All language subtitles for Dark Side of the Ring s02e09_English

They had the look,
they had that power.

They had put it
all together.

It was a total package.

The face paint,
the shoulder pads, and...

jacked to the sky.

Man, they
trained their asses off.

I mean, they hit the
ring like badasses.

We were two badasses
trying to be wrestlers.

They were wrestlers
trying to be badasses.

They were just like
the guys in Mad Max.

I mean, they were meaner
than the guys in Mad Max.

In the history of
professional wrestling,

no duo has dominated the
ring like Hawk and Animal:

The Road Warriors.

When we'd go to Japan,
they were like Godzilla.

You look at them and
you went, "Holy shit.

I hope they don't kill me."

They were
legitimate tough guys.

They clawed their
way to the top,

becoming one of wrestling's
biggest attractions.

But an unrelenting
lifestyle for one,

ultimately led to
their downfall.

He partied hard,
played hard. He lived hard.

Whoa!

That switch would flip
after the match, and bam!

I woke up this morning...

this is where I felt sick!

It becomes a way out,
as well as an escape.

You'll feel like you wanna bedead when we're done with you!

The road can eat you alive.

At the age of 46,
Road Warrior, Hawk,

unexpectedly passed away of
a suspected heart attack.

I literally cried
like a baby.

I mean, that was my friend.

I've been through hell
and back with this guy.

[growling] What a rush!

♪

[Narrator] The art of
tag team wrestling

engages fans in a dynamic,
far more complex way

than one-on-one matches.

The greatest tag team duos in history share a 6th sense,

operating as
two halves of one whole.

There's no one
without the other.

And no team proves that more than Mike "Hawk" Hegstrand

and Joe "Animal" Laurinaitus.

In an era dominated by
iconic personalities...

Just what exactly goes throughthe Road Warriors' mind!

...Whose singles matches
were the star attraction,

The Road Warriors would break the mold as comic book heroes

come to life and
post-apocalyptic warriors

beyond the realms of earth.

The most important
thing to us

has always been
beating people up!

Their larger than life
personas propelled them to

main event status
around the world,

winning titles
wherever they went.

But the price for
success is often high,

and in this episode,
we reveal the heavy cost

paid by both men, and how
their wrestling brotherhood

met its heartbreaking end.

I think tag team wrestling's
the most interesting part of

-the wrestling business.
-Tag team wrestling is an art.

It's a 4-person
athletic dance.

I'm Road Warrior, Animal,
one half of the greatest

tag team ever in the history
of professional wrestling,

The Road Warriors.

There's more of a story told
with the tag team

than there is with the single.

You can't just put two guys
together and make 'em a tag.

You have to have two guys
that really know each other.

- [sighs]
- [growls]

My name is Barry Darsow.

I was The Repo Man,
and Demolition Smash.

And, I always thought we
had incredible matches

with The Road Warriors.

What made The Road Warriors
successful was that

they're two guys that
really clicked.

Everybody believed that
they could beat anybody,

and they looked incredible.

I saw the "It".

These two have
the "It" factor.

Paul Ellering, Manager
of The Road Warriors

for 20-something years.

The Road Warriors, it's a
group that comes along

once in every generation.

And they're always copied,
never duplicated.

Hawk and Animal
are just two,

no-nonsense badasses.

Hawk was the
off-the-wall flier guy,

and Animal was like...

the buck stops here.

Most teams had one big guy
and one little guy.

Here, you got two
fricking monsters.

They could do
things in the ring that,

prior to them,
big guys didn't do.

I'm Nikita Koloff.
Not from Russia,

although that's what I
portrayed for many years

in the
wrestling business.

It was the
chemistry of tag team,

picking the guy up
on the shoulder,

coming off the top rope.

[Paul]
The Doomsday, you know,

he flew off of the top
turnbuckle and that was

the ultimate finish in
wrestling for decades.

They knew what each otherone was thinking all the time.

But sometimes, Animal knew
more than Hawk as far as...

what was going on.

[Nikita] Joe was much morepatient than Mike was. [laughs]

Again, you hear
some of the stories, right,

of how Mike would
snap in an instant or

fly off the handle.

Oh, yeah, man.
We got along instantly.

I was like 18 year's old.

And, I knew of
Mike Hegstrand,

known as a loose cannon,
tough guy.

In 1977, Mike Hegstrand and Joe Laurinaitus are two kids

growing up on the streets
of Northeast Minneapolis,

a tough,
working-class neighborhood.

You know, I was...

at Jesse "The Body"
Ventura's gym.

And I'm sitting there,
and I'm doing inclines,

and I got like 315 pounds onthe bar and, all of a sudden,

in the middle of my set,
I get this, "whack!"

on my chest.
This big, fat palm print.

And he goes, [growling]"Laurinaitus, you ain't right.

You should be lifting
more weights than me".

That was my meeting
with Mike Hegstrand.

