Original subtitles

The story is so much better if I'm honest.

I'm just going to talk.

In my long, almost year -long program with The Undertaker, I learned what a

receipt was the hard way.

So

now,

he's 6 '10". So him on a knee.

You know, he's still very tall, but he's considerably shorter than he normally

is. Now, there's a trajectory when you swing a chair, right?

Keep that in mind. So he's on his knees.

So I back up, and I start to swing.

I was off by about this much.

And when that chair came down, instead of hitting him here, I caught him with

the lip of the chair right about here.

and I ripped the skin off of his forehead all the way down to the bridge

nose, and he was covered in blood.

That wasn't supposed to happen.

The

old

school wrestling mentality is you get cracked in the chin, and you're like,

okay, well, he ain't getting over on me, so I'm going to crack him back.

This is not ballet.

If you're going to be brutal, you got to be brutal. So I'm pants.

We get back.

I see him. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. You know, I'm sorry. He just looks at me.

Don't worry, kid.

Your receipts coming.

So I'm like, oh, that sucks.

He's 20 years old. He's a third -generation superstar.

His father was Cowboy Bob Orton Jr., his grandfather the legendary Bob Orton

Sr., and Randy Orton has traveled to the OVW Training Center to hone his skills.

I had been in OVW, the WWE Developmental Territory, for six months,

eight months, something like that. We used to run very small shows, but then

when we had our big show, When we had our WrestleMania, I believe it was an

arena called Freedom Hall.

And for my very first big show down there, I was wrestling a Rico

But also on the card was Leviathan, Demon of the Deep, a .k .a. Dave

And he was wrestling The Undertaker. And the first time I ever laid eyes on that

man, he was standing in the back, looking tall, big, jacked, scary.

He was observing who were going to be the guys.

that get called up soon that I might be able to work with.

You have to remember, a lot of people have these preconceived ideas about who

Undertaker was.

I want to show my respect, and I want to move on before I do something stupid. A

lot of times, that's what I got. And until they were around me enough to

that I was there not only to be a talent, but I was also there to help and

of guide some of these guys.

I introduced myself.

Hi, my name's Randy Orton.

And I'm sure he said something along the lines of, you're Bob's son, right? I

said, yes, sir. And I remember Leviathan, Batista, and Taker went on to

up. Taker gave Batista so much offense and sold for him because that's what you

do. My job was not only to sell tickets and pay -per -views and put asses in

seats. But it's also to help that next generation to come along and keep the

product fresh and keep it growing.

There's a lot of old -timers that didn't think that way. They would try and

depress young guys and not let them develop because they were worried about

their spot.

And fortunately for me, I never really worried about that. With me, it was

always business first.

Undertaker was the measuring stick.

And in order to step up and if you wanted to take your place,

as a draw, and you wanted to take your place as a top performer, then you

had to hold your own against The Undertaker. Because if you could do

that meant you could pretty much hang with anyone.

And if Undertaker gave you that endorsement, gave you that nod,

little Undertaker dust on you, then you were good.

Most times you're good for the rest of your career because you were able to

in to that ring with the best and with the Godfather, if you will.

You're Randy Orton.

Yes, sir.

He's getting a tryout match.

Debuted on WWE television in 2002.

Randy Orton, face first goes hard for Holly. Over, over, may heaven hook to

leg. Had a great 2003.

Went on.

2004, kept rolling.

Worked with Mick Foley. Became the youngest world heavyweight champion in

history at SummerSlam. The Legend Killer idea came up.

And I love that idea. This is the fabulous Moolah, okay?

Randy Orton.

Legend Killer.

Target slaughter.

And I remember the office. It was creative. It might have been Bruce

even. But they came to me and they said, listen, kid, Undertaker wants to work

with you. And I just, with me?

Undertaker, you're 12 -0 at WrestleMania.

You're undefeated at WrestleMania.

The Undertaker's streak, his winning streak at WrestleMania, it wasn't a

yet. He was 12 -0.

And I went into WrestleMania as the legend killer telling everybody I was

to be the Undertaker's very first lot.

