On: Meeting Bret Hart
Having just returned home on an hour long train ride from volunteering at the Starrcast convention here in Austarlia, I feel this afternoon I had the most surreal and foundational experience of my wrestling life so far; and it took place outside the ring.
After finishing the events at the convention, I retreated backstage to pack my things and then headed outside to join my mates, it was there they were gathered around Bret Hart, The Hitman, telling stories of his work in the 80/90/00s, and answering questions from wrestling students.
“How do you get a dead crowd excited?”
(Essentially “Don’t worry about entrances; Build up interest/tell a story through repetition but don’t repeat a sequence more than three times, it’s a magic number”)
“How do you make what you do come across as more serious?” or “How do you plan a match?”
(Believe it to be real, imagine being in a bar fight and how that would go)
“Do you have a pain management strategy?”
(Protect your head, you can replace anything but that)
“What are some other moves that you use to make your opponent look good?”
(A question following on from an explanation he gave where he talked about doing the turnbuckle chest bump in an effort to make his opponent look strong)
“How do you make a story feel more serious?”
(Talking on his joy of working with Steve Austin, working with other talent by positing “This is Bret Hart the chacter, speaking to XYZ the character”, and where that famously failed)
And so many more questions.
As the crowd grew from 8 and towards 20 students & teachers, the conversation became so surreal, so intimate. I’m sure that in the end (from the point I joined) we sat there for close to an hour. Sitting facing an indescript public bench behind a building while maybe the most professional and proficient wrestler of all time dispensed free knowledge, decades worth of experiences and insight, do and do not, raw lived experience. No stupid questions, and the man just maintaining eye contact with the asker the entire time, full of respect.
The final 10 minute stretch where he was telling a story (answering the “How do you get a dead crowd excited?” question), out of like 20 people there he had locked eyes with me the whole time, and I sat on the ground keeping eye contact, with a warm smile and appreciating every minute of this. I didn’t even ask the question.
While he talked and I locked eye contact out of respect. I would inspect every part of his face, every developed wrinkle and muscle fatigued by long term health issues, I could picture all the times I’d seen him wrestle and imagine all the times I hadn’t been able to witness. The triumpths, the frustrations, the pain, the tragedy, the sheer pursuit of pefection he had aimed to achieve over so many decades. The sheer gravity it all was not lost on me, and It was heavy.
When I talked about it (the locking of eyes and this surreal experience) with my mates, they simply said “Yeah, because he was talking to you”, and damn, that hit hard.
He is not just in my opinion the most skilled wrestler of all time, but truly embodies and defines the word “professional”, in “professional wrestler”. I can’t wait to see him again.
Edit (2024 - 04 - 18): Great news, we met again last night as he dropped by the wrestling gym to do a spoken seminar, dude popped a smile upon seeing the tattoo as I waved goodbye. Hell yeah.