♪

This is a great
school photo of Mike,

and he was voted
class bully. [laughs]

[Producer] Yeah,
you can see it there.

I think that was,that was staged, but... [laughs]

Mike's reputation
in school was a scrapper.

His idea of a good time
was to go beat up someone...

Just stay away from him,he'll be a great friend to ya...

But, don't cross him.

I'm Rich Hegstrand,
Mike's older brother.

And I'm Dan Hegstrand.
I was...

4 years younger than Mike.

Mike was a lost soul
as far as,

"What am I gonna do,"
and everything.

And, our mom
had passed away. Ah...

♪

Come on, bro.
You can do it.

Ah... But, he obviously
found his way,

but it was a bit of
a road to get there.

-He was hyperactive.
-He didn't sit still, you know.

If he was sitting still, his legwas bouncing up and down, and...

you know, he was--
he had a lot of energy to...

lift weights
and punch people.

Yeah.

The way we put it is, I'm fromthe other side of the tracks

and Hawk was pretty
much the toughest guy

on his side of the tracks,
and I was pretty much

the toughest guy on
my side of the tracks.

My name is Scott Norton.

Professional Wrestler from
Minneapolis, Minnesota.

I grew up with
Mike Hegstrand,

known as Hawk.
He was gonna,

kind of like, mark his
territory in each school,

so he got into a
little brawl with a guy from

south high school and
knocked his ass out.

Got into one with the guy
from north high school,

knocked him out.
Went to west, same thing.

And he would
condition himself.

He would punch
himself in the face,

and I mean,
it wasn't just a...

I don't even want to
hit my hand that hard.

Fractures between
each one of his teeth.

You know,
basically broke his face.

Their hard-hitting lifestyle growing up in

northeast Minneapolis
would serve as a

training ground for their
careers in the ring.

And their circle of friends
soon expands to include

a massively talented roster of future superstars.

Pretty interesting that
Minneapolis was just a

mecca of guys who ended
up in the crazy,

whacky world of
professional wrestling.

Mr. Perfect Curt Hennig,
The Road Warriors,

and John Nord, and...
Barry Darsow.

Ah, Nikita Koloff.
Rick Rude.

Scott Norton, too,
right around the same time.

We all knew of each other.

We got closer as Hawk would
ask me to fill in working at

this bar, Granmma B's,
down in Minneapolis.

It's at one of Minneapolis'
toughest bars that

Joe and Mike get a
chance to cut their teeth.

Paid the bills and it was

a perfect outlet for him,
I guess you might say.

Just 'cause he could beat
up people and

get paid for it,
you know. [laughs]

I mean, it was just
like wrestling, so...

[Joe] I can't mention any names,but the guy that used to

own the bar we used
to bounce at,

he dealt in coke and when
someone owed him

a lot of money,
he'd say, "Hey, man,

you need to go have a
conversation with this guy."

I remember one time,
you know,

Hawk had one leg,
I had one leg of the guy,

and then we were hanging himover the Franklin Avenue Bridge

here in Minneapolis
and said, "Listen, man.

You need to
frigging pay up."

At Granmma B's, there was a
strip bar in the afternoon.

And then they'd always have
wet t-shirt contests and

everything so, I mean,
it brought some of

the worst of the worst guys.

Every night,
something happened.

Lo and behold, the bartender
was Ed Sharkey.

I had heard of Ed Sharkey
before because he wrestled

for Verne Gagne in the AWA,
and he comes up to us and

he goes, "Hey, I'm gonna
do a wrestling school.

You guys wanna do it?"

And, we all looked
at each other, said,

"Ah, man, I don't
know if I want to do that."

And I'm thinking to myself,
"Well, what can it hurt?"

My name is Eddie Sharkey.

I've been in the
wrestling business for,

well, most of my life.

Starting on a carnival,
I've been a

professional wrestler, referee,promoter, trainer.

I've done just
about everything.

Eddie ended up having achurch in northeast Minneapolis

and, he had a
boxing ring downstairs.

Eddie was a character.

He'd sit down
there and he'd go,

"Yeah, guys, good tackle,"
you know,

"good drop kick,"
or good whatever.

But Eddie really--
never got out of his chair.

Well, you know, if I would
leave the room or something,

I said, "No, don't
try a suplex," or...

I mean, you know,"You're gonna hurt yourself."

And, I'd walk out of the
room for whatever reason and

the one's got the
other up in the air,

and oh, my goodness.

Ed never showed us how to
throw what they call today

a "working punch".

So, we would literally
back up and go, bam!

You know, and
punch each other.

Nose would be broken
and bleeding like crazy.

[Barry] Eddie never really
smartened us up on exactly

what was going on until
after a while,

he says, you know,
"Well, here's what you do."

Eddie soon realizes that this promising crop of talent

might have a future
in the squared circle.

Ole Anderson was a
very, very good wrestler.

Another Minnesota guy.
And he became a promoter.

He worked for Ted Turner
so, he was the main guy.