But look into my eyes when I say this.

Soon, very soon, you will

be 12 and 1.

Not a lot of people have the nerve.

to slap The Undertaker. It had to be a great slap.

If he'd have pulled it or if he'd have made it look wimpy, it would have

flopped.

No, it was important to me to relay to Randy that that slap is what's going to

set this whole thing off.

I needed to piss off the fans in some way, shape, or form.

And we sat down and creatively figured out a way to where I could piss some

people off.

I have a message for everybody that thinks that I'm going to be a victim

of the Undertakers.

The reason why I love Randy Orton and have loved Randy Orton for a long, long

time is because when he comes on television and lets you know that he's

of the earth.

There's not a moment in time where you don't believe him.

Hey!

Oh, my God!

What? What?

What did you do?

Randy is sly.

And Randy's so cool that even when he's bad, you gotta love him because

he's cool being bad.

However, Randy can be it.

And Randy knows how to tap into and push the buttons of people to

go, all right, man, for a minute I thought you were cool and you were just

of being cocky cool. But that was too far.

That was after.

I was back doing what I was comfortable doing, being a prick, being a bad guy,

being a heel in the wrestling business.

It's what I've always felt the most comfortable doing, obviously.

I was right there, right back where I was happy as a bad guy.

We are live in Hollywood.

And this is WrestleMania.

Everybody's nervous.

Everybody's nervous at WrestleMania.

You put this incredible amount of pressure on yourself to go out there and

to steal the show.

Or even a young guy who's so poised.

Hope these men don't punch for punch here.

I can't believe that he's trading bulls out with the Undertaker.

On the grandest stage of all, he delivered.

At WrestleMania 21, we had a little surprise.

If you remember Cowboy Bob Ward, if you remember WrestleMania 1, then you know

that my father had a cast on his arm because he just couldn't get that arm to

heal.

People remember that about my dad, and we thought to have my dad come out and

hit Taker with the cast.

What was special about that for me?

was that I got to work with my dad.

My dad and I worked a little bit together when I first started, and then

to be in there with Randy, I was blessed.

Cowboy Bob Orton, a legend. I mean, one of the greatest heels of all time.

He was the classic tough guy, chicken shield.

I got to see my dad smile.

In a way that I hadn't really ever seen him smile before because he was doing

what he loved.

Better than most anybody.

Are you kidding me? What?

Randy Orton's going to steal this because of his Hall of Fame dad.

What the hell is going on?

Here's the cutaway.

Here's the cutaway. Here's the cutaway.

Wow.

Whoever I was working with, it would take forever.

For them to get me down. Everything that they've done and they've battled, I've

finally done enough to stop him.

And they take that moment.

They leave me there and they try to catch their breath.

That character sets up.

Everybody and their mother and their grandmother was like, oh, now you've

it now.

Oh, you let him set up.

That's your ass now. Oh, he's coming for you.

I've got this move, the RKO.

He wants to fit it in there somewhere.

Not exactly sure where. It's not an established move.

He goes to choke slam me. Now, this is one of those moves not everybody kicks

out of.

It's why my finishing move matters. It's why people chant RKO. Whether I'm a

good guy or a bad guy, and one of the forefathers of helping me get that move

over was The Undertaker.

He understood what our business is, what it is to

storytelling.

And Randy's one of those guys that does the small things.

He's going for the tombstone!

That means so much that people don't realize what they're seeing, but it ties

everything in so well together.

It was like water off a duck's back with Randy. He stepped up and delivered.

So after WrestleMania in 2005, of course, The Undertaker beats me.

So now we're building the SummerSlam.

What are we going to do? Well, creative says, you know, you had your dad at

WrestleMania. Maybe we have him come back. We could have him sit in the

Someone had an idea.

So a few years prior, they had a makeup artist come in, and they made up Eric

Bischoff, and he looked great.

No one ever knew that it was him.

Fast forward a few years, we got my old man sitting in the crowd.

But, you know, people know what Cowboy Bob Orton looked like, so we needed to

disguise him. We'll get the same makeup artist that worked on Eric Bischoff,

because he did a good job, right?

