Original subtitles

Macho man, Randy Savage.

Ooh, yeah. Ooh, yeah.

Complete mental insanity.

Everybody, when they're talking about Randy, they're never going to speak in

their own voice. They're going to do a Randy voice. They're going to do macho

voice. Every single time. I am the lord and master of the wreck. The growl that

he would have.

But I was going to do something devastating. It's more about quiet than

loud. We rise to the top. Oh, yeah.

And it's all in the fingers.

Letting the words dance outside.

Yeah. Step into a slip. Step into a slip. Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

No, no, what happened? I did my Randy Savage voice and I choked on it.

Isn't it great we didn't wear the same outfit?

He was a pop culture phenomenon.

It's some evil.

Randy loved it. There was no faking anything with him. He believed

did.

I'll be in the ring till they throw my withered carcass in a bag and drag me to

the dumpster. Let me tell you something, Dingleberry. David Perry.

We have a little magic in the bottle here.

The ones that stand the test of time are the things that are real. So long.

as you both do it.

Ooh, yeah!

Three minutes of peak time.

He was a wild man.

Ooh, yeah!

In this corner, from Downers Grove, Illinois, weighing

225 pounds, Angelo Puffo.

My father was a wrestler, and he was traveling around.

Randy was born in Columbus, Ohio, and I was born in Calgary, Alberta.

Our kids went to lots of schools.

When we finally settled down, we were in Downers Grove, Illinois, and it was

nice for them to have roots.

His mother was from Germany, and she was Jewish when Hitler was in power,

so his mother had had an extremely difficult life.

Randy was really something.

He was so different.

The first complaint we got, his teacher that he had for the fourth grade said,

he can't sit still a minute. He sees a piece of paper on the floor 10 feet

and he has to get up and pick it up.

The earliest memory of my brother is like having two fathers.

He gave me a lot of instructions, let's put it that way, if he felt I wasn't

giving my maximum effort.

Is that the best you can do?

When he was in high school, we had a lot of kids that were being bullied. He and

his friend, they used to escort the kids that were being bullied from class to

class so they wouldn't get picked on. He used to say, you want to pick on this

kid now?

Always for the underdog.

He was so busy with his sports because he played basketball, football, and

baseball.

He never dated, but all the girls liked him. He didn't have time to date.

He had homework. He had to get asleep.

He had to get up early to practice. There was always something to practice,

practice, practice.

He moved to Tampa, Florida in 1971 to about 75 to play baseball.

Apparently he was a very successful baseball player because he had made it

the minor leagues with the White Sox, the Reds, and the St. Louis Cardinals.

Professional baseball was the first endeavor that I encountered, and I did

rather well.

I did it rather well, I have to admit myself.

Started out in 1971,

St. Louis Cardinals, minor leagues.

He was a catcher, and then he had an accident at home plate with a collision,

and he separated his shoulder, and then he did the impossible. He learned to

throw left -handed.

and he signed as a left -handed first baseman with the Chicago White Sox. But

what I didn't do was I was a switch hitter and a switch thrower. That means

could hit and throw with both arms, which no other wrestler, no other

baseball player, no other hockey player, no other football player, no other

nothing could do with an athletic background like that.

Yeah, if it's even true, I couldn't imagine what he had to do to make that

I mean, you just have to be some kind of blessed, super freak athlete for that

even to be an option.

He made the first cut, second cut, third cut, and then they cut him.

He was a right -handed thrower, and then he learned to throw left -handed.

So they said he looked funny, and they couldn't put him on the White Sox.

It broke his heart when he was no longer involved.

She threw away his bats. She broke them.

She said, they're finished with me. I'm finished with them.

He asked his dad, how do you get to the top in wrestling?

That was the beginning.

Randy never spoke about baseball anymore.

He was always wrestling.

I 100 % think that all greatness comes from failure. And I think all greatness

comes from being overlooked, for doing it wrong.

Him not looking good throwing that ball probably affected how he performed in

the ring. So now he goes to his dad's business, the thing he grew up around,

thing that he knows and he's passionate about, and he makes it look great.

In 1979, we got a family business started, the ICW, International

Championship Wrestling.

The inevitable Randy Macho Man Savage.

Welcome back, wrestling fans.

We take you now to the Capital Plaza Sports Center. Macho Man Randy Savage.

My brother was gung -ho onto it. One reversal by the Macho Man.

John King takes it down, shoulders down. He had those feet hooked over his

shoulders. The only thing that comes with a second -generation wrestler is

falling into your father's footsteps, and you've got to toe the line.

Angelo was a tough guy, so Randy had to deal with a lot, especially when he made

the transition.

In the 80s and in the 70s, there were territories, and every area had its own

promoter. Mid -South, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Florida, Georgia, there were

all these different fiefdoms of promotions that promoted their unique

The first time I met Randy Macho Man Savage was almost 40 years ago.

He was running a little outlaw promotion, independent promotion up

Kentucky area, and they were doing the invasion on Memphis Wrestling, where I

was from.

We started elections in Kentucky, and we spread out in every direction.

We considered it our town.

And all of a sudden, the Papos opened up their own local wrestling promotion.

Randy Savage had to beat both these men in 10 minutes.

The first time they tried to run their shows, they didn't draw very many

So I think that's why they turned their formula around and said, look, if we're

going to draw money, we've got to challenge the other company. You know,

company against them.

Our boss told us, whatever we do, don't ever say anything on our live TV show

about them. Because sooner or later, if you don't talk about your opponent,

they're going to go away.

Jerry Lawler's dead. He's dead, man. He ain't healthy, man.

He's in his grave somewhere.

Randy would come on TV and challenge me.

Say, Jerry Lawler, you know, this week, when I get you down in that arena, you

know, I will beat your brains out if you show up.

Somebody told me, Randy Savage, that I ain't being under no longer, no.

Four years, man.

And we felt like they were, you know, almost false advertising to their

audience. You know, they're building up a match between me and Randy Savage that

we know is never going to take place because we don't have anything to do

him.

It escalated into what we felt like was a gang war.

I mean, people started carrying guns on the trips. You know, that's how scary

this thing got at one point.

Because the Pappos were known then around the territory as being nuts.

But finally, I think what really brought this thing to a head was the fact that

the Pappos ran out of money.

I was at Jerry Lawler's house one night.

So he'd written me this letter that Randy had sent to him saying, look,

leaving the territory.

Everything that we said, we apologize for.

Hopefully one day we can work together.

I said, what a home run. That's going to be a complete sellout.

This is something that had been talked about for years.

Randy Savage against Jerry the King Lawler and completely sold out.

Randy caused quite a stir when he joined up with Memphis Wrestling. I mean,

people knew he was going to be a very big deal.

My mother thought of

Macho Man, but the song by the YMCA Village People, the song

Macho Man was first.

Where did the name Savage come from? Well, I think he earned it.

And the prophet told me, he says, better to be rich and dead than poor and

alive. He never, ever in his life came to me for any advice. If there was

advice, he would give me advice, but he wouldn't ask for advice.

And then he absolutely floored me, and he said, Lanny, I need help.

When you sit from people that go up there and say that the macho man can be

beat. Those are 10 ,000 people telling 10 ,000 lies.

I said, you've changed your name to Savage.

You've got hair like a savage. You wrestle like a savage. Who is the best

-type interview that you've ever seen?

Let's copy him.

And he says, okay.

How about Pampero Furpo?

He has done it.

Pampero Furpo, the wild bull of the Pampas.

Oh, yeah!

And he goes,

ooh, yeah.

And I went...