And, he came up
to Gramma B's.

[Joe] One night, some guy
was misbehaving and

I had to escort him out.

Well, I had one hand behind
his collar and one hand on

his belt loop, and I threw
him through the front door.

And, we had this
trip wire outside.

And, we used to gauge each
other by how many flips

a guy could do
around this wire.

And when the guy
gets down flipping,

he lands right one
Ole Anderson's shoes.

And alls I did was say,
"Hey, how you doing?"

Then I turn around,
went back in the bar.

Next thing you know, Ole
brings me down to Atlanta.

While Ole recruits Joe to work in his Georgia territory,

his future tag team
partner has already been

scouted by
another promotion.

Mike started first for
Al Tomko, up in Canada.

Now, you men up there
that are married to some

good-looking wife, you know,
when your wife takes

a look at this man,
she's gonna go crazy!

I went down for Ole Anderson
as The Road Warrior,

singularly, by myself.

I looked like a giant versionof The Village People.

Now, keep in mind, when Joe
broke into the business

he had got his
girlfriend pregnant.

And, Joe did
the right thing,

and by that,
meaning, he got married...

and, 'cause he wanted to,
you know, raise his child.

You know, I was sending
all my money that

I was making back home.

I was wrestling
9 times a week,

making $150 total.

You know, I lost 50 pounds
of body weight.

I said, "I can't
live off this."

And Mike's experience wasn't
that great up in Vancouver.

So, we both came
back to Minnesota.

I actually could make more
money in one night bouncing

than I was making
working there in two weeks.

Ole Anderson came back
into the bar and Ed Sharkey

showed him a picture that Mikehad taken up in Vancouver.

Ole thought it was
a picture of me.

Eddie Sharkey goes, "No,that's not Joe. That's Mike."

And Ole goes,
"There's two of these guys?"

[Eddie] "Joe and Mike,
you're a tag team.

Be in Atlanta next week."

He goes, "Son of a bitch,"
and then Ole called me up

and said, "Hey, I want to
bring you guys in

as The Road Warriors."

From rough and
tumble beginnings in the

Minneapolis bar scene, Joe and Mike are about to be

catapulted into super
stardom and eventually

towards their own undoing.

♪

In 1983, Joe Laurinaitis and Mike Hegstrand are recruited

to wrestle in Georgia, except this time as a tag team.

They have no idea they're
about revolutionize

the world of wrestling.

Hawk, thanks for spending
a few moments with us.

What got you
started in wrestling?

I just started watching it
one time and I thought

if they could, I could do it
better and first time we

appeared together
on TV, you know,

we were both real green.

[Announcer] And The Road
Warriors moving up.

[Joe] The start of The Road
Warriors on TV was like

surreal for Hawk and I
because it was like,

man, here's all these
megastars in

Georgia Championship Wrestling.

There's Sergeant Slaughter
and there's Tito Santana,

and there's Dusty Rhodes,
and I'm going,

holy crap, there's some
major superstars here.

And then, here we are,
now we're a part of this.

Upon their arrival
in the territory,

matchmaker Ole Anderson
approaches his new tag team

with a bold, new idea.

[Joe] They actually handed
us the belts when we

got at the TV station.
They say, "Here's your belt.

Here's your belt."
And we're going,

"Where do we say we won 'em?"They said,

"Ah, say you won 'em in a tagteam tournament in Chicago."

[Announcer]
From Chicago!

[Paul] Ole says, "This is gonnabe the new tag team and

-they're Minnesota boys like you.
-Take care of 'em."

The names, they both
came up with themselves.

I think Ole pointed at me, says,"You look like an Animal.

And then, he said to Hawk,
"You look like--"

I forget what he said, but Hawksays, "I think I'm a Hawk."

So, it became
Animal and Hawk.

After their very
first match together,

newly crowned champions
Hawk and Animal

soon join forces
with Paul Ellering.

He acts as both their on
and off-screen manager,

leading them to
the big leagues.

So, I just took 'em
from that day one.

They jumped in my van,
and that was it.

[Mike] Paul was, was great at,at fine tuning us.

You know, he...

he said go with what your,
your raw strength.

Go with what you do best.

We used to sit
there at Denny's,

and Paul would take the
time to draw on a napkin.

"Animal, you're here.
Hawk, you're here.

Throw this guy into this
rope after you make the tag.

Hawk, you drop down.
Let's incorporate that in."

We had the motorcycle boots
and everything, you know,

and that's what
we wore down to the ring.

After about a month,
Ole goes,

"Hey, we got an
idea for you guys.

Remember the heel guy in the
Road Warrior movie that had

the red mohawk and
the feather in his ear?

Well, we want you to try and dosomething with the face paint."

[Paul] And that became an
evolution because the early

face paint was, you know, like ablack eye or something.

[Joe] But we were tryingdifferent things at that time to

try to get a painting of
expressing the way we feel,

and Mike Hegstrand goes,
"Hey, I got another idea.