Just brand new stuff for me. It was like being in the movies, I guess.

Yeah, it was kind of fun getting made up and everything in the back and had the

little mustache and everything. It was great.

I could have done a better job. My three -year -old daughter could have done a

better job making up my father to not look like my father. It made my dad look

like my dad.

Fortunately, we've come a long way in special effects and our makeup artists

the way we do things now. But it was awful.

It really was.

The match goes down.

My dad comes out, causes the distraction.

There's an RKO.

One,

two, three, I win.

We pull the makeup off, bit by bit, and it's just like...

The reveal was nothing like when it was Bischoff because everyone knew it was

Cowboy Bob.

So if that makeup artist is watching right now, thanks for nothing.

Casket matches. You've done more than anybody.

You think?

The match that favors The Undertaker. It is a casket match.

The match that The Undertaker has made famous.

They're fun because it gives you a whole different element of the out, the end,

the finish.

And so it begins.

Not only do you have to incapacitate your opponent, you have to incapacitate

them enough so that you can roll them into a casket and shut the lid.

Hadn't been in many casket matches at this point in my career.

Actually, I had never been in a casket match, but I was in there with the man

when it comes to casket matches, the Undertaker.

But we threw him a curveball.

It's a first -ever handicap casket match.

Both those men got to go in the casket for the Undertaker to be victorious.

You know, not only am I dealing with Randy, I'm dealing with his dad, who's

interjected himself time and time and time and time again, so it made sense.

So now it's cool, like... All right, two on one.

Are they going to be able to put Undertaker in a casket, or is Undertaker

to have to put both of those guys in a casket?

You

sit

somebody on the top turnbuckle.

Both Randy and Bob Orton, they know now they've got the dead man. Where the hell

they want him?

And then you just climb up there with them, and boom, away you go.

Can he do it?

It turns the heck out of you when you do that.

A super play by the Orton to the Undertaker.

I don't really know if mom jeans were a thing then, but I do remember they were

a little baggy, and it was not your typical cowboy Bob Orton Jr.

look.

Yeah, jeans and a shirt and everything to cover up the belly.

It was a little like,

I think you could have got some tighter jeans.

You know, I'm not, they'd have to be nut huggers, but I mean, come on, help me

out a little bit here. I can't be getting beat up when you're looking like

you're about to go out and mow the lawn, man.

I believe we pushed the casket up the

stage because, well, we had to get away from the fans because I was about to

light the son of a bitch on fire.

Now the Orton's symbolically wheeling the casket, which contains the

inside, out of the Toyota's denner. It's funny because during the day, you're

thinking rationally.

Now, at the end of a match and the end of a segment, your adrenaline is kicking

now, and you want this thing to be money, right?

It was a money segment.

No. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Come on now.

What the hell is Norton doing?

Stop. Stop. Hold.

God. No.

Oh, my God.

Come on, guys. This is.

The gasoline.

What the hell are they doing here?

So by the end of it, they're like, ah, screw it. Let's drop it on there, and

he'll be all right.

It's The Undertaker. He's going to get up regardless.

Come on, no. There's a man in there. Enough with this.

And I'm getting into it. My adrenaline's pumping. I'm about to set a casket on

fire with The Undertaker in it, so I'm not thinking necessarily about my

So I'm dumping all this kerosene all over this.

casket and it's dripping everywhere and it's splashing and it's hitting me and

it's on my boots and I didn't even realize it but my boots up to my knees

soaked in kerosene WWE is great when it comes to making sure we're safe as

performers and there was plenty of guys off to the side with fire extinguishers

at the ready and apparently they thought they were going to need to use them

because I was soaked in a flammable liquid

You hear me?

You hear the burn?

I don't think it's on camera anywhere, but I was standing at the barricade,

ready to run in, to grab Randy, to, like, try to stop him, to flip him

lighter.

And as I'm starting to go, it's like, okay, he might have it, he might have

Thank you, Jesus.

