Hulk Hogan Says Verne Gagne Taught Him to No-Sell, Recalls Working With Austin Idol

– Hulk Hogan discussed the origins of many of the trademark elements of his persona in an interview with Bill Apter. You can listen to audio below, plus read highlights via Wrestling Inc:

On his time after leaving WWE in 1980: “You know when I left the WWE originally and I went to work for Verne Gagne, I had a great deal in Japan. I spent weeks and weeks, sometimes twenty weeks a year over there and I loved it over there because I actually got to wrestle over there and I didn’t have to do the ‘ear thing’ and it was just totally different, it was fun for me it was kinda like how I learned how to wrestle. So going to Japan was fun and stuff like that but I’ve always dreamed about being the champion in New York. When I was there the first time [Bob] Backlund was the champion and even as a bad guy, kinda like how I heard how the crowd reacted to me and Andre [The Giant] at Shea Stadium, the Superdome — not the Silverdome, brother — for Bill Watts and working with Mike Labelle — I worked all over with Andre. Then even in Japan, I was always the heel and I had that black leather armband and [Classy Freddy] Blassie would load it with a piece of metal and then I’d knock Andre out with it. “There was always that really great reaction so I had always dreamed that, ‘Oh my gosh, if I could [do this in WWE].'”

On Verne Gagne giving him the “Hulk Up” idea: “Then what happened is I went to Minnesota for three years and I really honed my craft. Verne Gagne actually taught me how to start shaking and ‘Hulk Up’ and Verne actually taught me that, how to come up. He could coach me, ‘now you gotta start shaking and if somebody hits you with a lead pipe in the head you act like it doesn’t hurt you. When they dropkick you, you don’t go down… when they hit you with four dropkicks you just wobble.'”

On other talent being angry about his no-selling: “It used to piss off all the other wrestlers cause Verne told me to quit selling. I said, ‘Guys! It’s not me! It’s Verne! Verne’s telling me not to do this,’ you know and it was true. Verne didn’t want me to sell. Once I did sell, he said: ‘Once you go down and sell, sell like you’re a 100-pound girl so you get sympathy.’ That’s why when I did finally sell I’d start crawling around and that building would start rumbling, brother. It would rumble so loud when I started selling, it went crazy. So when I went back to [WWE], I finally learned my craft. I learned how to be Hulk Hogan. I was making all my shirts at the mall. I was ripping them off when I was up there, so I had it figured out before I came back this time. So when I hit the ring against the Iron Sheik it just took off and it was the most fun time of all for me in the wrestling business because like I said, it was the first time. Then the transition into the nWo, I always knew if they would let me be a bad guy again now that I had it figured out I could be the best bad guy ever. The dirtiest, nastiest, most evil bad guy and then when the good guys came at me I’d drop down and beg like the biggest chicken ever like Ray Stevens. I had a blast, but the first run with the red and yellow was the most fun.”

On working with Austin Idol: “When I first started working in Pensacola [Florida], Austin Idol was there. “He used to be a friend of my brother’s before my brother passed away. I knew [Idol] as a kid and he was really nice to me because he knew my brother really well. So when I went to work with him in Pensacola I watched him and he had the gimmick down, brother. He was the first one that I heard say ‘Idolmania’ so guess what I did? Guess who’s the first one I saw do ‘the ear?’ Austin Idol, I saw Austin do it. So I kinda watched him work and I said, ‘Oh okay, I get it… Austin Idol, Dusty Rhodes… I got this. I can figure this one out.’ So I kinda took the hot sauce from each one of those guys. You know when I’d go down to sell and that one finger would come up brother… you know I’m selling and that one finger starts shaking. That’s Dusty Rhodes all day long.”

On ripping his shirt off: “I was in a six-man tag at the Rosemont Horizon [now Allstate Arena] and the place was sold-out of course. It was me, Greg Gagne, and Jim Brunzell in the AWA […] There were three Sheiks against us three and that night when I was in the ring I had a shirt made up that said ‘Hulkamania’ on the front and ‘Python Power’ on the back at the local mall there and in the middle of the ring, Greg Gagne and Jim Brunzell ran up to me and ripped my shirt off — just ripped it off me. I was in crazy shape back then, I was a lot younger and the crowd went nuts. I went, ‘Okay… that worked!’ I didn’t even know they were gonna do it. So I just start ripping my shirt off after that, you know? But the cuts in the back were my ex-wife. I used to buy smaller shirts — the bigger I’d look, right? So instead of buying like an extra large shirt I’d but a medium shirt and there’s no way I could fit in it. So I’d cut the sleeves off so it’d make me look just huge. Then because I didn’t want to look like an idiot and some shirts are harder to rip, I’d always put a little tiny cut in the neckline so it would tear evenly when you pull it. Because sometimes you go to rip a shirt and you just can’t do it and you look like an idiot, you know? I would cut a little tiny rip in the front and my ex-wife would say, ‘That shirt looks horrible on you, it’s so tight, is that a small’ I’d go, ‘No, it’s a medium, come on!’ She goes, ‘Let me make it a little better for you.’ So she cut the three little cuts in the back which actually gave me room to breathe and opened my shirt up a little more. So that’s where all that stuff started.”