Danhausen in action | Image Credits : IMAGO/Icon Sportswire
Sportshadow got the opportunity to interact with WWE Hall of Famer, Godfather, in the thirteenth episode of its Wrestleshadow podcast series.
Godfather discussed why Danhausen is the highest selling WWE merchandise seller, backstage stories with the Undertaker and Vince McMahon, the Rock's rise to a Hollywood star, and much more in this exclusive interview.
Here are the edited excerpts while speaking to Godfrey Fonseca.
Social media, people, video games, movies (On things which have changed). Kids back in the day, when I was Papa Shango, now they're 40 years old, they were 8 years old or 10 years old then, and there wasn't any PlayStations and games of war and movies. So, I was the real boogeyman.
People weren't seeing that type of stuff on TV. So, for a lot of 40-year-old men right now, I was the real boogeyman. And even when I do these conventions and I sign as Papa Shango and I dress up as Papa Shango, the parents, I go to shake their hand and they're shaking, but the kids are laughing, "Ha, ha!" They're not scared at all because of what they see today.
The days of the big 6'7, 300lb wrestlers are over now. And with all the indie scene and everything going on, now wrestling is more normal looking people instead of the big guys. I have nothing against him. I've met him four or five times as Papa Shango. He's very respectful. I wish him the best.
That just goes to show you how wrestling's changed and now the number one merchandise seller is a voodoo guy. I wish I was around right now.
First of all, that's a misconception. I didn't miss my cue. I didn't go until they told me to go. I was behind the curtain like a track star getting ready to run because it was a long run. The mistake that they made was they never timed how long it was going to take to run from the curtain and it was a long run to the ring. So, they never considered that.
And as time has gone on, Bruce Pritchard, a lot of people said our mistake was, we should have timed how long it was going to take him. We didn't do that. The reason that Papa Shango's run didn't go longer had nothing to do with that. Nothing at all.
I didn't hear about that. I didn't know I missed the cue until years, years later when I'm doing these conventions. I'm like, what are you talking about I missed my cue?
I just knew what I had to do when I got there and I never heard one thing about it from anybody because it wasn't my fault. I'm not going to throw the person under the bus, but it was the person that was at the gorilla station.
As of what happened to Papa Shango, that has nothing to do with the WWF at the time. It has to do with me. I was going through a really, really, bad divorce. I was in a bad place. I'm literally getting into real fights every night.
The Undertaker's pulling me off of people every night because we hung out in strip clubs, biker bars. It is easy to get in a fight in these locations and I was looking for a fight.
So me, the Undertaker, and Vince (McMahon) went into a room and we decided the best thing for Charles Wright was to go home and get my mind right because I was in a real dark, dark place and, I was either going to kill somebody or somebody was going to kill me.
File pic of the Undertaker | Image Credits : IMAGO/Depositphotos
I met Mark (Callaway) like in '88 and we became a a tag team called Death Express in the Mid-South with Jerry Lawler in Memphis. We became really good friends.
First of all, when I met 'Taker, he didn't drink Jack Daniels. That's for me. When I met Taker, he didn't listen to country music. That's for me. When I met him, he had no tattoos. And most importantly, he didn't ride a Harley. That's for me.
Taker will tell you he's like, "Dude, all the American badass is this dude over here talking about me." But all I tell people about Taker is, I just introduced him to a new way of life and, he took to it real well.
You have a better answer to that than me. He was lucky. What he did caught on and he did what he did very well. He took care of the character. He took care of other wrestlers.
He has a lot of love for wrestling. He cares a lot about the sport. So, everything was in order. He has the look. He has the talent and he played his character very well. Why would you not like a big 6'10 dead man?
There was a lot of guys that wanted (to join BSK). I'm not going to mention names. There was a lot of guys that wanted to join, but they weren't part of the crew. And we weren't political like The Kliq. They were much more political. We were just brothers.
And if you didn't hang out with us, you weren't going to become BSK. You had to do what we did. And, the name BSK came from TV. We would be at TV for five or six hours sitting around. And, we would play Dominoes. And that's where Yokozuna came up with the name Bone Street Krew, BSK.
There's four or five guys that wanted to join, but Crush was the last one to get in. (After that) we cut it off.