I lighted on fire, and I think, if I remember correctly, as I did that, I

stepped back just in the nick of time where you saw the fire take over the

casket.

And I think it missed the tips of my toes by like this much.

I'm not real sure that the folks in the arena and what have you were real happy

with how well the casket went up. It was a spectacle to say the least.

Those are the kind of moments that people remember forever.

Most of those people, they're in tune with what's been going on, and they know

one thing about that character, the Undertaker character.

is he's going to come out of that casket eventually.

And when he does, there's going to be hell to pay.

After the casket match, Taker disappeared for a few weeks. I went on

Series.

I won the match, and I was being hoisted up on everybody's shoulders, and, you

know, all right, we did it.

Take a look at him, guys.

Randy Orton right there.

And then I heard it.

There's pops, and then there's rumbles.

That rumble is just, there's just that energy, that anticipation of what is

about to happen.

Oh, my God!

It worked against me a little bit, because, like, I'm in the inside. I can

the crowd.

It's my cue to bust out of that thing.

I'm juiced up. I'm ready to go.

So I hit that door.

It was just for a second, but, I mean, I could feel it, right? Big ball of fire.

And then I had to take a little half second there to assess, like, I wonder

there's anything on me on fire right now.

I really hope not, because that would really spoil this.

Tonight, Randy Orton has seen a ghost. The Undertaker is back now. But the

has come to the ring, and I don't think he's here to stay. Celebrate! I'm

standing there. People are going nuts.

Everybody's, you know, reacting in the ring. And boom,

then I start that march.

Yeah, it was just magical, man.

The Undertaker is cleaning house!

The Undertaker did it!

So as a fan, there are these moments in storylines where you go, I can't go that

far with you.

But then if you pass that moment and you go even further.

And

you

go so far over the top.

You're going into terrain we've never seen before.

What separates the good from the great?

I'll tell you what. The ability to play mind games.

Oh, yeah!

Oh, man!

Undertaker's got radios!

You have to submit to it and just go, okay, I'm on board. Let's go. Where is

this going to go?

Now we needed to up the ante. Now we needed to do some wild stunt.

So on TV, I think it was late November, I take Taker, I hit him with the tire

iron, and he falls on the back of the lowrider. Now we're parked at the bottom

of the ramp. Now back then, we taped SmackDown. People at home didn't see

But for the live crowd, I get in this car, I got to start it up.

Well, I flood the engine.

And you had our stunt coordinator.

He's off to the side going, lay off the gas, lay off the gas.

So finally, I get it to start. Now, I've got an undertaker in the back that I

got to drop off somewhere.

What do I do?

probably one of the craziest stunts I've ever been involved in.

And I'll never forget, I started going backwards up the ramp at a little bit of

an angle, and I could tell, like, I had to straighten it back up, but I had to

pick up speed, too, because if I wasn't going fast enough, we were just going to

hit the set and nothing.

The wild part about it, and I can't do it justice explaining it, but I had just

a couple inches on each side of that set that I had to

run that lowrider.

Had a few angels with me that day, so did Taker. Any kind of reservation that

you have about doing anything, it goes out the window when you're live.

You just don't really, you stop thinking about anything bad happening and you

think about making a moment.

Man, what would Vince say?

It was good.

You are looking live at the Dunkin' Donuts Center in Providence, Rhode

This was a long angle.

And there was some really, really good stuff that we did through the course of

all of that.

Just kind of reiterated to him, not that I had too much, but he's about to get

locked in hell in a cell with the Undertaker.

A pissed off Undertaker at that.

That's what your facial expressions need to tell your audience.

It's either eat or be eaten.

From Death Valley, weighing in at 305 pounds,

The Undertaker!

There's a lot of legends in the WWE.

But there's something special about The Undertaker's legend.

You almost can't really put it into words, but I'd say respect.

When I think of The Undertaker's legend, I think of respect.

So it has come down to this.

At WrestleMania, Undertaker won. At Summer's Glam, Randy Orton picked up a

victory. And tonight, scores will be settled inside Hell in a Cell.

I think that's something that's lost on people. They don't really realize that

it is a competition. You're always competing against your opponent.