By George, I think he's got it. The manager came up to me and he says, hey,

don't play baseball no more, man. You're fired.

Yeah, they do that. When you're not good enough or they think that you're not

good enough, they get you out of there.

They take your uniform out of your locker.

I promise you I never heard that voice again, his other voice.

Got my head together later that night. I stared at a candle and I said, Randy

Savage, you are going to be the greatest.

That's something someday, yeah.

Fans are going wild, and I'm so excited.

She's going up.

Hulk Hogan, he drops a big leg on him.

He's down for the cover of the leg. One, two, he's gone on.

We have a new champion.

Hulkamania is here.

Hulk Hogan was larger than life.

He was literally like a real -life superhero.

And WWE needed a real -life supervillain.

You want to look for unique personalities and unique personas, or

something and someone you can then take that and apply a new concept to.

In those days, all these little fiefdoms, all these little territories

rich characters.

And so the question is whether or not they wanted to come to work at WWE or

where they were.

When the WWE began its national expansion, to come on board to the WWE

now you're exposed to the entire country. Now you're going nationwide.

It was national exposure and exposure that a lot of the talent had never

experienced before.

Ladies and gentlemen, you're going to meet without a doubt.

one of the fastest rising stars in the World Wrestling Federation, a man who is

really making a reputation for himself almost overnight. As a matter of fact,

would you please welcome Randy the Macho Man Savage.

I think Randy left Memphis.

Probably, in hindsight, just at the right time.

Somebody said something about Hulkamania, yeah. Somebody said

Hulkamania, and I answered it with Macho Madness, yeah. So I'm feeling real,

real good, and I will be the next. Macho Madness. This contest is scheduled for

one fall.

The Macho Man, Randy Savage, who is quite a competitor, making his World

Wrestling Federation debut.

The top wrestlers that had only been seen in these local markets, they wanted

be seen nationwide. They wanted to be worldwide stars.

Well, he's a very good wrestler, but he's a very mean individual. But he

certainly has been a winner. That's what happened with Randy. He wanted to be

seen on the biggest stage.

Watch, old man. Randy Savage.

Ooh, another one.

I think these managers are out here all to take a look at Randy Savage. I think

so. The Macho Man congratulated by Bobby the Brain Heenan. There by Freddie

Blassie. Jimmy Hart, Mr. Fuji with a handshake. My goodness, I can't believe

what I'm seeing. Here is your winner, Randy Macho Man Savage.

When I first met him, I'm going, hmm, he's small compared to the size of our

performers at that time. I think Randy was very subconscious about being

smaller. Randy wasn't the biggest in size and stature.

However, Randy made up for the size differential with his intensity.

At that

point, managers were very, very important.

Everyone was sitting around waiting to find out who would manage this new,

Herald of talent.

He has invited all of the managers who are bidding for his services.

They had Bobby Heenan come out and go, Randy, let me tell you why the brain

should be your manager. Then Jimmy Hart came out. Hey, let me tell you why you

should be a manager.

Macho madness at this peak right now.

And we kind of know who the manager is going to be.

And here he comes.

Oh, my.

Oh, my.

Goodness. We're going to have to find out a lot more about this lady.

Hello, everybody. Welcome to another sensational hour of international all

wrestling. I'm your hostess, Liz Hewlett.

You know what, Liz is the love of Randy's life.

And we happened to be around when they first met. I mean, you know, they met

down in our territory.

Lexington, Kentucky, on Richmond Road, had a gym called the Cente Sports

Elizabeth was the first person you saw in the morning.

and she would hand you the towel and the key to the locker room.

And that's how Randy met Elizabeth.

They were married on December 31, 1984, approximately six

months before Randy went to the WWE.

Part of Randy's deal was he was going to bring his brother, Lanny Poffo, later

on became the Genius, but Randy also wanted his wife, Elizabeth, to have a

in the company.

As legend has it, Randy originally wanted Liz to do some broadcasting work

WWE. And then Vince took a look at her and said, No, you're not going to be a

commentator. It's a waste.

And so she became the manager.

What a beautiful woman.

My goodness.

It was kind of the prequel of all these reality shows.

Randy Savage selecting Miss Elizabeth to be his manager and giving her that

proverbial rose. Her being in his corner, I think it was revolutionary.

The Bachelor, The Bachelorette. Randy was one of the very first real scenarios

of love on TV.

People could just kind of pick up on the energy of that realness that was

actually happening in real life. It was a unique pairing because she carried

herself so beautifully and she had an elegance about her. It was kind of like

this Beauty and the Beast sort of dynamic.

That's what made Macho Man Macho Man.

You know, you get this queen, man.

You know, everybody wants the queen.

Not this lady. She's not a macho man in my book.

Oh, Billy Jack's sticking his nose in personal business. Oh, look at that.

Scoops Elizabeth right around and look at that. Give me a break.

At ringside, he would sort of give her a look sometimes that's like, you better,

or there was an inherent threat to the relationship of Savage and Elizabeth.

Don't get me wrong, I assume that part was him hamming up the character, but

it's still uncomfortable to see now.

He developed that persona, but he started using that personality in his

life.

Randy was so protective of Liz. He started bringing her to the matches

actually got her into the business. And he would put her in his dressing room

and literally lock the door when he wasn't in there with her so that she

couldn't come out and nobody could go in.

It was almost like a way to dominate her.

Once again, they did not treat Elizabeth very well. The way he interacted with

her.

And, you know, he put the voice, ooh, yeah, don't look at my wife when she

through the dressing room, brother.

I was watching him. It was like, okay, I get it. You know, he's the dominating

personality in this relationship.

Randy made it clear to everyone that Elizabeth was his and his only.

You jump out of the ring and take Ms. Elizabeth and move her to the other side

of the ring and tell her, you're safer here.

You don't know if it was a controlling factor or if it was a sincere, heartfelt

protection that he wanted for Ms. Elizabeth.

He believed in his gimmick. He lived his gimmick 100%. And he became the Macho

Man. Even when Randy Popple. I question his treatment of Elizabeth.

You have to believe it. You have to actually believe it and feel it and live

If you don't do that, you're not going to connect.

Randy lived it.

And he's ready. Oh, look at that. Give me a break.

I think the first thing that I perceived was obsession.

Oh, this guy's a lot.

I think little kids were like, stop being mean to Elizabeth.

We liked her. She was like our nice second grade teacher that was beautiful.

We're like, leave her alone, Randy. You're mean.

But it's so good. It was such good storytelling.

Randy Savage had this beautiful woman that he loved, but no one was going to

talk to her.

And she better know her place. Elizabeth, I've got to compliment you on

Just outstanding jewelry. That is very, very attractive on a very attractive

lady. Thank you very much. Wait a minute. I didn't tell you to talk, did

I tell you to say anything?

No, I told you to say nothing.

Didn't I tell you that?

What a dick.

I want to watch this guy get beat up.

Tampa's a great town. It really is. It's kind of a white trash version of Miami.

Tampa's known for strip joints, pimps, shop jock, sex tapes, macho, Hogan,

like that. Great stuff.

This is still the hotbed of wrestling.

Everybody from John Cena to the Big Show to Edge and Christian, Roman Reigns,

everybody lives here in Tampa. Actually started during the 70s.

When I first went up to Minneapolis and New York, I started bringing some guys

down that were single. The next thing you know, we had a whole crew here, man.

It was crazy.

When Randy got the job in the WWE, when I got Azir, I got him and Liz to come

down. Randy and Elizabeth were just so much fun to be around.

Just normal people.

Nice, really kind, normal people.

The relationship with myself and my wife and Randy and Liz, we hung out all the

time.