What if Animal shaves his hairinto a mohawk to look like

the guy in the movie?
I'll shave my head in a

double mohawk so
when Animal bends over and

I bend over,
we plug our heads in,

it looks like one unit."

[Paul] You know,
that came from Animal.

That was his idea.

And, it was genius,
on his part.

I had a friend of mine
that worked for Honeywell.

He milled me some spikes.
I said, "Listen, man.

I need some 6-inch spikes,
I want some 4-inch spikes,

some 2-inch spikes, and Isat in my garage with my drill

and I drilled holes
in those shoulder pads."

Licking my thumb,
like, fricking...

Picasso, right.

Then I put some
chains on them,

and that was the birth ofThe Road Warrior shoulder pads.

They put 'em on and it was
just frosting on the cake.

[Scott] And, you know,
the people just ate it up.

These poor guys
they're working against.

I mean,
they ran people over.

Hawk used to apologize to
them in the back:

"I'm sorry for what's gonna
happen to you, pal,

but your ass is getting
kicked." [laughs]

[Paul] They were bad boys,
but when they were bad,

they were very good.

[Joe] Man, as long as we stayedaway from the guy's nuts and

we didn't break their nose
or anything, it was cool.

But, if you look back, man,
some of those clothes lines

we hit guys with, guys were
doing natural flips

we were hittin' 'em so hard.

As cable was spreading
across the country,

it was creating
a revolution...

in the wrestling business.

Unlike other promotions
in the early 1980s,

Georgia's World Championship Wrestling enjoys a

prime-time spot
on Atlanta's TBS,

the first TV station to be broadcast across the entire USA.

I told the guys,
I think it was '84.

I said, "We can
work the whole world.

We'll just make it
our territory."

[Joe] Paul would book us in theAWA or he would book us

for the Rougeau's, up in Canada.

Go to Puerto Rico
for Carlos Colon,

and then go to the NWA.

And then, you know, we were
going all over the world,

not tied to any one company.

[Mike]
Paul's very instrumental in,

in not letting the promoters
manipulate us.

We were one of the few tag
teams that were main events

every night in the arena.

We never stayed any one
place and it kept us fresh.

And it was always good
because they bring us in,

and the place would fill up.

Everybody in the
business recognized

that Road Warrior pop.
Just loud.

I've lost all my hearing.
[laughs]

Even today, if someone gets
a good cheer going down

to the match, it's called
The Road Warrior Pop.

You know, first trip to Japan,we got there,

we get off the flight...
We gotta do an interview.

In this room was literally
150 photographers and

reporters from all over
the country of Japan.

They said there was more
reporters there than when

Michael Jackson
came over to Japan.

We will fight tonight like wewill never have fought before!

Well, Japan wanted us and,
the Japanese people

always like to be scared.

You know, we're entertainers
as well as wrestlers.

Hey, you guys hungry?

[Joe] You know, the Japanese
responded to us because

we were so far
ahead of our time.

We were so nothing like
the Japanese wrestlers.

We don't care who it is.

We're gonna stop
everybody in the country.

I mean, we wrestled
some top guys, man,

you know, Killer Khan...

When I pressed Killer Khan,
Japanese people were like,

"[speaking Japanese]".
Like, "I can't believe it!"

Killer Khan was
6"3, 6"4, 365 pounds.

I press landed him
over my head. [growls]

Then I gorilla slammed
him down.

It was national news.

[Japanese news coverage]

It was no secret that,you know, Mike liked to party.

Partied hard, ran hard.

There was nothing
he was afraid of.

No situation bothered him.

Mike got involved
with these people,

the Japanese
mafia over there.

They would pick him up and
he would go out to

dinner with them, and
next thing you know,

you wouldn't see
him for two days.

He'd meet Japanese
mafia over there and,

he'd tell me about, if you
made a mistake over there,

they just took a digit
off of your fingers.

And he'd come homewith just stacks of $100 bills,

which he declared.
[laughs]

I think Joe was more the
guy that would rather,

you know, go out to
dinner and, go to the room,

and get some sleep so
you can get up and

have a great
workout the next day.

Where Hawk, he was wild,

he wanted to go out to the bar,he wanted to do this.

[JOE] He had no shut off
valve to it, man.

It was just like...

go, 100 miles an hour,
all the time.

That's when it started
hitting a nerve with me.

♪

By 1986, The Road Warriors
have become one of the

top wrestling
attractions in the world.

To be that good in that
many different territories,

it's unprecedented.
My vision was, of course,

to make money,
you know, for all of us.

This is an opportunity that onlycomes along once in a lifetime.

Everybody out
there watching...

we'd like to kick
your teeth in too.

My first reaction to seeing
Mike in everything was, wow.

This is... this is amazing.

And I, it just took
you by surprise how,

how far he had come in such ashort period of time, really.

