Tommy 2 Slow

Formerly Narc

The Best There Is, Was, and Ever Will Be.
October 20, 2004 by Kirsty Quested

Sometimes the word "legend" is used with monotonous regularity, especially in this, the world of professional wrestling. A fickle mistress, at best. Given that legend status is also largely a matter of opinion, bestowing the title depends on the opinion of the bestowee. However, whether you've loved him or hated him, few would disagree that Bret "Hitman" Hart qualifies as one of the genuine legends in a business packed with wannabes and one-hit-wonders.

Bret's talent had already shone even before Vince McMahon turned wrestling upside-down and changed it forever. His traditionalist style and personality remained a fan favourite when McMahon turned wrestling in a direction in which some thought Bret had no place. Now the legend lives on in honoured retirement, his greatest matches still taking pride of place in all "best of" lists on websites across the globe, including that of the WWE.



Bret Hart was one of the first performers during the (then) WWF's explosion onto the international scene who was his own person - who could assert his own personality within that of his character, without robbing someone else of theirs. It was one of many unique talents that, over a 22-year career, would ensure his place as one of the all-time greats in the history of the business.

Bret Sergeant Hart was born on July 2, 1957, into what would be the middle of a tribe of 12 kids. Ironic really, considering Helen Hart had been told she probably couldn't have children. "Every time Stu hung his pants on the bed I was pregnant," she recalled with an impish grin. "It's very cold in the winter…and we love children." Fortunate, wouldn't you say?

Stu Hart, the patriarch of this remarkable clan, ran a local Calgary promotion, Stampede Wrestling. "Wrestling has, and always will be filled with some of the most bizarre, outrageous characters," Bret said in the documentary Wrestling With Shadows, and this description held true not just for his career but for his childhood as well. The Hart mansion was always filled with strange men, women, and animals of all descriptions (tigers and bears included!). In one of his columns for the Calgary Sun, Bret recalls Archie "The Stomper" Gouldie breaking Stu's arm and threatening to rip down the house and piledrive Helen Hart into the bargain. Upon looking out the window one day and seeing the Stomper making his way up the driveway, the 10-year old turned pale and stammered to his mother "H-h-he's here!" To his consternation, not only did Helen not batten down the hatches and call the police, she greeted the behemoth at the door with a hug and an envelope containing his paycheque. Such was a day in the unpredictable Hart household. From the tender age of 6, Bret worked for his father in this unique industry - hawking programs, setting up rings, queuing up intro music, and later on, refereeing. His brothers were all involved and it seemed inevitable that Bret would take up the mantle of the family business. Like all his siblings, Bret had been "stretched" by Stu in the infamous Dungeon, which he used both as a teaching tool for submission wrestling and as form of discipline if any of the kids got out of line. Despite no small amount of talent and success in amateur wrestling during his high school years however, Bret did initially disdain a career in both the amateur and professional arenas in order to study film at the Mount Royal College. But not for long. "It happened in a heartbeat," said Bret. "My dad needed some guys, and all of a sudden, I was a professional wrestler."

Contrary to popular lore, Bret was not initially trained by Stu in the Dungeon, not in professional wrestling anyway. His professional training he credits to his father's (then) tag team champions, Japanese wrestlers Mr. Hito and Mr. Sakurada. "You biggest one (of Stu's sons)" said Mr. Hito. "Why you no wrestle?" In their non-existent spare time, they trained the young Hart in the art of professional wrestling - this being how to protect yourself, and more importantly, your opponent. The protégé learned well. In his entire career, Bret Hart never injured another wrestler - ever. It's doubtful whether anyone else of the same tenure can boast that record. Additionally, it is to Mr. Hito and Mr. Sakurada that Bret credits his other moniker, "The Excellence of Execution."