Like, I would never say it at the time, but internally, I'm thinking, like, I'm

not letting this kid get over on me.

Yeah,

I'm going to make him look as good as I can make him look.

because that's what's right for business, and that's what's right for

Now, he on the other side is looking at me. He's like, yeah, this has been your

yard for a long time.

I'm going to show this old -timer what I got and who I am and where I'm taking

the business.

You can't be content with where you're at.

You always got to be reaching for the brass ring.

Sometimes that's what makes matches so great is that internal competition.

I told him how I was going to be.

I'm going to be snug.

I'll be safe, but I'm going to be snug.

Because you have to be. You can tell in the cell. The violence had to be

violent.

The Undertaker shows no remorse.

No doubt about that.

We're both rampside on the floor out of the ring.

He grabs a chair.

He walks over, has the chair down by his side.

I'm up leaning against the apron, and he comes over to me, and he just looks at

me, and he goes, That receipt's coming now.

Okay.

What am I supposed to do about that, right?

But even though he owed me one

because I busted his ass open, he took care of me anyway.

Because anyone else would have hit me as hard as they could.

I learned an important lesson that day, and that lesson was that your number one

priority needs to be to take care of your opponent.

Hell in a cell.

You better go in there and do some crazy shit.

And

when

you got two guys beating the shit out of each other.

chances are somebody's going to be bleeding.

Talk about an adrenaline rush. Talk about living in the moment. Talk about

feeling invincible, feeling the roar of the crowd, feeling that warm blood drip

down your face.

There's nothing quite like it. I might sound like a lunatic right now saying

this, but any of the boys in the back, you know what I'm talking about.

It is what it is. It's not comfortable.

And it's very visual, and it's easy to understand.

When it comes to using inanimate objects, if you're going to

use them, you've got to use them.

You can't pitter -patter around.

If you're going to hit somebody, you've got to hit them.

That's business.

That's the business that we chose.

And that's kind of one of the things that I've always felt and I've always

brought to the table.

Randy has such unbelievable instincts and understands

who he is. He is the Viper.

One thing about Randy, he doesn't waste movement.

Hell in a Cell is an interesting animal.

One of the biggest things with Hell in a Cell is coming up with original stuff.

to do one of my advantages in

2005 that armageddon with taker was that i was in a hell in a cell with the

undertaker so it didn't matter what we did me being stuck in a cage with the

dead man that was enough of a story to keep people tuned in for 30 minutes

there it is

Here you have, like I said, you have this established older guy and now this

-and -coming guy.

You've had great chemistry together, and this is going to be it for a long

while. You're not going to work with this guy again. So you definitely, for

other, I think not only your fans, obviously you always go out and perform

your fans, but you also want to perform for that guy because you all have

invested so much time and energy together.

You know, you really want to pay off. You really want to pay it off, all the

things that you've done.

You just want to make sure that you both leave, and it's like, yeah, man, we did

it. What the hell is this?

Through the timeout.

Splash. Almost going for a ride, my friend.

Went for the last ride.

An undertaker with the right hand of a referee.

Cowboy Bob Horton Jr., you could tell he was having fun.

Early on, he didn't want to step on Randy's toes.

But as the story went on, and as he became more and more involved in it, I

he loosened up along the way, too, and then really started letting the real

Cowboy Bob Horton Jr. out.

I was just happy to be there.

Being able to come back and get involved in something that was so high caliber

was just, you know, great.

Shoot, I was in hog heaven.

We had all these things to play with. Everyone knew the RKO at this point.

Everybody knew the choke slam.

But there's one thing that didn't get reversed a lot. When Taker picked you up

for a pile driver, chances are...

You were getting a piledriver.

He

had

me reverse out of a piledriver.

and give him a pile driver.

Now, the only person that's pile driving anybody is the undertaker.

It's a rule.

But here Taker puts his life in my hands, puts his body in my hands, trusts

that my number one priority is taking care of him.

It's strange when someone gives me my finish because I know that that finish,

you're only a couple of inches away at any time, really, of that finish being

catastrophic.

