Jesse 'The Body' Ventura PT. 1 | The Steve Austin Show

X, oh, is that they wrote things there, Steve, I arrived, I didn't even know what I was talking about, you know, who is the guy who makes file x? I forgot his name, he's very famous, well, anyway, but you memorized it well, yeah, you just did. I don't know what you're saying yeah I just didn't know what he was saying because it was so typical of The that was in it was charles nelson riley, do you remember him, yes, he has one of the main roles and it's a great episode, it was ranked as one of the 10 best x-files episodes in history, okay, leave it.

I ask you a question You, predator, you have running, man, I can list a lot of movies, you did some of the television things, what did he tell you or how did you say I'm done acting, it's time to do this, no. I never said it, I didn't make the right decision, how cool, when I was in Mexico, Arnold said to me one day, Jesse, when are you going to move to Los Angeles and become one of the guys? And I turned to Arnold and I had two. little kids so my kids were little so these weren't their late 80's and I said well Arnold, I told him what schools are like and he thought he gave me the best answer but he gave me the worst and he looked at me and said : oh, don't worry about sending your kids to private school.

Well, I sat down and thought: do I want my children to grow up in a city where we are required to go to a private school where the public school system is so bad and living there is so bad. In Minnesota, our public school system is award-winning and I figured I wouldn't take my kids to raise them in Los Angeles, so I did. I didn't move here, I stayed in Minnesota and Steve, it hurt me because, like everything, you know, here, out of sight, out of mind, you have to be here, you have to negotiate, you have to make the dinners, you have to do everything. the behind-the-scenes lack of a better term, you know, you have to do that.

I didn't do it for my children and I don't regret it at all today. I felt like my children were raised better in Minneapolis, Minnesota than they would ever be raised outside. here and my son learned pretty quickly because when he turned 19, guess what his first job was, he was Sean Penn's assistant. Now, if that doesn't teach you Hollywood, nothing will. My son developed a rep and Sean Penn had him as his assistant for three years he was with him when he won the academy award for mystic river when he directed jack nicholson in the engagement my son was fine with him and sean taught him the ins and outs of hollywood and today my son was nominated for an Emmy and he does his own

show

on Russian television called The Hawks.

Would I know that when you were wrestling you had a passion for the business because you grew up watching it? Yeah, and then it was the best of both worlds athletically and yeah theatrically, so you got In the business there was a passion. Did you have the same passion for acting that you had for the wrestling business or was it just something to do because you weren't wrestling anymore? Part of evolution. No. I had a passion for it, but. I didn't have the passion for networking huh, I had the passion for doing it, I loved it, there's nothing more fun to make than a movie, I mean I don't agree, I just don't do it, you just mark it right and I like, I'll tell you what I like when you go to the right place because then you become a family, you are all the way.

I hate making movies in Los Angeles because everyone goes home at the end of the day and you don't. If you don't live here, you go to a hotel, that's why when we did Predator we were in Puerto Vallarta and we all stayed in a hotel, then you become a family and then for me there is more camaraderie in the final product of knowing who we are. We did this all together, from the prop master to you name it, and da, da, da, we, it required all of us to do it, what was it like working on Predator?

Because I know you had fun, I know you're a rock. Arnold the Gym stories, yes. uh you and him and sven or whoever the

body

guard is spam yeah so you get to the gym early but john mcteernan says man when

jesse

first

show

ed up and it looked like you were full of piss and vinegar at the time but he had to get down a little bit yes, it was because you were so big because you're used to playing the wrestling crowd no, oh no, it was because I came back, what do you mean I came back?

Actually, um, I actually had some dreams there, so you I went back to Vietnam, oh, uh-huh, that's where it came from. I came back, the smell, the weapons, the incredible shots. I came back, no, no, I was struggling at this point, to say guys, can I pull myself together or what I never had to come to that. period, but I remember my wife came down and told me that at one point I ran up in the middle of the night and exclaimed, don't worry, the area is safe and then I rolled over and went back to sleep and she was I was shocked. because in our life together nothing like this had ever happened to me before, but when I went to do Predator, old things came out, yes, old, and look, for me it was an easy movie to make because I just went back to what I was trained to do well , you knew how to do everything, uh-huh, and in fact, gary goldman and I were the ones who were there a week in advance and we were the ones who taught them that gary is not a green beret and uh, we taught how to patrol, he always gave me at rear security so I could keep an eye on everyone else and then critique at the end and I feel proud because a lot of military guys came up to me and told me that predator patrol is the most authentic patrol they've ever seen because we kept our space.

