Former WCW Star Talks Rumors Of Stealing Money From Other Wrestlers, Steve Austin, His WCW Run, More

The Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling recently interviewed former WCW star P.N. News. You can download and listen to the full interview by clicking here, they sent us these highlights:

How he originally got in to WCW:

"I was in Germany and I was with Randy Colley of The Moondogs and I learned a lot from Randy. He was a great finish man and he comes from that Southern school of finishes and I tagged with him quite a bit and he told me that I needed to come back over to the States and it was Ole Anderson who was in charge of WCW at that point, so we called him from a pay phone . Randy started talking to Ole and he put me on and we started going back and forth and he said as soon as you get back (in the States) we can get you started right away and that was it, I was in. But then all of a sudden WCW had fired Ole and Dusty was planned to take over but he was still under contract with the WWF so I just went to TV with Randy and they always say to put your gear in the car just in case and after we had a word with Grizzly Smith he went and talked to some of the other agents and they said okay we will give you a dark match."

Who came up with the "Rap-Master" P.N. News name and gimmick:

"Dusty had seen the video tape of my dark match and said that I sit still and we will get you a spot. At that point it was just a waiting game to see when i would start and I was kind of panicking because until it's all in writing you just don't know. The P.N. News thing was all Dusty. I had a completely different name and gimmick in mind but because my name is Paul Neu he came up with the idea of that because we were working with Turner Broadcasting and that people will catch the connection with PN / CNN. Then Dusty added the "rap-master" and that was basically his presentation of the whole gimmick."

A proposed big-man feud with Vader that was built towards but never happened:

"It was talked about but it just didn't work out that way. There were other things going on. The gimmick of P.N. News was over in the South, Mid-West and out West. The gimmick was extremely well taken by the fans. The Northeast doesn't like any baby-faces even on a good day. I think it could have been a great little feud if we had gotten it but I kind of got pushed to the side for some reason and unfortunately the reasons that I got pushed aside I didn't do it. I think it was more of an excuse then anything to kind of put me on the side lines."

Being accused of stealing money from wrestlers while on an overseas tour with WCW:

"There was an issue where some money went missing in the dressing rooms over in London and actually I was one of the guys that lost my money as well but I got smeared with being the guy who took the money. About six months later they caught the guy, it was a referee that was stealing all the money but they put it on me and after we got back from the British tour which was actually the first tour WCW had ever done in Europe me and Rick Rude had a little bit of a scuffle over nothing. He just said to me be careful what you say to the office."

When he saw his run in WCW coming to an end after being so over with the crowd:

"In those days you filmed the TV's for a month and did something like 24 matches. I had only been used once that day and Dustin (Rhodes) had been on twice already and I was in the eighth match. The thing was that the people were quiet all night and when my music started playing the people went nuts and were dancing and going crazy. When I came back to the dressing room the only guy waiting for me was Ricky Morton and he started telling me a story and said 'to watch my back' because basically you just out-shined the Booker's kid and after that things really started changing for me. I didn't want to believe it but that's the politics of wrestling."

Working with Stunning Steve Austin:

"You could see the guy was talented there is no doubt about that. He was easy to work with and in this business eventually somebody at the right place and the right time will give you the break and if Steve was going to be in the right place at the right time you knew that he would be able to pull it off."