On the Stampede circuit, Bret's talent and professionalism were immediately obvious. When Stu sold his territory to the up-and-coming Vince McMahon, Jr., Bret was part of the package. Despite his ability, Bret started like everyone else in the WWF - at the bottom, doing jobs. Being Stu Hart's son meant not a jot, and Bret had to fight to prove himself to Vince. It wasn't long before the promoter took a closer look at the young Canadian. The first evolution of his character was to be "Cowboy" Bret Hart, complete with rhinestones, a Stetson and even a horse. "It's like a dream come true when they come up with a gimmick for you because it means they'll give you a push," Bret said. "But the more I thought about being Cowboy Bret Hart and tried to get excited about it, the less I liked the idea. I'm not a cowboy and it seemed like a putdown to real cowboys." Instead, Bret suggested tagging himself up with his brother-in-law, Jim "The Anvil" Neidhart. Whereas most tag teams consisted of two very similar-style performers, the combination of Jim's hard-hitting, bulldozing approach and Bret's technical, high-flying ability was unique - but it worked. The Hart Foundation was born. Initially they weren't given much of a push. In those days they didn't even stand out physically - what would become their trademark pink-and-black was at that time ordinary black and blue. It would take two more of Bret's brothers-in-law, Davey Boy Smith and Tom Billington (The British Bulldogs) to convince McMahon that the Hart Foundation deserved a shot at the straps - and followed this up by refusing to drop them to anyone else. Heels at the time, Jim and Bret finally gained the recognition they'd worked so hard for. They were about to stand out even more.

"It was all Judy's fault," said Bret. The costumier for the WWF had run out of material and the Foundation boys needed a rush job on new tights. "I just have this - a lovely shade of pink," said Judy. Pink??? A heel tag team in pink. Yeah, right. That'll be happening. As it was, they had no choice. "Maybe it would be good for a laugh," mused Bret. Upon seeing one of his up-and-coming, baddest heel teams in pink, however, Vince McMahon wasn't laughing. Jim and Bret developed cold sweats as their boss toured all the way round them, his eyes wide and his mouth agape. "Pink," said, "you're wearing pink." They were about to begin laying all the blame at Judy's feet when Vince announced that he'd pinpointed what they'd been missing all along. "You had no colour," he said. "From now on, you don't wear anything else." Heel tag team champions in pink - now that's taking a risk. But it worked. It worked so well, that despite their bad-boy status, they were getting more fan letters than any other tag team in the WWF. Responding to the fans reactions, Vince turned the Hart Foundation babyface. Their versatility was astounding, able to produce great matches with monsters like Demolition, then turn it around for high-flyers like the Rockers.

The WWF cut Jim loose after his temper got the better of him, which saddened Bret, but also opened the door for his singles career. Vince was sceptical - the Hart Foundation had always worked so integrally - but nevertheless gave Bret the push, based on the prowess he had shown in previous Battle Royals and Royal Rumbles. Bret captured his first singles title, the Intercontinental Championship, from Mr. Perfect (Curt Hennig) at Summerslam in 1991 in a highly regarded and technically brilliant match. If there had been any doubt about the Hitman's ability to work alone, it had been erased.

When people think of the rock band Queen, almost everyone can think of at least one song they like. This was because of their incredible versatility and ability to re-invent themselves. The same was true of Bret Hart. Everyone could find something they liked about him. The older male fans admired his no-nonsense, traditional personality and technical prowess. The younger guys liked his high-flying talent and courage with tricky moves. And the girls, young and old, melted over his looks and rarely-bestowed smile. Looking was all they would get to do; in 1983 Bret had married his long-time girlfriend Julie and had the first of their four children - Jade, Dallas, Alexandra and Blade.

Bret Hart's meteoric rise to the top of the WWF owed much to his unstinting work ethic and ability to keep his style fresh and innovative, while still retaining a traditional approach. Articulate and intelligent, his promos contained genuine cynicism and were more cerebral than much of the frenzied grinding into the camera people were used to seeing from the likes of Hulk Hogan, Randy Savage, Sycho Sid and the Ultimate Warrior. Vince McMahon capitalised on his incredible popularity as a babyface and launched him into some of the most closely-followed feuds in WWF history. Among those to withstand a long-running storyline with Bret was his younger brother Owen Hart.

Pitting brother against brother would have been irresistible to Vince and the scriptwriters in the WWF, but Bret was initially wary. "I was reluctant to do it because of the family name, and the fact that we really were close brothers," said Bret. "I knew the storyline would be long and drawn-out, and we would have to go through this charade 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, of hating each others guts." At this time, Bret had already captured the WWF World title twice. Getting a shot at the world champion usually means a substantial raise in pay, and Owen, a reluctant star, was really only in the business for the money, planning to work hard, save hard, and retire young so he could go home to his family. He won his brother over by saying it wasn't fair that other guys with families got to work with Bret, and he couldn't. "When he put it like that," Bret said, "I said right away, we'll do it then." Bret and Owen both agreed that their feud would not just fizzle, as so many of them do, but would instead be provided with proper closure by the brothers reconciling on either a Raw or a pay-per-view - to ensure all the fans witnessed it.