I used to fight with Mctiernan on that. I would say that you have everyone squeezed in an assault in the middle, you lose your entire platoon. What the hell and did I have to learn? We're making a movie, we're not making a documentary, this is not a Navy Seal training movie, this is, you're making a movie for entertainment, but to that point you wanted to be authentic if you were going to represent well, that just got there. . inside me, yes, because I said you have us too close together, we are in daylight, we would have 10 meters between us, you don't want one guy to be able to take out half the platoon, oh, I have no tactical training. not at all, but obviously that makes sense if you hadn't had blood clots, if you had run with Hogan, if you had stayed physically healthy enough to stay in the ring, there is speculation how much longer you would have stayed in the business, who knows, who knows, who knows if I had ever made it to broadcast because to me, no matter how good you were in the ring, you were 10 times better on the microphone, yes, oh, yes, no, it's a compliment, because in my day of wrestling I remember that the veterans told me to say no, you don't tie the match it doesn't tie because of what happens in the ring the matches tie because of what is said on the microphone and I took it seriously immediately it's the key is what what you say on the mic Ring work is actually secondary, you have to be able to back it up, yes, but look how many guys were phenomenal on the mic and couldn't work one bit on, you know, charisma or crowd psychology, because one of the things I want to ask you. because you are very good at explaining things and a lot of people can understand what you think is the key to overcoming it and this is to say, the wrestling business could almost be a parallel to getting an acting business, but let's talk and let's get chosen.

Yeah, because like you said, I know you're saying you're selling out, but yeah, well, the key, the key for me, talent, charisma, what is it? Well, it's talent, it's charisma, it's focus and you also have have to do it immediately. I would go to the ring. and I found the first brand that I could that would interact with me and appeal to him or her and the moment you engaged the crowd, you got it right, you got it. I remember people asking me who was your favorite person to wrestle and me. I would always choose Tito Santana because for some reason Tito and I's style matched perfectly and Tito knew how I needed to work and he was so wonderful that he and I had cases where the announcer would say that 10 minutes had passed and we had already not touched it. and the game was over and yet people had been getting up and down from their seats three times and we hadn't touched each other well just because and tito they let me be me and then their timing was phenomenal when it came time for him to trust me and I knew I would give it to him, yes, because I knew you had to give the baby face its due.

You know you got beat up at some point so you can be a coward, but when you called him. boy, the way you said it and compared it to boy and a man, but I thought it had to be close to tito because on the one hand, it makes people so angry that they are cheating on him. His name is Tito, but I just imagined. The boys were united, oh yeah, and I did it with everyone because they're all so insignificant to me, yeah, that's why I would do it because I'll remember the one time Vince backed off and I got involved, coco, watch out, and I sat on the bee a right and my mind started working, I thought, oh, I got this, so I went to Coco ahead of time because I knew she was going to be on the edge and I said, Coco, I told her what I wanted to do and Coco was great, I looked and what he did.

He told me that he goes to the

body

because that's what they call it, you go to the body, you say whatever you want about me because he said when you talk about me, I make money and that's why I got Coco's full blessing when I told her, so I'm out there. night and I say to McMahon McAhon I say: you know Coco, be careful, you know what the B means, don't you? Vince says what I said buckwheat, I said he's the grandson of buckwheat, coconut buckwheat, where and I went through the whole spiel about Vince and then the n. double acp falls on him and he won't fight them he gives up and censures me and i thought how can you do this when coco said okay and here was my argument

steve

at that very moment saturday night live eddie murphy was doing buckwheat, so it's okay for Eddie to make buckwheat, but it's not okay for me, excuse me, that's discrimination, that's discrimination, how come Eddie can make buckwheat and I can't?

And when they say that buckwheat is that black weird, well, all the kids in our gang. They were weird it was alfalfa, the normal white kid, look at it this way, our gang was the first neighborhood integrated into television, which in itself is monumental, buckwheat was the same as all these other little kids and Coco didn't. did, but backed away, would. I didn't take the fight and I lost a little respect for him because I thought he was right. I said how come Eddie can do it and I can't. Everyone make me go home. Nice, I'm going to finish this podcast. and ride off into the sunset before I do, that will give you something to watch on YouTube.

All you have to do is go to YouTube and type

jesse

ventura

or jesse the body

ventura

. You can find him fighting hulk hogan from awa in 1982. I think I was there on Christmas night. You can find some of his interactions with Vince McMahon doing color commentary. Whatever you want, just go to YouTube and watch the guy if you've never seen him or heard of him. Amen. Jesse Ventura is very intelligent. boy, he's had a tremendously interesting life, it was wonderful to finally reconnect with jesse, he came to the house, he was here early, he caught me completely off guard, i think it's the first podcast i ever did, i'm proud of the podcast because i had a great conversation with him and I did a lot of research on Jesse and knew all his stories.

I knew his loopholes and he picks on a few things with me, but we tried to talk a lot about wrestling and everything else. I'll talk more about the book in part two next Tuesday. Remember that Thursday is the second part of my conversation with the entire Epping program. This has been a podcast one production. Download new episodes of the Steve Austin Show every Tuesday at podcastone.com, that's podcastone.com.