The Undertaker appeared on Spain's Vibe & Wrestling, talking his Final Farewell this Sunday at the WWE Survivor Series. Highlights from the appearance:
On a normal day of the retired Undertaker: "Yes, I obviously have a lot more free time than I used to. Now, at the end of October, I would normally be fully in my camp getting ready for WrestleMania, but now I don't have any of that. Now that my children are in school I have free time to train if I feel like it; I love to go hunting or fishing and all these kinds of things that I had to put aside for all these years because I was traveling around the world or preparing for an event. I'm still trying to find my place and trying to fill that void of not being in the stadiums."
On what are we going to see on “30 days of the Deadman”- "You will be able to take a look at the 30 years of existence of Undertaker in WWF / WWE, there is a Brothers of Destruction documentary, we have already seen the Untold documentary about the rivalry between Randy Orton and Undertaker. There are going to be things like that, in addition to tons of special content to reel off my thirty years and, of course, you will be able to know in depth other Superstars, their thoughts and how they are throughout different parts of their careers. If you are an Undertaker fan it will be great and if you are not it will be a very long month."
One more match at Survivor Series 2020?: "I don’t know yet what we are going to do although I can tell you for sure that I will be at Survivor Series. Who knows, never say never, but what you can be sure of is that I will be live at Survivor Series. So we just have to wait and see how things develop between now and November 22nd."
On the creative process of the Undertaker persona: "He had… he explained it to me beforehand. He had this pre-created character and he was just waiting for the right person to come along and he basically told me a couple of times that he needed a big guy with no personality that could wear a hat and a coat and basically that was it. But honestly, I don't think any of us could have envision the success and longevity of this character. I'm extremely happy that I took that Undertaker from 1990 and held him all the way to 2020; There is nothing like it and I am very grateful to Vince, obviously, but also to all my fans around the world… my fans in Spain… without the fans and without their desire for this character and their support for him, we would not be having this conversation now. It does not depend only on me. I really appreciate that the fans have chosen me despite having had many other characters around and they were always by my side; when I injured myself, they injured themselves, when I got up they got up and I really appreciate all the people who have supported me throughout 3 decades… like you."
On how was the WWE locker room back in 1990: "In November 1990 I had only been in this business for a few years, I came from WCW and suddenly a young man like me finds himself surrounded by all these people: the Hulk Hogans and Ultimate Warriors, the Randy Savages ... the biggest names in our industry. Then basically I sit down and just say: "Hello, how are you sir?", "Yes sir" ... knowing my place. Back then people were a bit more reserved and they waited a bit until they met you. Basically we did not talk much, but I knew where I was, which was very low at the beginning, so I sat, watched and learned a lot from everything that was happening around me, especially in that first year when I said to myself: “Ok, I am going to take all this knowledge, because we have here many of the bests in the world and I am going to see how they do their business and the effort they put their matches ”, I was like a sponge trying to absorb as much knowledge as possible without trying to make a lot of noise and without pisssing anyone off."
On Old School wrestling vs. New School Wrestling: "That's a good question. I think athletes today are exactly that, amazing athletes in terms of what they can do physically, but what I think is that the disconnection or the problem is that they rely too much on their athletic ability and the things they can do in the ring instead of trying to develop the layers of their characters. I was talked to Bruce Prichard on the phone a couple of days ago and I told him how much I like the rivalry between Roman Reigns and Jey Uso, because it's an old-fashioned kind of rivalry. It is very easy to understand, especially if you are familiar with the Samoan heritage and linage and how proud Samoans are of family status, especially in this world of professional wrestling. Understanding that and having two cousins who grew up together and are now fighting ... there are so many layers to this story that I think it's the closest thing to old school we've done in a long time and obviously they did a great job and it was an amazing match too. But I think the big difference is that you don't have those rich characters to believe in. A lot of people used to tell me: "I don't understand, were you dead or were you alive?" They were so committed to the character and I think that's the most important thing: the story and the character development. I think they all have twisted their priorities in what they are doing in the sense that they are so athletic and they have these amazing matches, that they should, but it's always about storytelling, the good versus the evil... that's what's really important and that's what makes people invested in what you do; it's always about the story."
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