Introduction
THROUGHOUT THE PAGES OF THIS BOOK, I frequently mention a screenplay I wrote based on Have a Nice Day!, my towering New York Times number one bestseller. I wrote the screenplay in just over two days, feverishly working with pen and notebook as the images of a new American movie classic poured forth onto the pages. Not only did I think it was good, I knew it was good. So good, in fact, that I flew to WWF headquarters to meet with WWF head honcho Vince McMahon to ask him to consider making the film a WWF project. Unfortunately, my screenplay was still being typed up at the time of our meeting but I convinced Vince of its greatness and he seemed genuinely interested.
A few weeks later, I received my masterpiece in its typed form. I resisted the urge to devour it instantly and instead went to bed comforted with the knowledge that it would be there waiting for me in the morning. Indeed it was, and I cradled that screenplay like it was a newborn pup until I was comfortably seated on Delta flight number 1212 from Pensacola to Atlanta, which would then connect with Delta flight number 1999 to Los Angeles. I had a long day of flying ahead of me and was looking forward to every minute of it. Why? Because I had a friend with me. A friend that would catapult my life story onto the big screen where it belonged. A friend that would soon entertain millions of theatergoers. A friend that would make me rich. As the plane departed Pensacola, I began to read.
After twenty minutes, I was confronted with an uncomfortable realization. Wow, this really isn't very good. I put the screenplay down for a while and considered the possibility that maybe the early wake-up time that the early morning flight required had left my brain incapable of absorbing my witty dialogue and hard-hitting action sequences.
So I waited until the Los Angeles leg to read some more, at which time I was forced to consider the possibility that my dialogue wasn't all that witty and that my action sequences didn't hit all that hard. I was forced to consider the possibility that I hadn't written a new American movie classic, and forced to admit that as a screenwriter, I more or less sucked. I had boarded that plane in Pensacola looking forward to spending time with my friend. Now I find myself hating him.
That afternoon in Los Angeles, Jamie, one of the writers for that evening's Raw television show, asked me about the script. Jamie had written several scripts, and so I had been enthusiastically talking shop with him during the weeks in which my screenplay was being typed. "Well, Jamie, it's not quite as good as I thought it was," I felt forced to admit. "As a matter of fact, it sucks." Jamie's reaction caught me completely by surprise.
"Mick, you've got a gift that most writers will never have—the ability to be objective about your own work."
"Really?" Wow, I had a gift.
"Yeah, Mick, I'm telling you, most writers are convinced that everything they write is great. You're miles ahead of them."
"So what you're saying is that it takes a good writer to know their writing sucks?"
"Exactly."
A few weeks later, on a trip to Southeast Asia, I began writing Foley Is Good. I had planned on learning how to use a computer for this task and had actually gone so far as to buy one a month before leaving. Unfortunately, I had not gone so far as to actually open it, let alone learn to use it, so as I departed for Asia, it was with two notebooks, and a collection of Pilot fine-point precise rollerball pens to keep me company.
Seven weeks and 129,000 words later, I had a book (or, more accurately, about 600 pages of barely legible notebook paper) in my hands. While the typing process was underway I began working on an additional section, which is my thoroughly researched answer to an often reckless media's criticism of the world of sports entertainment. These 30,000 words took me an additional seven months to complete and I sincerely hope that it will shed some much-needed light on the proverbial "other side of the story."
During the course of corrections, editing and rewriting, I have read Foley Is Good many times. And guess what...I like it...I really like it. Equally as important, I had a tremendous time writing it, and look forward to future literary endeavors. I guess it is inevitable that people will compare this book to Have a Nice Day! I'm sure many will favor the first book because it has more pages, wrestling, foul language, and blood. A whole lot more blood. I think others (including me) will like this one better, partially because it has less pages, wrestling, foul language, and blood. A whole lot less blood. As for how this book will fare, critically and financially, I can't really say with any degree of certainty.
There is one thing I can say, however, with a great deal of certainty. This book does not suck. If it did, I would know. It's a gift I have.
