The Undertaker Discusses the Mental Strain of Working with Giant Gonzales in WWE, Learning How To Work An Actual Match and Not Just a Gimmick

In an interview with the Not Sam Podcast, The Undertaker discussed having to work with Giant Gonzales in WWE and how working with someone that limited helped prepare him and forced him to get better, and how working with guys like Bret Hart taught him how to work a match instead of just doing the Undertaker gimmick. Highlights are below.

On having to work with Giant Gonzales in WWE: “I got a taste of Giant Gonzales when we were in WCW together. I think that might have been another reason that I left, because they were trying to get me in a program down there. Fur patches. Oh my, that was the worst. Hideous. It was so bad on so many levels.”

On how working with Gonzales was such a mental strain: “That whole thing took years off my career. I would be in much better shape now if I could have skipped that one program. As physically demanding as it was, it was twice the mental strain because you got Bret’s there, now Yoko is there, all these guys are going out and having these great matches, and obviously you want to be mentioned in the same breath with those guys, and it was just not possible. It was survival every night, just trying to figure out what he could do and at that time, I didn’t sell a lot and bump around, but man, I was flopping and just trying to make chicken salad out of chicken crap. It did help me and it prepared me later on to be able to work with people, but I still sometimes wake up with cold sweats.”

On learning to work an actual match and not just the Undertaker gimmick: “After awhile, you work that gimmick, and it was always about the gimmick really, so it really didn’t matter who he plugged in against it. It was me working the gimmick. Then obviously chokeslams and doing all that. But when I finally got a taste, and I think it was, I want to say it was Bret Hart was one of the first guys I got to work with, and Bret didn’t really want to change his style too much to kind of cater to the Undertaker character. So it was my first chance really to actually work-work. And then I had to figure out, OK, can you work the gimmick and then work a wrestling match. Had some really, really good matches with Bret that I’m really proud of where I started getting better talent and that went into the early Shawn Michaels stuff.”

If using any of the above quotes, please credit Not Sam with an h/t to 411mania.com for the transcription.