But it's an unnatural feeling because, obviously, all these years, I haven't

taken very many of them.

Because I know how I like to grab somebody. I know how I like to put them

my shoulder. I know how I like to position them. Of course, he kicked out

whipped my ass.

It was like, oh,

you know, that's what you feel. Oh, you should have done that. You shouldn't

have tombstone the Undertaker.

It's going to be bad news, brother.

Oh, my God.

How about you, Taylor?

Try to keep the legend down.

I never saw anybody refresh the tombstone on the Undertaker.

And Randy Orton believes it's over.

Randy Orton believes that he's talked it over.

Not so fast, my friend.

Hey, tell me, Bob, what the hell?

Then he had to give my father a piledriver.

Oh, the tank is in control.

Now, boy, bomb one.

And I'm looking, and I'm like, oh, no.

Welcome to the two. Let's go, piledriver.

But then, of course, he gets them.

Boom. One, two, three.

And now we're in the army specs.

Undertaker stalking his man.

The end is near, Paul.

The end is near, I'm telling you.

Wow.

The legend continues.

Here's your winner.

That wasn't planned.

It was just like I was feeling it. I knew we had just blown off a

great story.

We just had an awesome Hell in a Cell match, and it was just me feeding off of

not only the story, the match, and the reception from the audience. It was just

like, all right, I'm going up. I'm going up, and this is going to be the icing

on the cake. This is the exclamation point.

At the end of the sentence right here, darkness prevailed in the end.

It comes up every once in a while when my old man's taking me to the airport,

you know, to go to work, and we'll talk about it. And sometimes we just look at

each other like we've got to pinch ourselves because we were blessed to be

to be put in that situation as father and son, having fun on that kind

of a stage with...

That kind of a talent. It's really amazing when you think about it. And the

older I get, the more I look back and realize, man, I was lucky.

I was very lucky.

To this day, Randy Orton is the guy. And Randy Orton is the best from a veteran

standpoint right now that can go in, make anybody, make himself.

And make it look easy.

Make it look effortless.

I got a little side story.

It doesn't really show me in the best light, but let's face it. I was 24.

I was a little bit of a prick back then.

So, we have the Hall of Fame and we have WrestleMania.

The day of the Hall of Fame, that morning, we had rehearsal.

It was my father, John Laurinaitis.

who was our agent, Ricky the Dragon Steamboat, who was also our agent, one

the referees, I believe it was Michael Chioda, and The Undertaker were all a

part of this rehearsal.

But there was a sixth man that was supposed to be there, too.

It was me.

Let's just say I got into a little bit of trouble, didn't get much sleep, just

in case my kids are watching.

Now, keep in mind, this is my second WrestleMania.

I'm 24.

I'm being given the world.

My dad is there.

Taker's there.

I got down there just as they were finishing up, and they were walking out.

I worked with The Undertaker for a year, and it all started off with me missing

rehearsal for the biggest match of the year.

A lot of people may have opinions about me earlier in my career, but nobody

considers myself more of an asshole than I do.

So, Taker, if you're watching, Thank you for not bitching me out, cursing me

out, or chokeslamming my ass to hell after I missed that rehearsal.

That's probably one of my biggest regrets in the business, letting you men

that night.

But now as a father, a husband, a 40 -year -old man, I think that I see

now how wrong that was. And when I'm in the locker room and when I'm talking to

the young guys and girls in the back,

Trying to teach them about the little things, I always go back to where I

started, and I knew that if it wasn't for Undertaker, none of this would have

ever happened.

I was handed a gift when Vince gave me, you know, he gave me that character.

You know, I realized the importance.

That character has over the last 30 years of our industry.

And it's humbling.

And I hope it's inspiring.

I was told before I come to WWE that no one would ever pay money to see me

wrestle. I've wrestled men.

I've wrestled their son.

I mean, how blessed can you be to do something that you enjoy so much

for so long and still be here and able to talk about it?

I mean, really, I've led a very blessed life over the last 30

years, and I take nothing for granted.