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Managers of Renown

Posted: Mar 28th 2008 By: mikeiles

Sunday, March 16 was a tremendously sad day in the world of professional wrestling. Gary Hart, manager, booker and most of all, genuine human being, died suddenly of a massive heart attack. He had only just returned to his home in Euless, Texas, coming back from an autograph session in Allentown, Pennsylvania, when he was felled. He leaves his wife, Gloria, and two sons, Chad and Jason.

?Playboy? Gary Hart enjoyed a stellar career in the world of wrestling. Primarily known for his outstanding work as a heel manager, it was Hart who was the booker during the 1980s when Fritz Von Erich?s World Class Championship Wrestling (of Dallas) was at its peak. One of the all-time greatest feuds ever conceived and executed anywhere in the sport placed the spotlight on the hostility between the Von Erich boys and The Freebirds (Michael Hayes, Terry Gordy and Buddy Roberts). The company took Gary?s ever-evolving creative ideas and developed them into a long-running series of thrilling battles between the two sides. Being humble about his achievements, Hart always gave credit to everyone involved, saying that having so much talent at his disposal is what made his concepts thrive.

Before too long, a full column devoted to Gary Hart will be forthcoming. But for now, let?s take a short look back at a few old school wrestling managers that made their mark every bit as much as their charges. These are in no particular order, and in no way is the list complete.

It?s important to define the role of the manager as it was portrayed back in the days when pro wrestling was more about wins and loses, rather than skits and bad jokes. Managers played an important part in wrestling for different reasons. Some acted as mouthpieces for wrestlers that didn?t have the verbal skills to express themselves effectively. No matter how capable a wrestler was in the ring, he also needed to speak or otherwise project his personality in a way that drew the fans in (and that meant something other than yelling). In order to fire up the imagination, these grapplers had to learn how best to get their points across without meandering about or losing their direction entirely. For those that lacked the talent to speak clearly with a well-defined purpose, a silver-tongued manager was worth his weight in gold.

The second reason for the manager?s existence was to generate heat during the course of a bout. A good one knew when the time was right to insert his presence into a match. Usually, this took the form of distracting the referee, although some actually got physically involved, ordinarily on the sly. And while Type One sometimes crossed over into Type Two, the old school manager tended to favor one style over the other as a general rule of thumb.

Perhaps the original loquacious manager was a former wrestler with the rather plain name of Ralph Berry. That would never do, which is why early in his wrestling career he incorporated the color of his hair into his newly adopted moniker and became ?Wild Red? Berry. After many years competing as a very successful light heavyweight, Berry hung up his boots to become a ? pardon the pun ? wildly successful manager. It made perfect sense, as his gift of gab reached dizzying heights. Promoters actively sought his services, and while he represented many well-established wrestlers over the decades, his most famous team was comprised of Roy Heffernan and Al Costello, better known as ?The Fabulous Kangaroos.?

Berry actually had nothing to do with the team?s formation. They had come together in Calgary in 1957 and literally made such a hit from the moment they first teamed, that adding ?Wild Red? as a front man almost seemed unnecessary. And yet, once he came aboard, the Kangaroos rapidly ascended to the very pinnacle of the tag team wrestling ladder everywhere they appeared. The trio traveled throughout the U.S., Canada and eventually the world, almost always at or near the top of the card. They sold out New York?s Madison Square Garden numerous times, coming close to starting a riot by taking excessive liberties with favorites Antonino Rocca and Miguel Perez.

It?s been said that ?Wild Red? Berry and The Fabulous Kangaroos were the ones that created great interest in the team style, not the least of which was due to Berry?s long-winded speeches that left audiences gasping for air. No one before had ever strung together so many sentences overloaded with three and four syllable words that, when analyzed, actually were grammatically correct and made sense!

James E. ?Jim? Cornette was (and remains) another motor-mouth cut from the same cloth as ?Wild Red? Berry. As the verbal agent for the excellent ?Midnight Express? tag team, Jimmy?s oral antics were laced with great humor, often leaving the viewers laughing, amidst a mixture of feelings that see-sawed between respect and hatred. One of the most quick-witted of the managers, Cornette established his character as a mama?s boy, complete with tennis racket in hand and silver spoon in mouth. But what came out of that mouth were finely tuned witticisms and a running commentary that caused both hilarity and anger. Not an easy gig to pull off, but James E. Cornette became a master of it.