[img][/img]The scriptwriters must have been salivating over the storyline possibilities of a sibling rivalry, and wasted no time making it one of the nastiest in WWF history. For their part, once they'd adjusted to their new regime, Bret and Owen began having some of their most enjoyable matches. Trust between performers is a huge part of a successful match. The more you trust someone, and the better you know them, the more risks you are able to take. Thus, you can put together matches that are fantastic for the fans to watch. Knowing each other as well as they did, and with both of them being so technically sound, Bret and Owen pulled out all the stops. They were having some of the greatest matches in WWF history, including Wrestlemania X, and the brilliantly contested steel cage match at the 1994 Summerslam. (If you haven't already, you must check out this match to see one of the best suplex moves ever executed.)



One storyline per performer at any given time will not suffice for long, however, and in addition to working with Owen, Bret also continued a long-running feud with former Rocker, the Heartbreak Kid Shawn Michaels. It seemed inevitable that the writers would pair these two superstars up. They were of the same era, had similar styles and were a fair match for each other physically. Like a bad relationship, their feud was on and off for years. They would break away for a short time, but would inexorably be drawn back together by the writers, who responded to the huge reactions generated anytime Bret and Shawn faced off. They put together not only the first 60 minute Iron Man match (Wrestlemania XII) but also the very first WWF ladder match (an invention of Stu Hart's.) Perhaps the fact that this match took place at a house show in May 1992, is the reason it's overlooked as the first ladder match, which has been popularly supposed to have been the Wrestlemania X match between Shawn and Scott Hall (Razor Ramon). (I've checked this out pretty thoroughly. Contradict me if you will, but please provide the proof.)

Although disagreeing on pretty much everything from the colour of the sky to the position of the moon along its ecliptic, the one thing that Bret and Shawn do agree on is that at some point, their scripted feud crossed the line into reality. There seem to be many and varied reasons for this, depending on whose version you're listening to at any given time. Shawn had formed the "Kliq," consisting of himself, Scott Hall (Razor Ramon), Kevin Nash (Diesel), Paul Levesque (Hunter Hearst Helmsley) and Scott Waltman (1-2-3 Kid), and this collective appeared to be steadily gaining some power-behind-the-throne status. The WWF was heading in a new, more adult direction, and whether or not Bret blamed this partly on the Kliq, he felt that overall, wrestling was becoming less and less presentable to kids. The animosity between himself and Shawn increased. Bret's manifested itself by taking pot-shots hinting at Shawn's sexuality. Shawn retaliated by making scathing comments about Stu, and occasionally even dishing out the odd potato in their matches. (Watch carefully during the Iron Man at Wrestlemania XII - Shawn's knee in Bret's back at around 38 minutes is a classic example.) "The whole thing's getting stupid," Bret said at the time, and has since gone on to say that he tried a number of times to bury the hatchet with Shawn and maintain a professional working relationship, only to have Shawn nip him behind the knees again and again. Understandably, Bret's frustration with Shawn's lack of professionalism and his tendency to let his temper and immaturity get the better of him increased. Coupled with the new, raunchy WWF of which Bret disapproved, his passion for the business was on the wane. When the offer came in from Canadian TV series Lonesome Dove, it seemed like a good time to take a break. Bret dropped the belt to Shawn at Wrestlemania XII, and temporarily hung up his tights.

During his absence, the direction of the WWF continued to change. In addition to the more adult storylines, the lines between heels and babyfaces were becoming blurred. Fans were beginning to cheer the guys they were supposed to hate, and in no-one was this more obvious than the up-and-coming Stone Cold Steve Austin. Stone Cold's character was designed to be as nasty and disrespectful as possible, but the more he jeered at the fans, the more he insulted the other wrestlers, and the nastier the stunts he pulled, the more the fans adored him. "It's like, he's so bad he's cool," Owen Hart said at the time. Vince McMahon recognised the way the fans reacted to Steve Austin and did not fail to capitalise on his unexpected but burgeoning popularity. "The quintessential 'good guy,' the kind of guy that my parents would have thought was a 'good guy,' people puke at that," said McMahon. "People don't want that anymore."