As their popularity grows,
the promotions booking

The Road Warriors realize
they're not just getting a

run of the mill tag team, they're getting rising stars

with a guaranteed
sellout crowd.

The greatest thing about
The Road Warriors is that...

we never had to
change who we were,

whether we were
babyface or heel.

I mean, we were stone cold heelsuntil we wrestled the Koloffs.

Probably some of the best
matches that I remember are

the Russian Chain matches
that we had against them.

And now we're getting USA cheersand cheers from the fans.

We were over so
bad as heels,

it made us great babyfaces.

Your winners of the match,
The Road Warriors!

In early 1986, Carolina-based Jim Crocket Promotions

approaches The
Road Warriors with an offer

to headline their
flagship event.

Dusty Rhodes calls
us and he says,

"Hey, we got this idea."

♪

A scaffold match.

Had never been done
on a national scale.

Man, I was 310 pounds,
315 pounds,

and Hawk was 270.

Then you had bothThe Midnight Express up there.

They were over
200 pounds, each.

About 3 days before
the scaffold match,

Hawk broke a small bone in
the bottom part of his leg,

over in Tokyo.

We were the old school,
the show must go on.

And he wrestled up there
with a broken leg in a boot.

You know, he didn't want to
let the people down 'cause

it was sold out and...
it was a big, big deal.

Well, what you see
in a lot of sports,

and wrestling's
no different, is,

there's injuries and
there's pain,

and you just self-medicate
after a while.

You don't even
go to a doctor.

And then it becomes
a vicious cycle.

And, that's probably
where Hawk was at that time.

It started getting bad latterpart of NWA, WCW run

before we went to WWF.
The drinking's a no brainer.

I mean, that's...

you know, Hawk was straight
up vodka on the rocks guy.

The muscle relaxers
were a big part.

I'll say 85% of the
guys that died early,

in the wrestling business,
the common denominator was

the muscle relaxers.

I think...

Joe was very disappointed
in Hawk and,

he didn't let that
out so people knew it.

But, knowing Joe,
I could see that.

I think it's just
like any marriage,

you know,
which it kind of was,

that I don't think they
always, you know,

saw eye to eye
on everything.

So, I think there was, you know,some friction there at times.

It wasn't until he,
we really got into...

WWF years where it
really started to get bad.

The Road Warriors have conquered the wrestling world

with one
big exception...

and the pressures of
performing in the WWF

will soon set the stage
for their downfall.

The WWF was
always on our screen.

It looked like they were the
place to go in this

wrestling war, if you wanted
to be on the winning side...

And we did.

You're gonna feel the pain
by the hands of

The Legion of Doom!

Vince had just hired
the Modern Day Warrior,

Kerry Von Erich. He already
had the Ultimate Warrior.

And he says, "Hey, I know
you guys have been

The Road Warriors.
Can you think of a

different name that we
could use to call you guys?"

I said, "How about
the Legion of Doom?"

"Oh, that's great!
I love The Legion of Doom!

Let's call you guys
The Legion of Doom!"

It was actually He-Man.

The most powerful
man in the universe!

And Hawk would watch
that all the time.

He always watched He-Man.

This was Hawk...

[imitating voice] "Back at
the Legion of Doom!"

And then, he, he'd just
start to make up stories,

and this is while
we're driving in the car.

And he'd just start to
make up that we were

The Legion of Doom.

[cheering]

[Joe] The WWF, on the road atthe time, was a grind.

And you were busy
14 days on, 4 days off,

all year long.

So, it's like your
whole life is no sleep.

But when you get in the ring,

then all of a sudden,
you get an injury.

Well, now there's no sleep,
you have to train.

That injury doesn't go away
and you have to perform.

So now, all of a sudden,
you take a pain pill.

Pretty soon, you're drinking,you're taking pain pills,

you're taking this,
you're taking that.

That's kind of the cycle
that a lot of guys got into.

But now, Hawk's downward spiral is about to intersect

with The Road Warrior's
historic climb to the top,

and in front of a
record-setting crowd.

♪

To the non-wrestling fan,
I wrestled for many years

in the WWF.

The Godfather's probablywhat I'm most well known for.

♪

Alright, so...

We're in this club,
and then all of a sudden,

for some reason, Vince decidesto take everybody's finish.

In The Road Warrior's case,
it hurt people.

Have you seen their finish?

I wouldn't take it
in the ring!

And Vince took that
finish in the club.

The CEO of this big,
------- company is taking

people's finishes in a
------- titty bar?

Just, I was like...

♪

Just as The Road Warriors
are reaching new heights at

Vince McMahon's WWF,
Hawk's substance abuse

was becoming harder
and harder to hide.

That's when we were starting
to get into the age of doing

the Pay Per Views now.

And now we're doing
the big, huge events,

and everything else so,
there was a lot of respect

and a lot of pride in what
you did for your work 'cause

you wanted to be the guy
that was gonna be top dog

on that Pay Per View.

Those WWF years was
when it started getting

real kind of nasty.

