Kurt Angle reflects on why his comedic gimmicks were so successful in professional wrestling.
The Stories With Brisco And Bradshaw podcast recently welcomed Kurt Angle to the show. Angle was asked about his infamous cowboy hat segment where he sang “Jimmy Crack Corn” to “Stone Cold” Steve Austin.
Angle said he initially had reservations about being funny on camera, noting how he wasn’t very comfortable speaking on air but Vince McMahon pushed him to do it.
“I just thought I would just wrestle but Vince wanted me to do all of these funny things. It didn’t really hurt me as a wrestler, I think because of my background. Like you, Bradshaw, you were a pro football player, they know you’re a badass. I also know you’ve been in a lot of fights in your life [laughs] so you’re a badass in that state, too,” Angle noted. “But the fans [knew] that I could do that kind of stuff because I was still a badass in real life. So I was able to exploit myself a little bit and have fun.”
JBL said he felt like it made fans appreciate it more, and Angle agreed.
“They did. [They realized], ‘Hey this badass is actually pretty funny, pretty entertaining.’ I had so much fun wrestling back then, I couldn’t wait [to work]. I was like a kid in a candy store, I couldn’t wait to see what I was going to do next. The writers — Brian Gewirtz and all the writers — they would write some great material for me and it was really cool,” Angle said. “I was really excited, but once I got injured and got hooked on the painkillers, that’s when the fun started to end.”
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