Yeah, this is unbelievable.

They lived right down the beach from us, so every day when we were home, we were

all together on my boat or at the pool or at the beach. We hung out with them

all the time.

Therein lies the problem.

Hey, Hulkster, what's the deal, brother? Talk to me. It's not like you to leave

me hanging and just checking out the babes and just leaving me out there.

We need to have a little talk, brother, about who cut out on who.

All right, let's do it right now.

Come on. All right.

Hey, maybe they're going to fight.

Randy and Miss Elizabeth threw a party, and we were so excited to go because my

sisters and I all wanted to be like Miss Elizabeth.

My dad and Randy were really close friends, but for us, we were still in

Miss Elizabeth because she was the woman that we saw on our TV screens.

As kids, even though our dad was a WWE superstar, we were still fans.

They had a beautiful home, and they had really beautiful artwork.

It wasn't a mansion, but it was just this beautiful home that was so well

care of and so pristine.

Their house was immaculate. Like, I felt like when we walked in, we had to,

like, take our shoes off right away and put on little, like, booties.

So I felt like he may have had OCD.

When I met Randy, he was the macho man, Randy Savage. Ooh, yeah!

24 hours a day. But what he didn't have was the look. He needed to look like a

star. I said, bro, I got a guy named Michael Braun that I played in a rock

roll band for 10 years.

He made all of Hendrix's clothes. He made all the stuff for the guys in my

Randy called me on the phone.

The Hulkster told me, you can make me some clothes.

I'm going, who's this?

He comes with Miss Elizabeth, and he brings me shorts that have three stars

the front and maybe two -inch letter across his tush.

It says Macho Man.

And I say, dude, I need real estate. I need from the floor to past your head.

He says, you can do whatever you want.

This is the kiss of death.

I make him five outfits, out of spandex, but full -length pants and shirts.

And maybe there's a little fringe here and there. We're just starting out.

In the 80s, there was a series of pimps. One pimp would bring another pimp often

to us.

and they'd say about me, he's all right.

Yes, there was some inspiration from them for Macho Man's clothes.

The costumes fit, man. Every little, the tiles, everything just went down right

where it was supposed to go to, you know what I'm saying?

Damn, there was a pimp outfit Randy was wearing, man, when you think about it.

Like, duh.

Randy Pimpin' Savage.

The guy that dressed the pimps in the 70s ended up being one of the most

influential costumers in all of wrestling.

That's how Tampa rolls.

A real funny story is he wanted a really fast car, you know. A buddy of mine had

one. So Randy went out there, looked at the car, bought it, had the car sent

from California. He called me, he said, the damn Corvette.

I said, what's wrong with the car?

He goes, my hat box won't fit up front in the trunk.

I guess the only place there was a trunk was in the front of a Ferrari. So he

put the hat box in and he wouldn't close, so we had to send the car back.

Hats are doing good. Now we've got hats, we've got glasses.

I'm painting on his shirt, on the hat, on the sleeves, on the

pants, on the back of the jacket, Macho Man.

Over and over again. How many times can you write Macho Man? How many times can

you paint the name? How many fonts can you use?

Nobody can wear Randy's clothes. Nobody.

They all look silly. There's something about this person fits these clothes.

He did spend money on his outfits, and they were lavish and extraordinary and

colorful. Randy spent a lot of money on the perception of who the Macho Man was.

That was all out of his pocket.

Michael Braun made the fortune making Randy's clothes.

He wouldn't buy you a cup of coffee, but that's another subject.

Randy saved his money. He was smart.

That's a nice way of saying he was cheap, but that's okay.

Well, Randy was making a lot of money.

Randy probably held on to every nickel that he ever earned.

His mom and dad didn't always have it easy.

And his father had to work really hard for every penny that he made. So Randy's

father, Angelo, instilled in both kids, save your money.

He would drive from Memphis all the way to Louisville, Kentucky, wrestle in a

match, and then he wouldn't get a hotel. He'd sleep in his car.

It was a lot of fun having him with us on the road.

I don't remember him ever buying. I'll say that.

Pomp and Circumstance. What a song.

All these other wrestlers had, I'm gonna beat you up. And that like crunchy,

like 80s, 90s guitar of like, I'm a man, I'm a man. And then you just have this

classic, elegant Pomp and Circumstance. And the second it hits.

Macho Man Randy Savage is the definition of Pomp and Circumstance.

I think that that was the perfect music for Randy.

What I think made Randy such a good wrestler is the combination of his

ability and his personality and his work ethic in the ring.

Man, he was just on the cutting edge with all of it, always.

He was extremely professional when it came to his preparation.

He spent more time on the preparation than some other people did, a lot more

than I did, and it showed in his work product.

Guaranteed. One, two, three. You know, my phone would ring at 3 or 4 o 'clock

the morning. Hey, I've got an idea about that finish at Madison Square Garden.

I'm going, Randy, it's 4 o 'clock in the morning, brother.

I don't care what time it is, you should care as much as I do. I'm like, okay, I

care, Randy, I care.

It was always just banging heads with him. He'd go instead of the big foot for

it rather than how about just elbow me back over the top rope. I was like,

Randy, fine, talk in the mornings.

But he was always on, man, and he was a wild man.

I think he would really overthink it sometimes.

He was too calculated, you know. Sometimes you got to like free form in

and you hear what the crowd wants instead of going to the corner and

guy you may want to.

grab his arm and bite his thumb off or something, you know.

Cut out the costumes, cut out the crazy voice, cut out everything.

At the core is a man that knew what it took to be great. He knew the work. He

wasn't afraid of the work. He put in the time and he put in the effort.

And I think that's a beautiful thing that anyone in any field could look at

realize that's what it takes.

Go put in the work. Go fail. Get back up. And then you'll have your

3 moment with Sting. Heavyweight champion, along with Elizabeth.

Along with the man who will be in his corner, George DeAnimus. Nice block by

driver.

This is

the

WrestleMania Report.

I'm Gene Okerlund.

Surprise. Yes.

Yet even another match has been added to WrestleMania III.

Well, this was going to be the biggest thing ever. At least that's what I said.

It actually became the biggest thing ever for a long time.

We could hear the numbers coming in from the number of ticket sales at the

Silverdome. You know, 50 ,000, 60 ,000, 70 ,000, and it finally got up to 93

,000. Heavyweight champion Hulk Hogan. Hulk Hogan and Andre the Giant are the

two biggest icons in our business at the time were the main event.

We want a match to steal the show.

Randy and Ricky were not trying to upstage my man at that.

They didn't go out there and go, okay, we want to steal the show from Andre.

We want to steal the show from Hulk Hogan. They didn't do that, man.

Our goal was to have the match of the night.

And to do that, we had to upstage Hogan and Andre.

March 29th, 1987.

This is going to be the biggest moment in wrestling history.

I knew that when I watched the whole show, as good as Hogan Andre was, and it

was damn good.

It didn't hold a candle to Randy Savage and Ricky Steamboat.

Obviously, it turns out that one of the ways that they were able to do that is

because Randy Savage was obsessive about that match and worked out every single

detail repeatedly on notepads with Ricky Steamboat until they got exactly the

match that they needed to have.

We had these yellow legal tablets.

We got into two and a half pages of these long legal pads.

We're getting up to like 160 steps.

We started quizzing each other, and I would say, Randy, step number 37 is

this, and this.

Tell me the rest of the match.

Number 38 is this, number 39 is this, number 40 is this, this, that.

We took every opportunity and every advantage going over the match just to

sure they're all on the same page.