He would fail a drug test
and then there would be

3 months off.

And of course, me being
a tag team partner,

I had to take a few
months off with him.

But Mike, again, he wasn't
shy about, about, you know,

hiding anything.
You know, whether it was...

you know, his drinking
or his, his...

his drug use,
or his steroid use,

he was pretty outspoken
about, about all of it.

As Hawk drifts
closer to the edge,

over 80,000 fans
await their match

at London's Wembley Stadium,

and things are about to
come to a head.

Wembley Stadium was a
classic event 'cause

they had 90,000 people there.

We were supposed to wrestlefor the tag team championship

in Wembley Stadium.

And, getting ready to go out
to the show and

we're doing a run through.

Vince McMahon's trying to
tell us what we're gonna do.

And I could just see where
Vince is fuming 'cause

every time Vince tried
to say something,

Hawk's going, "Now Vince,
I got this idea."

Found out later there was
this thing called placidyls,

which is another kind of littlelike a hallucinogenic drug

that Hawk had took it and
it lasts, like, for 6 hours.

And here we are, gotta drivemotorcycles down to the ring.

We went from semi-main event
match against

The Natural Disasters, towrestling Money Incorporated,

I think, their first
or second match.

As Animal watches his
partner step into the ring,

it's clear that Hawk is
in no shape to perform.

Getting in the ring and they
wanted us to do the finish,

the Dooms Day off the
top rope and everything,

and I said, "We can't do it.

He's gonna fall
off the top rope."

And he goes,
"No, no, we gotta."

I said, "Look at him.
He can't do it."

They were watching
him and, you know,

Hawk was kind of
like inebriated, you know,

quite a bit and...
so, we changed the finish.

Hawk's like
right in the middle.

I kind of had to push
him out of the way and...

When Hawk was on,
he was the best, man.

Nobody was better.

But, when he kind of waslike that, it kind of really...

I wasn't very
happy with him.

I knew there was a
suspension coming on,

that I was fricking hot.

[Barry] You know, and it's like,we're gonna spend

millions of dollars on
TV and do all this stuff

for these guys at Wembley,
the biggest show ever,

and if he came
and messed up...

Right there, you're not
the top guys anymore.

Irritated by
Hawk's recklessness,

Animal chooses to
go his separate way, alone.

We went to, from that
London taping to

Hershey, Pennsylvania
to do TV.

And when we got to
Hershey, Pennsylvania,

Paul Ellering and I
are ready to do TV,

waiting for Hawk
to do interviews.

Well, Hawk hadn't
shown up yet.

[Paul]
Nobody knew where Hawk went.

Well, he's just not
on the plane.

Nobody knew where Hawk was.

Got a phone call, and Hawk
called Vince's secretary

and said, "Hey, I quit."
We're sitting there, like,

okay, now what am
I gonna do?

Animal decides he's not
gonna chase after

his partner this time...

after performing the role
of fixer for so many years.

I think it just got the time todraw the line in the sand and,

listen, man, shit,
I've had enough. That's it.

I'm fricking done with this.

[Barry] You know, Joe was
probably in a panic,

wondering how in the world
are we gonna solve this?

You know, wrestling
is your whole life.

It's all you have.

Your family's at home,
and you're with the guys,

and you finally
get that push and,

you can't have something benegative to bring you back down

and that's,
that's what was happening.

Mike kind of, you know,
the short fuse and losing

his temper and, whether it
was with the promoter,

could have a real impact
on Joe's career and

even Ellering's career, right?

So, I'm thinking
to myself, well,

I'm gonna be a business man,
and I'm gonna serve out

the dates that I
have left with WWF,

to protect our name, in case
we ever want to come back.

I said, man, I want
to do these dates, Mike,

so we leave on
good terms.

Right, to be businessmen.
I put my foot down and,

Hawk was so out of his mindhe called up a couple guys and

ended up working out
his own deal in Japan.

Like, screw the team.

He just went on his own.
Then we were done.

Well, he tried to get it overthere and had Kensuke Sasaki

dressing up as
The Power Warrior,

all spiked shoulder pads,
the face paint, and...

[Japanese commentary]

I said, man, that's...
that's our gimmick.

♪

Hawk inadvertently leaves
the future of the world's

biggest tag team in limbo
by replacing Animal and

continuing The Road
Warriors' brand in Japan.

Standing in front of you
lies the future in

tag team wrestling, my new
partner, Power Warrior!

What are you doing, bro?

I'm not doing
that here in the US.

I'm not having
anybody replace you.

I'm by myself!

I ended up doing a
two on one match and,

I herniated a couple discs.

[Paul] Animal got injured and,you know,

there were like two years
there where I didn't do

anything with
wrestling anymore.

And, I didn't think
I'd ever go back.

While Animal lies in wait
recovering from his injury,

Hawk presses on.

But without the
guidance of his partner,

he spirals out of control.

Like 3 different times
he'd been rushed into

an emergency room of
drug overdoses.