"In the end, the fans decide everything," Bret remarked. Perhaps as an attempt to cool the heat between Shawn and Bret, Vince began building Steve Austin to work with Bret on his return. Steve taunted the absent Hitman, taking jabs wherever possible and setting up the new storyline. Another reason for setting up Bret and Steve could also have been Shawn's refusal to drop the strap to Bret at Wrestlemania XIII, a job he was supposed to do to "return the favour" after Bret put Shawn over at Wrestlemania XII. Instead he forfeited the belt after a tearful speech about going home to find his smile. The official reason given was that he needed time to recover from injury. Bret, annoyed at having been cheated out of the title shot, scoffed at these excuses. Whether or not Vince was making a genuine attempt to cool these two off, for all intents and purposes the feud was re-ignited. Shawn tells us he was hurt by Bret's insinuation that his decision to pull out of Wrestlemania XIII had less to do with his injury than it did with his reluctance to drop the WWF title back to him. Bret backs up his statement by pointing out that despite Shawn's assertion of "career-ending injuries," he was back in the ring in an amazingly short time. For his part, Shawn snidely remarked on Bret's "Sunny days," a reference to the bubbly, blonde valet Tammy Lynn Stych (Sunny) and her - ahem - "involvement" with Bret. Bret's vehement denial of this accusation seems to have provoked one of two interpretations. The first being that, given Bret was so outraged, Shawn must have lied. You just don't cross that line and accuse someone of marital infidelity and not expect a furious response.



Others maintain the old "methinks he doth protest too much" is in fact evidence by proxy that Shawn touched a raw nerve. Whatever the truth, it was enough to ignite a backroom brawl in which Bret, from most eyewitness accounts, dominated Shawn and seemed about to take him apart, until Vince sent them both home to cool off.

During Bret's absence, he was approached by the WWF's arch-rival, the WCW, an operation owned by sports billionaire Ted Turner. They had already had some success in luring away some of the WWF's biggest names, including the larger-than-life Hulk Hogan. Their competing Monday night show, Nitro, was out-rating the WWF's Raw. Now they wanted Bret - and to prove it, they offered him more money than he'd ever dreamed of. "They've offered me 9 million dollars over three years," said Bret. "I got interested in that." Vince countered Turner's offer with about half the money, but with a 20 year contract. This was unheard of, and it was still more money than any of the other top guys were getting. After a great deal of soul-searching and bouncing back and forth, Bret eventually put his loyalty to Vince McMahon and the WWF first, and accepted their deal. "I always saw my relationship with Vince as kind of like a father," said Bret. "And I felt like, if I left, it would be a bit like leaving my dad, especially when the chips were down. Loyalty's important."

Meanwhile, the scripted heat between Bret and Steve was working nicely. Bret returned to the WWF with a bang at the 1996 Survivor Series, defeating Steve Austin in a match that strongly hinted at how well these two would work together. However, despite the WWF's best efforts at creating a super-heel in Steve, his popularity increased and babyface feuds just don't work. As a result, two significant events took place. The first was the reconciliation of the Hart brothers, Bret and Owen. Although their feud had taken a backseat to the real-life animosity between Shawn and Bret, it was nevertheless time for the brothers to kiss and make up. This they did on a Raw taping after Bret interfered in a match between Owen and their brother-in-law, Davey Boy Smith. What had been a three-way snark-fest was resolved in seconds as only WWF scriptwriters know how to do, but it made for great television and some of the emotion between the three men could very well have been for real. As a direct result, the New Hart Foundation was born, encapsulating Bret, Owen, Davey, their friend Brian Pillman and the return of Jim Neidhart.

To be continued...

AudioSavior

Boooooooooooo, this is crap.

Chewy

I dont care The Rocks still the best there is

The Phantom

Why didnt you just send us to the link for that site? I mean no ones gunna read a post that long on a message bord!

Danny Diamond

Founder/Admin

Why wouldnt they?

What is the difference between a link and the whole story?

The Phantom

Just a hell of a lot of reading, when I come on a message bord i dont expect to read essays, If Narc had writen it himself then i'de have probably read it, but he hasnt, so just post the link.

Tommy 2 Slow

Formerly Narc

Yeah, I think ur right. I see your point.