You got the ultimate good guy in Ricky Steamboat. He's impossible to dislike.

Then you got Randy Macho Man Savage, who Savage being, you know, the bad guy.

It was just a perfect storm ahead. Everything you needed for the perfect

And the story that they told leading up to it had layers.

I will not only embarrass you, not only pin you with the one, two, three count,

but I'm going to put you out of wrestling for good.

They never have a televised match until WrestleMania 3.

And now, here he comes, making his way down the...

Crowd is so big. It's majestic. It's like this gigantic sea of people.

The noise of 97 ,000 people.

Your body would almost vibrate from when you came down the ramp, through the

curtain, and you're out there for the first time.

My stress level rose because of trying to remember 160 -some different steps.

One.

Two.

3 4

5

6 7 8 9

It's never as good as when you have one pure good guy and one evil bad guy, and

they're doing things that are athletic and excellent and great and violent with

reckless abandon.

159, 160.

It is done.

It worked.

It is perfect.

To this day, people think it was like one of the best matches ever.

The goal of a match is to tell a story within a match. How can you, with your

body and your face, tell a story to the fan?

There was nothing like the rush from the crowd after taking the fans on a

ride.

20 false finishes.

The sound was deafening.

You see the crowd jump up and react.

I've watched it a thousand times. I still get the chills.

It's the definition of what the art of professional wrestling is supposed to

I'll never forget Savage when I covered him.

Randy goes, we got him, Dragon.

We got him.

And Elizabeth leading.

It's a labor of love, and it's a craft that when done at the highest level is

art.

Savage, even though he was obsessed with living the character, didn't seem to

care about wins and losses.

I'm going to lose the theme boat at the biggest thing in front of 93 ,000

people? No problem. It's going to be awesome. We're going to make it

A truly great wrestler should be as happy.

When the third count hits, if he's on the top or looking up, it should be the

same thing. If the crowd reacts, you should be happy either way.

The match actually ruined his life because he could never top that night.

could never top the match.

His standards were too high.

That's where it all blew up, right there, man.

Perfectly ridiculous.

With Mr. Perfect, you can achieve perfection.

Randy and I, I think we had 300 licensees each at one time.

So Randy was running neck and neck with my merchandise.

Everywhere they booked Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan, it was always, always sold

out. Everywhere. We couldn't do anything wrong.

Hogan wasn't threatened at all by anybody.

And there was no one around that could touch Hulk Hogan at the time. But Randy

Savage came close at that time.

I feel real strongly about this man right here, yeah.

This is the man who is going to lose to the macho man, Randy

Savage. Isn't that right, Elizabeth?

Randy was a little more indoctrined to it and knew the life.

style because of his being the second generation of his family whereas terry

kind of stumbled into it and i think that maybe randy always resented that a

little bit that hogan not only stumbled into it but also became the biggest and

outshined him there was no jealousy over anything like that no problem at all

baby no problem at all you see my t -shirt

Everybody's going to be seeing a Hulk cool Vince McMahon.

I think everyone that has been or will be ever in the WWE will be in Hogan's

shadow. I don't think Randy ever thought he would overshadow the Hulkster. Hulk

Hogan is going to be the unbeatable guy.

That's the way it is.

Those eyes right there.

Those eyes.

You got my face. You got luck for Elizabeth right there.

I think Randy Savage doesn't get nearly enough credit for how important he was

to the success of the WWE at that time.

Hulk Hogan seems to be the guy that's like, there was Hulk Hogan and there was

wrestling.

He was intense.

Mix a little intensity with the right toxins and the right poisons and he'd

a little crazy.

Tonight is the first time that I've ever been the prize in a match.

If Randy wins, I stay with him.

And if George wins, he gets the title and he gets to keep me.

Tonight is definitely the scariest night of my life.

When we look back on Randy Savage's career, so many of the most influential

matches and storylines of his career involved Miss Elizabeth.

So without her being a foil and a catalyst in his storytelling, we

remember those iconic, epic matches.

You grab her and push him in front of him. He was the king of that move, of

grabbing her and being like, no, no, not today.

You know, like, you're going to hit my woman? And you're like, what a dick.

To use Elizabeth in the storyline was so easy.

Looking back, we weren't setting a good example for kids watching at home. It's

not something we do today, but we learn and we move on.

It's professional wrestling, man. I call it the theater of the absurd.

Anytime you cross that line, that stirs the fan's reaction.

When you stir their reactions, you start putting asses in seats.

And that's what it's all about.

She was the first major valet in wrestling to be kind of part of the

The husband -wife team working together, I don't think we really had anything

like that before, so it was unique.

Randy was extremely possessive with Elizabeth.

If you're given to be a certain way, and

I can take that and boost it up, you know, then it becomes larger than life.

It worked. It just worked.

Miss Elizabeth broke the mold.

You remove Elizabeth from the equation of Randy Savage, and he's just a guy

talks weird and is incredible in the ring.

Miss Elizabeth anchored Randy Poffo to that character.

I don't think she had any clue about how talented she was and how beautiful she

was. She didn't have a healthy body image. Liz struggled with eating

She struggled with bulimia.

So she really struggled with just self -confidence.

She tried to be what she thought the man that she was having whatever

relationship at the time with, what they wanted her to be.

So she would get lost in the relationship.

I was the first one to push Liz down in a very physical altercation where I

shoved her sideways.

That was really, really a big deal.

He asked me to come up to his hotel room, and we went over.

The pushing of Liz for about two hours. She was falling on the bed when I was

pushing her sideways.

How they got Randy to go for that or to do that, that's a mystery.

30 or 35 million people tuned in to see it.

They came up with the idea of the slap.

Not me.

That was the last thing I thought I'd ever do. I got more heat from the fans

slapping her than I did for the snake biting Randy.

The wrestling fans destroyed my car.

Knocked all the windows out of it, busted the headlights, taillights.

It's like the thing with slapping a woman. You don't do that. That's

in here, man. That's one of the two top evil things you can do.

Can you imagine somebody slapping somebody today?

Randy and Liz were married in real life. However, on camera, their relationship

was never, it was never exposed and it was never talked about. It was more of

animal magnetism and attraction.

Randy's character changed. Randy went from a very popular character to just a

despised character, the Macho King.

Savage goes full bad guy because of jealousy. A very real reason to turn.

Elizabeth is out. Sherry's in.

Queen Sherry, what kind of rules are there?

No!

Hold back!

She turns on the macho man.

In the crowd, Elizabeth.

When she came back and slapped Sherry, come on.

Come on.

Everyone popped. Everyone went nuts. I loved it.

Hello, Howard.

Bring us up to date on the travels of the World Wrestling Federation.

I mean, you could be in Dallas one night and Miami the next and then up to

Chicago the next. And this would just keep right on going. And the traveling

part was the hardest.

We were running so hard in those days, man. We were running seven days a week,

every night.

Our way of dealing with it wasn't right.

Guys were doing steroids. You guys were doing a lot of pills, man. You know, a

lot of pills.

Some others, including myself, did fair amounts of cocaine just to get going.

Your body needs time to heal.

These guys, their whole empire is built upon their physique, so to speak. So I

got to think that's very, very tough on them.

It's a world of action figures, and when you put yourself out there as much as

wrestlers do, your body ain't going to keep the body of an action figure.

It's tough enough to do it by yourself, not to imagine having your wife there

with you every step of the way with, you know, sharks tagging behind.

Randy really loved her.

And I know that he wouldn't have it any other way.

Mr. Elizabeth's with him.

You know, the business is tough. It's just the road. It's a tough business. I

don't know of any husband -wife teams that have done it since.