He told me he had a head-on
collision with an 18-wheeler

and rolled the pickup truck
6 times with no seatbelt on,

and walked away from it.

You know, I don't
know how many...

ah, near death
experiences Hawk had.

I know he had a few.

When he got Hep C,
it's like he got

slapped in the face like, wow.

He's not the first wrestler
that contracted that.

You know, guys in this
wrestling business, man,

used to do some crazy things,you know, speed balling,

mixing different drugs together,

different things like
that where, you know,

guys would share a
needle and just go,

"Oh, god dang, buddy.
You guys are nuts."

He was on the interferon,

which is the medicine
you get from Hep C.

He fricking cured himself
of the Hep C.

But the worst part about it
is the doctor gave him the

green light to go do
whatever he wanted to do so,

he thought that meant,
okay, I guess I can

keep drinking and partying.

Hawk's wild side shows
no sign of slowing down,

but in 1997, a new opportunity arises from the WWF and

is too tempting
for either man to resist.

Vince McMahon has
been great to us...

and the WWF has
been great to us.

And they're a classy
organization and we only

want to associate ourself
with a classy organization.

I, I knew eventually that
it would come back to it

was gonna be The Road Warriors.

We were so unique in the
way we did everything,

and we were so unique
as a tag team and...

it's like nothing else likeit in the wrestling business.

[Mike] Animal and I have
become so close.

We're probably the only
tag team that's been around

14 years straight.
We're pretty much a unit.

Their new contract comes with a strict insurance policy,

guaranteeing they
will make their matches.

But WWF introduces a
third member to the team,

29-year-old ex-Denver
Bronco, Daren Drozdoff.

They introduce Droz, and...

he was gonna be like
the youngest member

of The Road Warriors.

Actually, I remember
when I first saw them.

You know, they had
been icons forever.

Hey, this is Droz.

You know, I'm one of the
players they brought in for

The Road Warriors
to work with and,

you know, had a
great run with 'em.

While the WWF has enforced a contingency plan,

it also sees The Road Warriors'
real life problems

as something it
can capitalize on.

Vince McMahon came
to us and said, "Hey,

we want to do this angle
with you guys where Hawk's,

we're gonna portray him
as drunk and have him,

happens on TV."

[Commentary] I don't know
if he's inebriated.

The referee's not gonna
start this match, is he?

Yeah, he'd come out like
staggering around while,

you know, they were sayingI was trying to separate them.

[Commentary] Well, Droz...
just assaulting Hawk.

"We don't need him, you know,he's messed up again." So...

[Announcer]
Drozdoff!

Delivering Hawk's
own move to Hawk!

Yeah, it was,
it was heartbreaking.

But that's wrestling.

They take the dominant part
of your personality and

they just make it bigger.

You know, it was
kind of tough.

It's like, you know,
they're doing this.

But, he had been
through it and

he didn't have a
problem with it.

They wanted Hawk to climb
the Titantron and

they wanted me to...

you know, they wanted
me to portray like,

"Hey, Hawk, don't jump,"
type of thing.

Hawk, I wish I could say Iknow how you feel, but I can't!

But I care about your life!

Droz did a deal where they
made up, made pretend he was

gonna go up to the Titantronand help Hawk

and Hawk had all his demons
and everything else and

he was drunk up there.

When they really
went to go grab him,

he really went
and pushed 'em.

Get his shirt-- Ah, no! Ah!

Got away.

You know, to be
honest with ya,

I didn't really have it in meto want to do the angle.

It was too close to what
was going on in real life.

And that bothered me.

The angle is not only unpopular with Hawk and Animal,

but with the
fans as well.

And once again, The Road
Warriors make the choice

to hit the road on
their own terms.

We were wrestling
in Australia and,

you had the beach,
you got drinks,

you could buy Xanax
over the counter,

and so, it's just
not a good mix.

Rumor had it that 3
or 4 of the guys,

and Hawk was one of 'em,
had gotten ahold of some

party essentials,
let's just say,

and they were pretty much
up for two days.

So, when you're doing the
coke and you're doing

the muscle relaxer,
you're going,

yo, yo, yo, like a yo-yo.

Your heart can't
take that all the time.

And, as I'm looking around
the arena by the

-entrance area there, I see this,
-I see this big crowd of people.

And I'm thinking
to myself, well,

somebody just came
back from the last match,

they're just laying down.

And I push everybody aside
and it's fricking Hawk,

and they're putting
the oxygen mask on him.

I said, "Whoa, whoa, whoa.
What are you doing?"

I said, "He's gotta
go out wrestling."

They said, "Man,
he can't wrestle."

He goes, "This guy's about
ready to stroke out,"

and they took him
to the hospital.

Hawk had cardiomyopathy,

his heart was about
ready to blow up.

And he calls me up
and he says,

"Animal, you gotta
come get me."

I said, "What's going on,
man?"

He goes, "I am not dying
in this fricking country."