Sincerely,
Mick Foley
The Hotel Hershey
Hershey, Pennsylvania
February 20, 2001
1: Night of the Champion
The Worcester fans were on their feet, and I was on the shoulders of D-Generation X as they paraded me around the ring. Several pictures later showed the members of DX smiling broadly, and I know that the smiles were too bright to not be real. Much like the early Dude, Mankind—or more accurately, Mick Foley—had made the people feel good about themselves. A chant of "Foley, Foley," began, but unlike my traumatic night at King of the Ring, these chants were loud and growing louder. I was let down from the shoulders of the DX and grabbed the house mike. I first addressed Vince, who was yelling and fussing his way offstage, although secretly I suspect he was beaming. I then got down on my knees and spoke from my heart.
"At the risk of not sounding cool," I began, "I want to dedicate this belt to my two little people at home, Dewey and Noelle—Daddy-O did it!"
I know, I know, that's how Rocky II started, with the end of the first Rocky being shown over again. But hey, Rocky is my favorite movie of all time, and I even wrote a screenplay for Have a Nice Day! that borrows a couple of lines from Rocky 77, so why not "borrow" the start of my sequel from it as well. Just for the record, I never liked the title Have a Nice Day!—I always wanted Blood and Sweatsocks. So if my life story makes it onto the big screen, or even goes straight to video or the History Channel, then by golly, Blood and Sweatsocks it's going to be. Unless of course they pay me a lot of money. Then they can call it The Adventures of a Fat Guy in Tights Pretending to Fight for all I care.
I had always tried to downplay the importance of the World Wrestling Federation title in my career. That is, of course, until I won it. Then it became the most important thing in the world—besides my family and the log flume at Santa's Village. I was definitely feeling good when I got to the backstage area. Handshakes and hugs all around, except for Rodney of the Mean Street Posse, who I refused to let touch me. Actually, Rodney hadn't even started with the World Wrestling Federation yet, but I need someone new to pick on in this book, and I have a feeling that the Posse is going to take the brunt of it. Now, don't get the feeling that I'm tired of blasting Al Snow, because I'm not—it's just that all my jokes about him somehow ended up actually helping his career, and I don't ever want to be responsible for something like that again.
A team of psychologists recently determined that up to 28 percent of all children under the age of twelve suffer from some type of attention deficit disorder, or ADD. They also determined that during an Al Snow match, that percentage can jump to as high as 90. Yess! Yess! All right, I lied—of course I'm going to tear Al a new Snow in this book. I just won't do it as often.
Actually, I traveled with Al back to Boston after the match—in a full stretch limo, no less. When I walked into Worcester that afternoon, I had no idea that I was going to leave as the champ, and during the day I had agreed to do a personal appearance i
n Everett, Massachusetts, as a replacement for Kane. The money wasn't good, but the owner of the store, Phil Castinetti, was a friend of mine, so I said, "What the hell." This guy Phil knew everybody; a few days ago I went to Yankee Stadium with him (my first game there in twelve years), and through his connections, ended up having my picture taken with Mayor Giuliani and eating hot dogs in Yankee owner George Steinbrenner's office. No, George wasn't present at the time, but yes, I did pretend to be George Costanza while I was there.
As much as I liked Phil, I still contemplated holding him up for more money once I won the belt, but in the end, I realized that a deal is a deal and did it for the original amount. Besides, what could be better than a long dark limo, soft snow flurries on a crisp winter's eve, and the company of Al Snow and the Blue Meanie? Wait a second; did I just say "the company of the Blue Meanie"? With bright blue hair and a belly that made my abs look like Jack La Lanne's, the Meanie was quite a character in the ring. He also had a ring outfit of tight "Daisy Duke" shorts, and a half shirt that exposed stretch marks that, when viewed sideways, looked like a road map of upstate New York. (The Meanie has since lost over a hundred pounds and looks a lot better than me.)