But there's probably a reason why that doesn't happen a lot in wrestling

it'll ruin you.

I guess in hindsight, he just finally couldn't take it anymore. Not only

sometimes was Randy overprotective, he was a little bit overbearing on Liz.

And I really think that she just reached her breaking point.

I think he always felt like there was somebody else in her life besides him.

When there really wasn't, how could it be?

You're locked in the house and you can't go out on the road. Nobody can touch

you. Nobody can see you. How in the world could she fall in love with

else?

Elizabeth, I love you.

When Randy the Wrestler and Miss Elizabeth were having a great life on

were having a horrible life in real life. And I think that was a huge, huge

accelerator, so to speak, of the demise.

Can you imagine that? Like if your marriage was seriously in trouble and

to publicly get married again.

So the world is kind of like, oh, my God, that's so cool, you guys are

It's like, no, no, actually, we were married, and now we're barely married.

I wonder how much of the worst of him was brought out by the wrestling

They clearly brought the best out of him professionally, but I wonder how much

it cost him personally.

As the orchestra played, the formal line of eager guests gave their

congratulations to the happy couple.

I remember Randy coming to me.

Liz is very unhappy with me and thinks she wants a divorce.

And I said, well, maybe she just wants a little bit of freedom. But I knew he

was really heartbroken over that, you know.

I don't know if anybody ever.

looked at Randy and his wife's situation and said, hey, maybe I should step in

and say something.

If you knew Randy, I don't think that would have slept well with him. I think

maybe later on, Hulk Hogan and the time Hulk's wife may have crossed that line,

and that didn't go well either.

I didn't realize that Wiz was uneasy.

I just remember Randy had just bought a boat.

My ex -wife was on the dock, and, you know, her and Liz were talking. She

yeah, well, Terry's going down to Miami to shoot a movie called Mr. Nanny. We'll

be down there a couple months, and I'll be there with the kids, and he's going

to be working on it. So if you get bored, come on down and hang out and

with the kids. So I went down the next day to Miami, and I was shooting night,

and I guess I left work about 5 o 'clock when I came in at 6 in the morning.

I saw the red Cadillac out there. Hmm, that's Liz's car, you know.

I go upstairs, and I said, where's Liz at?

My ex -wife was still asleep. She goes, oh, she's in the back room over there. I

just kind of peeked in the other room, and no one was in the bed. And I went,

hmm.

I didn't think nothing of it, so I went to sleep and got up, worked out, did my

thing. The next day, I went to work again. At night, I came in, same thing.

Nobody in the bed. I said, okay, here's the deal.

I don't know what's going on.

But if she's not going to be sleeping here, she needs to get her stuff out of

here. Because I don't want any heat.

And so as things progressed, I saw her down by the pool hanging out with the

that played tennis. And I was getting ready to go to work at night.

And I came out of the shower about 6 o 'clock and I heard the scream. Where is

she at? Where is she at? Do you know where she's at? And I said, oh my God,

here. So I put a towel on and went out in the living room.

And there was Randy standing over my ex -wife pointing his finger going, you

know where I live? I said, Randy?

Tom, you're, you know what, down, brother.

Grabbed the manager. I said, hey, brother, this is Macho Man. His wife's

He doesn't have a key to her room. We need a key to her room.

So the manager walked us all the way around the back of the hotel.

Guy put the key in the door to open it. Randy pushed the door open and goes,

hey, Liz.

And I took off. I was gone.

All of a sudden, I get ready to leave to go to work, and there's like 20 cop

cars outside the hotel.

I was blamed for that.

The truth is, after the second guy should have called him right away and

hey, man, I don't know where your wife's at, but her car is here. She's in my

room. I should have done that, I guess.

That's where our relationship fell apart for about 10 years.

Just as intense as the wrestling was, that's how much he hated me in real

I just figured if I got her out of my room, I had no idea she didn't call

I had no idea that she left and packed all of her stuff up and didn't tell him

she was done with the marriage. I didn't know any of this stuff.

I just thought she came down to hang out. She left him and didn't tell us.

Let's just be honest. The day that Randy died, he still loved Miss Elizabeth.

Like, I mean, that's his ultra love in life.

And so as he's losing her in real life, he has to act like, you know, worse in

love, getting the whole nine yards. And so, I mean, I can't even understand how

much pain that would be.

Boy, that's right the real deal right here. I'm the Macho Man Randy Savage,

me, Gene Okerlund, I'm going to be your co -host, yeah, on All -American

Wrestling. Do you have any problem with that? I don't have a problem at all. I

don't know why Vince puts people on commentary other than the fact that he

have another vision of what needs to be done for the product.

Vince, I don't think, wanted him to work anymore.

They wanted to get him out of the ring and do commentary, and Randy always felt

like he had some matches left.

The reason that I argue that Randy Savage is probably the greatest who ever

lived is because he literally could do every single aspect of professional

wrestling, except for commentary, and was not a fan of that.

You've got to be able to get a patent on some of these wrestling holes. People

are stealing them. That's the million -dollar dream.

Randy probably looked at it as, man, do they not think that I'm...

Good enough in the ring anymore that they're going to put me out here as a

commentator? His voice was a small doses thing. You don't want to just, you're

running commentary, oh, up the top, oh, there we go.

After two hours of it, it's like, ah, it doesn't have the same mystique anymore.

Are you ever going to get back in the ring?

Absolutely. Thanks for asking me that question.

I'm going to just, you know, I've been on the sidelines kind of just picking my

shots, and I feel an opportunity coming up really.

really, really soon, within a week, in fact, and I'm going to get back into the

ring. I'm going to still be doing the broadcast because I really enjoy it, and

I'm broadcasting because I want to, not because I have to.

But when I get back into the squared circle, I'm going to make a quick name

myself again, and I'm going to go after that World Wrestling Federation

Championship belt for the third time, a three -peat.

Randy had a lot of fight left in him, a lot of gas in the tank. He had no knee

replacements. Randy hadn't had any major surgeries.

His legs were good. He tore his tricep.

I knocked his teeth out one time by accident. He was in great shape, man. He

could go.

When they wrestle me, they turn out to be a clown one way or another. Yeah,

Doink the Clown. Doink the Clown, Hulk Hogan the Clown, or whatever it is. You

know, it doesn't even matter. I know you and Hulk were kind of friends there for

a while. Kind of not, too.

Oh, yeah? Yeah.

Kind of and kind of not, yeah.

Somewhere in between, uh -huh. Yeah.

They said, we're having a youth movement. The best thing you can do is

to the mic.

He says, well, I'll get a second opinion on that. And it turned out WCW didn't

think he was too old. I'll never forget the night that it happened.

I remember Vince walking around saying, has anybody seen Randy? I would need to

go over the format with him. And then an hour before our show started, somebody

came to Vince and said, hey, Vince, turn on the TV.

It gives me an upright feel of pleasure to introduce...

Truly one of the all -time greats in professional wrestling, finally arriving

World Championship Wrestling.

I was with Vince at the time, right in the same room, and he no -sold it.

There was no expression change on his face at all. He looked around, he looked

over at me, he said, King, could you do the commentary with me tonight?

Randy, I know you're out there listening, and on behalf of all of us,

your fans, and certainly me,

The number one fan, I'd like to say thank you for all of your positive

contributions. Even when it was happening, a lot of people didn't

happening. Wish you nothing but the best.

Godspeed and good luck.

It was a surprise.

And not a pleasant one.

And it was, you know, it hurt. They wanted me to do the commentary thing,

know, which I will want to do sometime, you know, because I got a pretty good

slanted viewpoint on things, you know.