Hawk and I were literally,
when we were on the road,

we were brothers.
It was a hard situation

because there was
such a love of the guy,

but the hate of
what was going on.

So, I went, picked Hawk up,

checked him out of
the hospital -

against doctor's orders -
and from Sydney,

flew all the way
to LA and from LA,

he was going back to Tampa.

I said,
"You're on your own now."

When it seems Hawk and
Animal's run as wrestling's

most dominant tag team is
about to come to an end,

an unlikely event brings
them back together

in a way nobody expects.

♪

Animal is faced with no
choice but to strike out on

his own when Hawk's drug
affliction threatens to

ruin both of their careers.

I had just gotten
home off the road.

I got done
working out at the gym,

and there's 6,
300-pound guys called

The Christian Power Team.
They did this event.

So, I went to it and I
was pretty impressed by it.

Eventually, Joe shared that
story with me and I said,

"Man, why don't you come outto this conference in Phoenix?

Come on out."
He goes, "Could Hawk come?"

They came to Phoenix and,
I just remember Mike was the

first one to the altar and
wanted to make a decision to

give his life to the lord.

And, that weekend,we actually even baptized him.

We did a--
In the swimming pool,

we did a water
baptism with him.

And, from that point on,
Hawk lived in a good way.

I think he found religion,
and then,

he married a gal named Dale.

And, he was very
happy with her.

He was a different
person then, with her.

Now, my motivation's
different than what it was

when I first started out.

My motivation now is
my family, my fiancé.

To make sure that if
something were to ever

happen to me,
she's not gonna be hurt.

He used to say,
"God has 9 lives,

but God gave me 10, so I
can give my life to Jesus."

He was moving out of his
house off the beach and,

he had just moved the last
piece of heavy furniture

in the house for
his wife, Dale.

And he said, "Dale,
I'm gonna go upstairs and

lay down for a little bit.
I don't feel well."

And I was out
in my backyard,

and all of a sudden,
I get a phone call.

Friend of mine,
Bob, and he goes,

"Hey, have you
talked to Mike?"

I said, "Yeah, man,
talked to him last night."

He goes, "Huh. Have you
talked to him yet today?"

And I said, "No."

And he goes,
"Joe, Mike died."

-It was an early Sunday morning,
-October the 19th,

when the world of wrestling
was saddened to hear

that Michael Hegstrand
had passed away

at the young age of 46.

And it wasn't that
he OD'd or whatever.

You know, it was just
that his heart just stopped.

It was probably one of
the hardest things

I ever had to go through.

Well, it was, you know,
I was just at home and,

and Animal calls me
up and, and tells me.

You know, "Hawk is gone."

Joanie, my wife,
I said...

"We gotta get the..." Hm.
Yeah, we--

"We gotta get the black van
and drive to the funeral."

The old black van that I
took him to the airport in

our first day together.
I still had that black van.

Went to the K-Mart and got
cans of black spray paint,

cover up all the rust.
And, we got in the black van

and drove all the way to Tampa.55 miles an hour.

Got passed by 10,000 cars.

Yeah. I remember. Ah...

October 19th, 2003.

The dark clouds
covered the bright sun.

Today we lost our friend.

Our brother of planes,
trains, and automobiles.

Many miles.

If I could steal a line from,

from The Outlaw Josey Wales,

"Hawk, it is good that men likeus met in the struggle of life."

Hawk's death brings to an
end a partnership that has

not been matched in
wrestling ever since.

He was unique both in
and out of the ring.

A warrior, a partner,
a friend, and a brother.

He, he wasn't Hawk.
[sniffles]

Yeah.

I think that is akey point is, he was still Mike.

We never looked
at him as Hawk.

He really gave a
shit about his friends.

He just had your back, andhe probably knew I needed it.

♪

Biggest compliment that I
can make to Hawk is that

everybody liked
to be around him.

So, it was a huge void.

And, Animal would know a
lot more about that than me

because they've been
together and

always thought of as a twosome.

A lot of things in common.
At the gym, worked hard.

They were a great tag team.

They performed
unbelievably in the ring.

But you know,
totally different.

They were brothers.

You know, brothers,
they love each other,

but they'll have a
fight once in a while.

I mean, listen, man, there weretimes where we were

at each other's throat 'causewe were together so much.

But, 99.9% of the time there
was a common respect there.

It's over half my life, man,
I was with Hawk.

From being stars in Japan
to being family members,

to being brothers,
to everything else.

You know, now what do
I do now he's gone?

And that's the
hardest thing.

I think we will be rememberedas the greatest tag team

in professional wrestling
and I'd just like to go down

as one tough dude
that had one tough partner.

Hawk should be
remembered as one of the...

one half of the
greatest tag team ever.

He had one of the best
punches in wrestling,

one of the best
interviews, for sure.

Well!

Hawk was
definitely a character.

To be honest with you, a partof the wrestling business

died when Hawk died.