Stone Cold Steve Austin and Chris Jericho in action in 1995 | Image Credits : IMAGO/Newscom World
It's a different time. It's different people. It's different management. It's a different era. So things are different.
Now, the wrestlers as far as I see, don't have the creativity that we did. One thing about me, I was never scripted. As Godfather, I might have to mention a town and event but I would never be scripted.
And, I don't know if they still have that. Last time I was there, I was amazed because it's so much different in the locker rooms. It's so much different. When I was there, everybody was a bunch of friends and buddies. It was the guys that hung out together.
Now it's more of a business. The guys are more concerned about how many Instagram followers or TikTok followers they have than what they actually do.
I tell people you want to become a wrestler now, get a million followers. They'll put you in there right away.
I'm not mad at anybody for making money. People hated on me when I came in as Papa Shango. They thought I was going to be the end of wrestling. So, I am not mad at anybody. God bless them! I hope they're all making money.
Vince has done so many wild things. Where where do you start? Godfather and Papa Shango is not even on the list. He's a very creative, very smart, very good person. And no matter what you hear about him, don't believe what you see on TV. He has always been very, very good to me and my family.
I was at his 80th birthday party. I was invited to that. That whole McMahon family has been nothing but good to me and my family.
Something on a side note, I don't know if you know what a legends contract is. Well, they started that (the legends contract) in 2003. That's when I finished up in 2003. I had been on it continuously since 2003.
23 years, I've been on it. And they just signed me to another five-year deal. They just came out with an action figure, some pants.
They've been so cool with me. My characters, even though they were short-lived, people remember them.
All I will say is the money seemed to be better when Vince was running things. And I'll let it go at that. But, my royalty checks have gone way down since Vince left.
Didn't change me at all as a person. Not at all. Put more money, put a little bit more money in my pocket. Bought me a bigger house, but other than that, I'm the same person going in as I did coming out. I haven't changed a bit.
When you see the Papa Shango, Kama/ Kama Mustafa, those were all gimmicks. The Godfather is really me and, it's just me acting like me. Not scripted. That's how I always am. After 40 years old, I became a nicer, funner person. And that's just me being me. There's nothing scripted. It's just me. I still act the same.
File pic of the Rock | Image Credits : IMAGO/Icon Sportswire
No, I knew he had talent when they put me in the Nation of Domination because they wanted to make the Nation bigger, blacker, and stronger. So they put me in there. He was always cool. I don't have his phone number, but, if I see him anywhere, he'll go out of his way to come and say hi and thank me.
He always thanks us for helping him start his career. Good guy, though. I always say if there's anybody that got that type of success, it's glad it was him because he's a good dude. There's a lot of a**holes that make that type of money and he's not one of them and and I'm proud of him. I'm glad for him.
Did I think he was gonna become one of the biggest movie star? No. But I knew that he was on his way to become one of the greatest wrestlers.
And when they put me in the Nation, Vince pulled me and Ron into the office and he's like, "Do you know who Dwayne Johnson is?" I didn't know who the hell he was. And Ron did. He goes, "Well, listen. I tried doing this with him. It didn't work. I tried this. It didn't work."
He goes, "This time I'm going to put him in the Nation." And he says, "Once I get people to hate this kid, he will be the biggest thing that wrestling's ever saw." And that's what Vince told me and Ron. He says, "When I switch that kid to babyface, he's going to be over." And he was.
I mean, he had a lot of talent. I'm proud of him. Good for him. Even though, he never put any of us in any of his movies, but that's cool.
I've never seen anybody taking steroids. I'm sure there were a lot of people who took it. You could tell by looking at people. I was never a steroid person. I never had a steroid body. It just wasn't for me.
I might have did it but I couldn't stick it even with all my tattoos. I could not stick a needle in me. I can't do it. You knew the people when I was there that was on it, but it wasn't like steroid cells in the back room and people shooting up and needles.
I've never seen any of that. I've never seen anybody selling steroids.
That's tough! I'm going to go with the night that I won the Intercontinental Championship on my own against Goldust. That was a pretty cool night. That was a big night for me.
This is an exclusive interview by Sportshadow. Media outlets using quotes are requested to provide a backlink to this article or the website's homepage alongside embedding the video interview published on Youtube.