I feel that I would like to express it at some time. You know, it's not even

now. But I just wasn't ready, you know, to take off my boots at that point. I'm

glad I didn't.

I don't think he wanted to do that.

He didn't want to do that.

Who, Randy?

Macho Man and Hulk Hogan have a date with destiny.

Oh, yeah. Star King, dig it. All right. The Macho Man, Randy Savage, already

making his presence known here on WCW Saturday night.

Oh, yeah.

During the Monday Night Wars, when WWE and WCW were going head -to -head on TV

on the same night, for a long time, WCW, they were winning the Monday Night

Wars. And part of that was because a lot of talent would jump ship, and Randy

was one of those talents. I mean, he was a big, big star.

I think it was devastating.

You know, I think it was because he was our captain.

I remember...

A bunch of us were talking and saying, like, man, we don't have any stars.

So we all felt maybe there was a shift going on. Like, gosh, the two biggest

guys of our era, Hogan and Randy Savage, are there?

There was a huge rift with Randy and Hogan.

So when Randy went to WCW, it was always a very businesslike relationship.

It was a really smart move because Randy wasn't done wrestling.

Vince told him he was done wrestling, and Randy wasn't done wrestling. He had

major impact on the wrestling business once he came over and got back in the

ring again.

Randy was highly motivated, so was I.

And when you get two highly motivated people that each want really the same

thing, then it's just about numbers.

And what was really, really interesting about negotiating the Randy Savage deal

is it didn't cost me a dime. Because when Randy Savage made the jump to WCW,

did Slim Jim.

He took Slim Jim

with him.

And that was to the tune of...

$750 ,000 per year.

Macho man got me to eat Slim Jims.

So any irregularity I have with my bowels is on you, Slim Jim. I'm going to

you to court. Drop the elbow from it, yeah.

Intestinal fortitude not included, yeah.

What do you see? Slim Jim.

Slim Jim.

You could tell he was struggling with aging in WCW, and you could tell he was

doing whatever he had to do to keep his body in shape.

And he got too big.

I'm not giving up.

I'm just getting started.

In that period of time, it was about guys being bigger, stronger, faster.

You know, it was an all -sports.

A lot of wrestlers took steroids just to heal and to maintain their body.

If you're on the road like that, you're not eating properly, you're not getting

the right sleep, your body starts to tear down.

Did Randy use it?

I've never seen him do it.

Now, if you ask me if I think he did, yes.

That's just my own thought.

I've been wrong before, though.

He got his money in WCW, you know? He went and cashed in, got a nice check,

money he could have lived off of for the rest of his life.

He did sort of in WCW kind of end up in Hogan's shadow again.

In WWE, it was almost like he was lurking in the shadows of Hogan, like,

right here. I could do this. In WCW, it wasn't like that. He was never a threat

to Hogan's spot.

I think there was a lot of competition. I think until the day that Randy Savage

died, there was a lot of emotional feelings between he and Hogan.

It was kind of scary.

Even though neither one of them would talk about it, they didn't need to have

anybody tell you what was happening.

You could see it.

They didn't get along.

They did not get along.

Larry Bishop came to me. He said, hey, man, you get an opportunity to grab

Elizabeth. They were divorced, you know.

I went, oh, my God, if we could get her, that would be so intense.

When Miss Elizabeth wanted to come to WCW, it was Randy who was one of her

biggest advocates.

Randy had moved on with his personal life, so there was no excess baggage.

He didn't have a problem with it at all. He said, man, if there's money to be

made, let's make it.

My boy.

By the time that I met Liz and we were getting to know each other, I had the

sense that she had completely moved on from the marriage with Randy.

She had met someone.

All of a sudden, Liz was converting to Judaism and moving to Florida.

You know, it didn't last long, but she tried.

What I thought at the time was an innocent workplace flirtation. And sure

enough, there is no such thing as innocent workplace flirtation. So

together and being around each other, we definitely crossed those boundaries.

My best friend from wrestling, Stink, he tried to sit down with me many times.

Talk to me about it.

Man,

I just, I wouldn't do that. There just wasn't any stopping him at the time.

It didn't seem like it was probably the best idea for a number of pretty obvious

reasons, but somebody else's life and they're going to do what they're going

do.

When it became obvious to me.

I thought, okay, here we go. This is that iceberg, the Titanic hit that

saw coming. Here comes mine.

And it didn't happen.

I think Randy was just kind of maybe over it, just kind of was keeping his

distance.

It was like a full circle situation because, you know, if I hadn't have done

that, then I hadn't have got over it. You know what I mean? Because, you know,

don't believe in taking it.

taking anything to the grave, you know what I mean? You know, because me and

Elizabeth are still friends, you know what I mean? Just something that didn't

work, and it was a no -problem situation, you know what I mean? And

know, life goes on, and, you know, just, you know, you shouldn't spend the rest

of your life dwelling over any one thing.

When he had Liz, I don't think he really went out. When they separated, it was

almost like having, like, a freshman in college.

What are we doing tonight?

I believe Randy Savage met Gorgeous George outside of the wrestling

I'm not sure what she was doing for a living at the time. There may have been

some dancing involved.

I moved to Tampa, and the first person that I met was Randy.

It's kind of like fate. I totally believe in fate.

The first place I've worked is the dollhouse.

So I get in there. They give me a sequined gown that I owe money for at

of the week. I'm on the set list to go on stage.

I didn't even have enough money to get a drink for myself.

So I'm sitting there, and some old guy starts whacking me in my arm.

And he's like, girl, buy me a drink.

And I was like, you buy me a drink. And he starts fighting with me. So next

thing I know, I got grabbed up and thrown outside the dollhouse on my knees

sequined gown.

Some guy comes up to me, and he goes, hey, girl, are you okay?

And I'm like, dude, did you just see what happened?

He's like, yo, that wouldn't have happened if you wouldn't have been

on Evel Knievel.

And I get to looking at him, and I'm like, macho man?

I mean, this was like a surreal dream.

He gave me his phone number and an address.

So I got this piece of paper with his phone number in my hand, and I'm

to myself, well,

it might be cool.

She was a lot younger than all of us. She was the perfect eye candy for the

macho man, for the gimmick.

Where Elizabeth was unclosed, she got plugged back in.

Gorgeous George.

She was cool. I mean, young.

And she was kind of hip. She kind of updated Randy.

Randy got kind of a cool factor.

That's when he started wearing leather. That's when he got really jacked.

He got rid of all the flair. He was coming out in just like black leather

necklace. Here comes the macho man.

Thursday night, Thunder, Monday night, I troll.

It just kept going, you know. There was never no let up. We traveled over 300

days a year.

There's the celebration.

My sister, she's about 17 at the time. She moved down to Florida to watch my

son. So when we went to travel, I trusted somebody.

My sister had called me. She said, I'm going to be wrestling, and with Isaac

being down here, I need someone that I can trust to watch him.

And, you know, I'm down.

Randy was really nice to me.

He was just really focused on his work. Macho Man, he would take me to Toys R

Us. He would buy different action figures for me and stuff, and a couple

he actually bought himself as an action figure.

It was cool.

Oh,

that's nice.

Randy and George had the reputation in town of really partying, and that

reputation got out.

They seemed to have a good time. After shows and matches, they went out

together. She partied hard.

George wasn't afraid.

George came from the stripping community, and Randy was, I think,

vicariously in a young type of way through George. I don't know what the

was. I think it was quite extensive.

Even though he was older, he didn't act older.

He was fast going, upbeat.

