the sharp leather edges during a match one night. Luckily that type of thing didn’t happen often. He was also thankful that he didn’t find it hard to breath or see in the mask.
Jacobs says the most fun he had in WWE was working as a more light-hearted character in the last several years. He spent so many years working as a dark, demonic character, and it was a breath of fresh air for him to have a more comedic role. Working with Daniel Bryan as part of Team Hell No was a lot of fun for him, and it showed an entirely different side of his character.
Jacobs says he wouldn’t be where he is now if Undertaker didn’t do what he did for him many years ago. He recalls Undertaker telling him to bring up his assertiveness in the ring, and he thinks Undertaker said that because he saw something in him. He adds that McMahon would suggest similar things, pointing out that time is money, and WWE was investing a lot of both in the Kane character.
Jericho asks Jacobs who he’s a fan of on WWE’s current roster. He says he’s a huge fan of Braun Strowman and he expects big things from him in the future. He’s also a huge fan of Seth Rollins, Cesaro and Roman Reigns. He considers Cesaro to be a very underrated performer, and he loves the work of both Rollins and Reigns as well.
Jericho asks Jacobs if there were ever any moves that he wasn’t a fan of taking. He admits that he’s not a fan of Powerbombs since he’s a big man, and the slightest hiccup with a Powerbomb could have catastrophic results.
Jacobs comments on his original unmasking in WWE. He points out that he felt he had accomplished everything that he could under the mask and it was time for a change. He and McMahon had spoken about it for months in advance and McMahon was in agreement with Jacobs, but there were some other people backstage who were of the mindset, “If it ain’t broken, why fix it?”
Jericho asks Jacobs if there are any career highlights that stick out to him. He mentions that working with Pete Rose, his first WrestleMania match against The Undertaker, the Inferno match against Undertaker, and the First Blood match with Steve Austin all stick out as highlights to him.
That sums up today’s episode of Talk is Jericho. You can listen to the show yourself anytime here, and I’ll catch ya next week for another recap!
March 9, 2018 3:23 am
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