The soft flurries turned into a blizzard, the one-hour trip to Boston turned into three, and by the time we finally rolled into our Holiday Inn, I was more than ready for my post-big-match ritual of a big fattening meal and a Pay-Per-View movie. The meal, which Phil had arranged to have picked up, was supplied courtesy of Kowloon's Chinese Restaurant, and I was just about to dig in when I realized that a frosty beverage had not been provided with my feast. So it was on my way to the soda machine that I saw him. The Meanie, looking forlorn in the lobby of the hotel. "Meanie, what's the matter?" I asked the rotund grappler. (Actually "rotund grappler" is one of the ways, along with "pear-shaped brawler," that the National Enquirer once described me, but for some reason I like the term better when it's applied to someone else.) The Meanie looked up at me with a sad expression in his eyes. "They don't have any more rooms," he said. Ooh, this was a tough decision for me. On one hand, the rotund grappler looked miserable in the lobby. On the other hand, I had just won the World Wrestling Federation title and was really looking forward to my solitary ritual. "What time is your flight?" I asked. "Eight o'clock," came the sad reply. Damn! If he had said "six," I could have justified leaving him there under my "don't ever get a room if you're going to be there less than four hours" rule. This was too long to sit in a lobby. Yeah, I deserved to be rewarded, but I couldn't leave the poor guy hanging. "Wanna stay with me?" I mumbled with the same enthusiasm I usually reserve for "let me pay for your dinner."
So it came to pass that I marked my championship night with about seven pounds of Chinese food and the Blue Meanie in my bed.
2: I Hate That Guy
"Daddy won the belt! Daddy won the belt!" At the end of 1998, the World Wrestling Federation had television tapings on Monday and Tuesday every other week. On Mondays, they taped matches for various shows until 9 p.m. Eastern, at which time Raw Is War, the company's flagship show, aired live. The following week's Raw would be taped on Tuesday, to be aired at nine, six days later. So when I came home from Boston, I hid the belt and didn't tell my children, Dewey and Noelle, about winning the title. When they saw it, they went crazy. "Let me see, let me see," they yelled, and then my wife Colette and I proceeded to shoot an entire roll of film as the kids posed, cut promos (interviews), and ran all over with the belt around their tiny waists. Dewey even fell asleep with it on while I read him a bedtime story.
For anyone who didn't read the first book and has picked this one up only because it is tearing up the bestseller charts, I'll answer your question, or at least confirm your thoughts for you. Yes, wrestling is entertainment, and no, I didn't actually "win" the belt in the way that World Series or Super Bowls are won. Instead, the World Wrestling Federation title, which is without question the premier title in the business, is more like winning an Academy Award. Usually, it is given to the wrestler that the company thinks can "carry the ball" for them, in terms of drawing crowds in arenas and buy rates on Pay-Per-View. In my case, the belt was more like a lifetime achievement award. I knew I probably wouldn't have it long, but I was sure going to enjoy it while it lasted.
Later that evening, I tuned in to the show of our competition, World Championship Wrestling, which I had worked for from 1991 to 1994. They had a Monday night show named Nitro that they ran in direct competition to ours, which they also rebroadcast a few hours later. I wanted to watch the program, because it was thought to be pivotal in the Monday night ratings wars, which had been raging since September of 1995, when Nitro made its debut opposite Raw. In all fairness to WCW, they had been able to capture the public's imagination with a hot angle in July of 1996, and had at one point won the ratings battle for eighty-three straight weeks. With the genius of World Wrestling Federation owner Vince McMahon, creative writing of our show, superior production values, the solidification of "Stone Cold" Steve Austin as a media sensation, the emergence of new stars such as The Rock, and the continued evolution of mainstays such as the Undertaker and myself, the World Wrestling Federation had forged ahead—but the race was close.
WCW felt that they had momentum on their side. On their previous night's Pay-Per-View, Kevin Nash had ended rookie phenomenon Bill Goldberg's long win streak, and a rematch was set for the next evening's Nitro. In addition, Hulk Hogan, who spearheaded the wrestling resurgence in the 1980s and was still a big drawing card, was making a much-publicized return on Nitro. Furthermore, whereas our program was taped six days earlier in the relatively small Worcester Centrum, WCW was coming live from the immense Georgia Dome in their home city of Atlanta. So it was with great interest that I tuned in to Nitro on January 4, 1999.