He worked out every day. He was just go, go, go, go, go. That was Randy.

When I first met Randy, he was definitely doing steroids. There was

veins. He had veins in his eyelids.

If he started to regress from it, he'd see the difference in his body change.

So as soon as he thought for one second he was getting older, he'd push more.

We would always stop at his mom and dad's, and Angelo would put me in the

massage chair. He would take Randy upstairs to give him his medicine.

The dad would distribute the things that he needed to enhance his physical

being. I would stay in the chair until the shots were distributed, and then

jump in the car and leave.

We were doing alcohol, ecstasy, steroids, uppers, downers.

He liked to indulge in some ecstasy.

In Florida, it was kind of on the scene, especially over in Tampa.

He'd sometimes give me $200 or $300, and I would go and get them, and I'd give

them to him.

Randy would walk around with $1 ,000 or more worth of ecstasy pills in his hip

sack at all times.

There's one really distinctful time we were high.

It was when we were wearing the red outfits.

People

were like,

what is he talking about?

We were so high.

At the height of my success was the worst part I've ever been in my entire

I looked gorgeous. I looked beautiful.

I looked like I had it together.

And at the same time, I had nothing together.

I heard about Randy doing things to live through the grapevine.

I had heard that she had to go to Hulk Hogan's house to hide from him with his

wife. I'd heard about her eating in closets. I'd heard about all this stuff.

I didn't believe it because he was so good to me. And then as time went on,

steroids got worse and worse.

And the paranoid schizophrenia started to grow more and more.

I was so young.

I had no idea how to categorize what I was seeing.

I didn't see the side of him yet.

until now he's looking at me like that.

One day, I'm cleaning his house, and all of a sudden, I notice this fuse box on

the bottom of the broom closet.

I go to open it up. So I put the keys in, and I turn them, and I pull it out,

and I open the door, and I'm like, wow, what is that?

And there's four screens on top and four screens on bottom. Wow, that looks like

my house.

Wait a minute.

That is my house.

He's got my whole house. House taped, and then I hear him coming up the

corridor, right?

And right when he walks in the door, boom, clicked it, slammed it.

I sit there like this.

He goes, are you okay? I go, he goes, what's wrong with you? I go, take me

now. He goes, what is wrong with you? I go, take me home.

There were things that he would say, there's no way he would be able to say

if he didn't have some kind of...

camera or audio video in our home because he wasn't there.

That's when it got crazy.

There were some times where, you know, you could feel the tension between them

both. Being that young and being around a lifestyle like that, it was really

busy, you know. Everything was just really constant.

Randy had it upon delusion of our relationship would be the termination of

every kind of contract.

He knew what he was doing.

When they broke up, she went from George back to Stephanie.

Done.

Randy cut her out of every single thing.

We ended up leaving Florida, and she got a place back in her home, Rockford, and

we got our own house there and stuff, and Randy was really pissed off about

that, you know, and he wanted her. He just wanted her, you know, and she

want to be a part of it.

Nobody knew what I was going through.

And I've never really opened up and told anybody. I don't want to tarnish

somebody's reputation who was such a great person.

The things that were bad were very bad.

But the things that were good were very good.

Miss Elizabeth was very pristine, was always on this extra pristine pedestal.

I think she may have jumped out of Randy's frying pan into a hotter

to speak.

I think the ongoing scuttlebutt amongst the boys was, this is not going to end

well. We definitely did not put the brakes on.

Might have been a good idea, but we didn't.

In retrospect, of course.

In hindsight.

Because she was so deep into

this relationship, she was...

around us less and less. She was a little more isolated.

We were concerned and we were worried and we would always reach out to her and

see what we could do to help her, but it just wasn't working.

I was surprised she was running with Lex.

Lex was running real hard, so were some of his friends at the time.

And when I saw her with Lex, I told Eric Bischoff we'll be reading about her in

about two years.

Let me just tell you that right now, by you or anybody else.

You know, if he wants to fire the first shot, that's fine, because I'll fire the

last shot and machine gun the dial.

You know, the sad part is about this whole thing.

I'm supposedly the enemy, and I'm this no -good son of a bitch. Randy and Hulk

had a dysfunctional relationship, much like many marriages that I've witnessed

over the years, where a husband and a wife kind of tend to fall in and out of

love with each other.

If all the moons line up just right, you know, and everything is just great and

it's a sunny day, you know, they might be able to work something out. It was

that way with them. You know, they had their wars, you know, in Florida.

Randy Savage got on another radio station and talked crap about me. Say to

and Hogan are having sex.

That's fine, Randy. The girl you used to have sex with now is doing pornos. Join

me tonight at Stormin's on the big screen and I'll play the gorgeous George

tape. It was all apparently real. They were always kind of hot at each other.

When he started on me, I started on him, you know, and I had a bigger voice in

him because I had a buddy here in Tampa that had a local radio show, and we just

blasted him every morning, drove him crazy.

Making fun of Randy kind of gravitated to my airwaves fairly instantaneously.

within a few months of Hogan and I hanging out, we just started kind of

Randy.

Oh,

it just drove Macho Man insane.

Macho Man would go to lawyers in town and be like, yeah, there's this fat

guy who's talking a bunch of crap about me and I poop my pants.

And then the lawyers would say, well, Randy, did you poop your pants? And

they're like, well, yeah, well.

It's the debut release from Macho Man, Randy Savage.

Listen to him throw down with such songs as Let's Get It On and Be A Man.

At some point I look up and I see that Macho Man Randy Savage is a rapper.

And he's not kidding.

I've been putting my music as a priority one.

Everybody's writing a book and I'm not writing a book. I want to express myself

with music.

I think the entire motive of his rap album was to try to take a shot at

I just think.

I don't know. It didn't really gain any traction anywhere.

It was just one of those things, get it off his chest. It was part of that hate

that he had to get rid of.

Randy had a plan that Be a Man Hulk was going to sell 50 million copies.

Instead, it only sold 50 ,000.

The critics said it defied physical possibilities.

It sucked and blew at the same moment.

I don't necessarily know that any of us are really proud of it. I mean, I

wouldn't be a man if I...

didn't say, you know, to the camera that I was sorry for the things that I said.

There was

nothing

untypical about the evening.

We were hanging out, watching movies, having a few drinks and popping some

pills. Of course, you dozed off on the couch for a minute. It was a late night,

so when I realized definitely there was something wrong.

So I immediately called 911.

She's laying on the floor. I've tried to pick her up. I've tried to... Okay,

what I want you to do, I want you to go over and see if she's breathing. I can't

tell. Please send somebody here who knows what they're doing.

And I got taken in from there, and they found all the drugs in the house, and I

was placed under arrest shortly thereafter.

One day, the phone rang.

Liz is gone.

Pro wrestler Lex Luger is under arrest tonight, and his girlfriend is dead.

This all happened today. She just had so much to offer.

Both Lex and Elizabeth did what addicts often do, which is hide it. By the time

it became obvious to those of us who would have liked to have known, it was

late. They were already pretty far gone.

She was a beautiful, wonderful, gorgeous woman who had no clue how...

gifted she actually was.

Absolutely. I had a role and definitely a profoundly negative influence on

somebody who asked, did you murder her? No, I didn't force her to do drugs or

take pills.

But was I a negative influence for time that led to that happening?

Definitely.

If I could change that and go back in time, boy, I would,

but I can't.

I think the end for Elizabeth is one of the saddest things that's ever happened

in wrestling.

She wasn't supposed to go that way.

Like, she wasn't a wrestler.

She didn't abuse her body that we knew of, you know? Like, it's just, it's

heartbreaking.

