Shawn Michaels Talks Turning On Marty Jannetty, Crowd Reaction To 'Losing His Smile' Promo
Shawn Michaels was recently a guest on the In This Corner podcast. During the interview, he dished on some of the most memorable moments of his career.
Before embarking on his massively successful solo career, Michaels was a member of The Rockers alongside Marty Jannetty. Michaels turned on Jannetty in the infamous barbershop segment in which he sent Jannetty crashing through a glass window. Michaels looked back on the segment and said what made it work so well was how real it was. With Jannetty pleading for Michaels to remain as his tag team partner and then suffering a vicious assault, Michaels said the audience really connected with the segment.
"I had the boots on and that one was a little snug; I will say that. Every now and then it does get away from me, but I must say that Marty Jannetty took that like a champ I must say. You just never know; it's not like we went into those moments where we said that this is going to be something people are going to remember forever, and then they'll make shirts about it and reference things," Michaels said. "You are so busy in the time and in the moment; of course you want it to go well, but you absolutely have no idea that it's going to be something that people will remember forever, and I guess that is one of those things that you try to pass on to not be afraid to step outside the box. Go ahead and give it a whirl, and give it a try, again, even if the Social Media crowd is just saying this, you just don't know what is going to connect with people. Nine times out of ten it is something that is real and authentic.
"I think fans can see that, and they know the difference," he continued. "When all things are said and done I think that is probably the most important thing to be teaching; to not be afraid to put a little of yourself in there. That is what they want; they want to get to know you, and want to know the person. They want to feel what you are feeling, but it's a risk to do that, and I think that is one of the things that certainly the generation I was in, it was stumbled upon with all those nights on Monday Night because it was live. It's impossible to get it right each and every time. I think over the years those live moments that were captured; good bad or otherwise made a difference changed the Pro Wrestling business at all times."
Michaels also discussed the emotional moment when he had to relinquish his WWE championship and step away from the wrestling business due to numerous injuries. Michaels tearfully told the crowd he "lost his smile" as he had to reevaluate himself to find his love for wrestling again. Michaels said he appreciated how much the moment affected the audience and how the fans identified with him at such an emotional time in his life.
"Nothing good was going on in my life I can tell you that much. It's funny to me because I never knew at the time that some of the stuff would get so big. It is amazing to me; whether it'd be the Barber Shop, whether it'd be the 'losing my smile' moment, or the Ladder Match. Things that you would have no idea at the time would become these unbelievably huge and iconic moments over the years. I suppose that is the one thing I am thankful for, that in the long run it worked well for me," he said. "I lived a lot of my life on this live show [Raw], a lot of my ups and a lot of my downs, the good, the bad, the struggle; all of those things, I lived all that openly and wasn't smart enough to hide it and hide behind a character so to speak. I guess I wasn't a good enough actor. It was better for me to be who I was and share the things that were going on; at least, in some respect to the WWE audience. Thankfully, for me, whatever 25-30 years later it all turned out okay, but I think that is one of the things that separated me from somebody else, that there was an honesty whether good or bad in Shawn Michaels that he was sharing some real life stuff that was going on with me. It meant a lot to the people."
If you use any of the quotes from this article, please credit the In This Corner podcast with an H/T to WrestlingINC for the transcription.
Source: In This Corner
Peter Bahi contributed to this article.