Actually my interest wasn't that great, because their show at that point was getting difficult to watch, and they kept going back to a ridiculous scenario that had Bill Goldberg arrested for stalking one of the WCW ladies. After about the fourth poorly executed Goldberg vignette, I turned to my newspaper, until the unlikely mention of my name on the WCW show jolted my attention back to the screen. The words that spewed forth from announcer Tony Schiavone's mouth simultaneously shocked, hurt, and angered me. "We've been informed," Schiavone began, "that Mick Foley, who used to wrestle here in WCW as Cactus Jack, and now wrestles as Mankind, is going to win the World Wrestling Federation title tonight on their program, which is a taped show." I couldn't believe it. Then Schiavone continued with the biggest insult of my career, when he sarcastically said, "Wow, now that's gonna put a lot of asses in the seats."
I was so hot that I immediately wanted to call and blister him on his answering machine. Instead, I decided to wait. I watched in disgust as he made several other insulting comments about me during their show, and then tried to go to sleep while I hoped that the Nielsen ratings would vindicate me.
The next afternoon, I called the World Wrestling Federation offices and not only did my anger and pain disappear—they were replaced with an unbelievable rush of joy . . . and a thirst for vengeance. The ratings showed that almost 100,000 households switched over to the World Wrestling Federation show IMMEDIATELY following Schiavone's comment. IMMEDIATELY! So, not only did their company come across like scumbags for insulting someone whom the fans held in some measure of respect, but they also cost themselves a hell of a lot of viewers.
The World Wrestling Federation continued to gain viewers throughout their program, and on a night that many felt would turn the tide back to WCW—we ended up blowing them away. WCW did win the five-minute time period following my title victory, which was actually even worse news for them. It meant that people were, in fact, interested in their title rematch, but had been driven away by their own announcer's foolish remarks.
So now, with the ratings on my side, I decide to give Mr. Schiavone a call. I had known Tony for quite a while and had always gotten along with him, and even though I didn't think he was in Jim Ross's league, I alwa
ys respected him as an announcer. During my time in WCW, I had physically sacrificed a great deal, always put the company's interests ahead of my own, and had been about as productive as a person can be when he is constantly having the rug pulled out from under him by some of the WCW people who are more concerned with retaining their top spots with the company than making that company successful. Deep down, I sensed that Tony's words were not derived from feelings of his own, but were probably ordered upon him by one of his superiors.
I got Tony's answering machine and resisted the urge to yell. Instead, I very calmly said, "Tony, this is Mick Foley, and I just wanted to say that I heard your comments and they made me sick. Why you would insult someone who worked so hard for your company is beyond me. I have a feeling that the words you were saying weren't your own; but either way, I felt that it was low class and uncalled for, and in truth, it just caused more people to watch our show." Then I left my number and hung up.
A few hours later the phone rang. Colette came to me and said, "Mick, it's Tony Schiavone—he sounds so sad." "Hello, Tony, this is Cactus." When Tony spoke, he did indeed sound sad. As I had thought, the feelings were not his own, but had been forced on him by his superior. Right, Eric? Schiavone's words not only haunted him that night, but for weeks, months, and even years after. Signs started popping up in every arena we went to that disproved WCW's theory; Mick Foley put my ass in this seat.
I hate Bill Goldberg. Yeah, I said it. I don't know him, but I hate him. I've heard nice things about him, but I hate him. This isn't blind hate, however; it's deserved for one very good reason.
I was with my family at Santa's Village in New Hampshire in the summer of 1999. I am an amusement park junkie, and as a card-carrying member of American Coaster Enthusiasts, there is nothing I like better than high-powered thrill rides. Except big rides mean lots of teenagers, which means I get besieged by wrestling fans all day long. Which is why I prefer smaller parks like Santa's Village. People still recognize me, but it's a family atmosphere, so they are much more polite about it. On this June afternoon, I was watching Dewey and Noelle on Santa's Red Hot Racers water ride, when a man tapped me on the shoulder. "Hey, aren't you Mankind?" he asked. I told him I was. "We're big Goldberg fans," the man informed me. He then spoke to his son, who appeared to be about six years old. "Joey, show him your Goldberg imitation." I really wanted to see my kids on the ride, but I squatted down anyway so I could see what this little tyke had up his sleeve. Boom. The kid punched me in the nose. Now, I don't care how tough you are, or even if you are a hardcore legend like myself. When a six-year-old punches you in the nose—it hurts. I expected the adults to reprimand him just a little, but instead they gave him hugs and said things like "attaboy" and "you showed him, Joey." Man, I hate Goldberg.