I never said a word about it. I said, I'm very sorry for Elizabeth.

Thank you. I didn't pick his scabs.

I spoke when spoken to, and if I saw a mud puddle, I didn't splash him with it.

We loved each other, but we didn't talk about everything unless he brought it

up. I know that he had a lot of fond respect for Lex Luger, and I don't think

he held any animosity toward him.

At all? Really? I gave my answer.

Really feel real bad for her and her family.

And a situation where we hadn't seen each other in about maybe five, six

But, you know, we had closure and we said hello and everything was all good.

But I feel bad for her family.

It just sort of ended.

And Randy Savage seemed to just sort of fade away from wrestling.

He seemed to kind of go peacefully into the night in a way that most wrestlers

are incapable of doing.

In my whole life, it's because I want to do something rather than having to do

it. You know, so I've been a really good businessman as far as my personal

finances have gone.

From what I heard, he was doing well. He was happy. A lot of the guys leave this

business and they can't get it out of their system, can't get it out of their

blood. But Randy seemed to have done that. And if you remember, I mean, he

one of the first guys that got a decent part in a major, major motion picture.

Take the chain off. Hey, freak show.

You're going nowhere.

I got you for three minutes.

Three minutes of peak time.

I got this little switch inside my brain when you

trip that light fantastic and it's show time and you hear that roar from the

crowd. You know what I mean? And you get those chill moves all the way up the

nose of dudes.

then it's not a problem at all. In fact, it's pretty easy for me to get up for

something like that because it's either inside you or it's not. And I say that

when it stops getting to be fun for somebody, they need to get out.

When Randy Savage was done with people, he moved on.

And Randy would cut it off and move on. You didn't exist to him. So the same

thing with his personal life, same thing with his business.

It was time to move on.

He moved on. Didn't look back.

And the latter part of his life where he went gray and he kind of naturally

aged, I think that that might have been when he finally dropped the Macho Man

persona and could be Randy Poffo. And I think that that might have been a huge

relief for him.

There's arguably no more tiring character to play than Macho Man. I

from a physical voice standpoint.

You can't tell me there weren't times when he was like, I just want to not

for three days because my throat hurts.

Randy had...

reunited with his high school sweetheart.

To me, it was like Randy had found peace.

I was at a heart doctor. I look up, and there he is, and he looks great.

He's about 240 pounds. He's got his weight back.

He's smiling. He's happy. It's, hey, Mach, what's up, man? I love you. I miss

you. I love you, too, brother.

I said, damn, you have your wedding ring on. He goes, oh, yeah, I got remarried.

I was so happy. It looked so great. You could see the glow coming off him. He

was at peace, and he was himself, and he was happy.

It kind of, like, made my life to see how happy he was, and he forgave me for

whatever I did.

I remember my dad telling us about Randy having met, you know, back in the 70s,

a woman named Lynn Payne, and he had this relationship with her before he

met Miss Elizabeth.

In 1975, Randy had left baseball and he and Lynn had broken up. So it caused

Randy to leave Florida and get into professional wrestling.

Randy had told me that Lynn was always the love of his life.

They were sweethearts early on. And then, of course, they went their own

and they found their way back to each other.

And boom.

The stars never shone so bright.

They get married on Lido Beach where they had met 36 years before.

Just tell him that he was then.

He was still macho, but the pace was much different.

You could see that Randy had kind of went full circle.

So many of these guys were so tormented.

Then you hear that they died.

It's like the life of a kamikaze pilot.

We used to know Randy got to touch down back on the carrier for a while.

It was at the point of relaxing and enjoying his life with the woman that he

supposed to be with.

So he's just ready to just, ah.

And he told me that, I've got my dogs, I've got my house.

You know, I'm there.

Randy?

Getting back this high school sweetheart who hadn't been around the wrestling

business ever. She wasn't jaded, you know. And I think when he unplugged from

this crazy business, he fell back in a really beautiful place. It was probably

before he ever wrestled. You young punks, they got nothing on the macho man

Randy Savage and my generation.

Randy Savage, at the end of his life, left wrestling in a way that I really

respected and I liked.

Because he walked away from it. He pulled a lot out of WWE.

Made a ton of money.

Had a hell of a ride.

Circumstances being what they are, man.

A wonderful, wonderful life.

They were coming back from being at the store.

Randy was driving his Jeep. He said, I'm not really feeling that well.

I think I'd like to go home.

And he started to swerve out of his lane, and he

pressed the gas.

Lynn had to steer. The Jeep was going to crash into other vehicles, oncoming

vehicles, and cause all kinds of other fatalities. So she steered the

Jeep into a tree to stop it.

And Randy was pronounced dead right there on the scene.

Some sad news to report this morning. Pro wrestling icon Randy Macho Man

died Friday in a car crash in Florida.

I get a message from Largo Medical and my brother and his wife were in a car

wreck.

So I called up, and that's when they put me on the phone with Lynn, and she

explained to me what happened.

Police say Savage lost control of his Jeep Wrangler about 9 .30 this morning.

His wife suffered minor injuries.

Randy Macho Man Savage was 58.

My thought immediately went to, I wish I would have shared some more moments

with Randy.

Not too much of in -the -ring stuff, but just...

going out and having a lunch or something, you know, to the other side

Savage.

If I never would have been able to meet with Randy one last time before he

passed away, it would have probably been something that would have haunted me.

I don't think I could have really rationalized it if I never got across

him again.

He had a heart attack while driving, and that's a crazy way to die, but it's

also a very macho man way to die.

You take a Jeep and a heart attack into a tree. You're like, dude, what's up?

You kind of wonder if he negotiated that death.

He's like, what if the heart stops and the Jeep pops over the highway? Yeah,

right under a tree. And everyone's like, that's a tough way to go.

Very memorable, you know, as opposed to just dying in a bed.

It's a very Macho Man way to die. I mean, it's a sad death. I'm not taking

away from it. But I'm saying, as far as spots go, that's a suplex off the top

rope.

For as many people, it can be like, oh, it's not a real sport, you know. It's

just entertainment. By the way, I have a big update for everyone.

All sports is just entertainment.

The value that these athletes have is just as great in culture as a

athlete. In fact, with ones like Randy Savage, they're greater.

He gave us more than physical entertainment. He gave us himself as a

Snap into a Slim Jim.

Ooh, yeah.

Being in Spider -Man. I hope all of those things, these cultural moments,

up to something where he knew, like, I was a big deal. I was meaningful.

It's crazy because there are some people whose run as a professional wrestler is

amazing because it lasts 20 years.

Randy Savage, his run was really seven years.

But it's one of the greatest seven -year runs of all time.

History beckons the macho man.

He was different. He wasn't like everybody else. The perfect way to

him, he was an enigma.

Like watching an artist paint, he

could take you on that roller coaster.

He had psychology, he had athleticism, and he could tell a story. That was him

being that painter.

A whole generation, probably a few generations, have a piece of him in

heart, in their mind, in their memories.

Randy affected a lot of people all over the world.

You conjure up warm feelings thinking about Randy.

He was very intense and wanted to give his all. And I still respect someone

that.

You've got to clip by a tie and I'll tell the people that if you don't shut

and sit down.

Randy was the real deal. He loved this business. He gave his heart and his soul

and everything to this business.

And there'll never be another like him. Very few guys have this in their blood

and live it. And Randy was one of them.

on the planet and you don't want none of this.

How much longer do you think that you're going to keep this up? I'm tapering

down. I'll probably go about 248 more years and then I'll retire for a year

come back and win the world title again.