The ?Midnight Express? team got its start in Southeast Championship Wrestling. Originally comprised of Dennis Condrey and Randy Rose, it eventually added Norvell Austin. Some exciting wrestling took place in that region in the early 80s, and the Midnights were at the forefront. Finally, the threesome split up, and Condrey moved along to Bill Watts? definitive company headquartered in Oklahoma, Mid-South Wrestling. It was there he teamed up with Bobby Eaton who, for all of his admirable wrestling acumen, was never a good talker. Enter Jim Cornette, and the rest is wrestling history. Their feud with teeny bopper heroes ?The Rock-N-Roll Express? (Ricky Morton and Robert Gibson) was off the charts, thanks in no small part to Cornette?s funny and acerbic ranting. Given the superior booking and logical storytelling in the territory, the fiery hot matches between the two sides continually threatened to steal the show.

In this capacity, Jim Cornette was hilarious and infuriating, playing the ultimate coward who attacked the opposition from behind with the tennis racket Mama Cornette had lovingly given him. Not only quick with a quip, Jim could swing his racket like Andres Agassi in his prime while simultaneously preparing to bail out of the ring, should the action got a little too hot and heavy. Eventually becoming a color commentator, then an outstanding booker with his own territory (the highly regarded Smoky Mountain Wrestling), a creative force within WWE, and now currently seen weekly as the ?Management Director? with TNA, James E. Cornette has truly done it all.

That?s quite a different path than the one followed by ?Gentleman? Saul Weingeroff. This manager worked almost exclusively in the southern U.S., rarely venturing outside of that territory (although he did appear for many different promotions). And while he would certainly speak well for his charges, Weingeroff is generally remembered for being at the forefront of one riot after another.

To start, the gimmick he used was something that was genuinely risky. Here was a portly middle-aged well-dressed man with an obviously Jewish name. The kicker was that his team was, for all intents and purposes, a pseudo-Nazi combination! Kurt and Karl Von Brauner (Jimmy Brawner and Doug Donovan, both of whom would eventually have their names legally changed to that of their ring personas) more than hinted at an SS past. Such an outrageous scheme could never fly in today?s politically correct climate. The very fact that a Jew would be selected to represent them in their battles was either a daring stroke of booking genius or an invitation to a potential lynching.

The strange mixture of Saul Weingeroff with the Von Brauners was a recipe for a riot, made all-the-more likely because Saul did everything within his power to incite them. Taking the psychology aspect of pro wrestling to an extreme, the manager frequently used his cane on the Von Brauner?s opponents. And when he wasn?t doing that, he?d sometimes introduce a fireball to a foe?s face, an act that was far from commonplace in those days. Saul himself once admitted that if he didn?t get the fans worked up to a fever pitch and ready to kill him, he hadn?t done his job properly. The stories of ?Gentleman? Saul and the Von Brauners? travels through Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas and other parts of the south are legendary.

Another southern-based manager that not only made a name for himself regionally but on the national scene as well, is that of Jimmy ?Mouth of the South? Hart. As vocal as Jim Cornette (without hitting quite the same heights in verbal witticisms), he got every bit as involved in his men?s matches as Saul Weingeroff (without threatening to start a riot by his mere presence, usually). His years working in Tennessee were tremendously successful ones. Coming across like a hyperactive Water bug much of the time, Hart did a great job speaking and creating distractions for his group of heels, known collectively as ?The First Family.? At various times, they included Jim Neidhart, ?Ravishing? Rick Rude, King Kong Bundy and Randy Savage. His relationship with Jerry ?The King? Lawler is the very definition of love/hate. Managing him on occasion, most of the time Hart was doing his best to defeat and humiliate Lawler, with the end result most often seeing Hart take the pratfall.

In 1985, he joined the WWF and, along with Hulk Hogan and others that comprised the ?Cartoon Era,? contributed to Vince McMahon?s drive to conquer the wrestling world. As in Memphis, Jimmy ran around the ring during his men?s matches, adding an amplified megaphone to his repertoire. The desired effect, of course, was to irritate the fans as much as possible, and there?s no question he achieved that goal. It?s fair to say that ?The Mouth of the South? was capable of both verbal assaults and physical ones, when the opportunity presented itself.

The surname brings us right back to where we started, with Gary Hart. While there was no connection between Jimmy and Gary (and definitely no relationship to the Harts of Calgary fame), both achieved greatness exemplifying different characteristics as managers. When we delve more deeply into Gary?s methods, both as a manager and a booker, we?ll explore how they differed.

But for now, we?ll simply close by expressing our sincere condolences to the family of Gary Hart.

Tags: Gary Hart, Fritz Von Erich, WCCW, Von Erichs, Fabulous Freebirds, Jim Cornette, Midnight Express, MSW, Rock-N-Roll Express, WWE, TNA, Karl Von Brauner, Jim Neidhart, Rick Rude, King Kong Bundy, Jerry Lawler, WWF