Greetings. I recently had as a guest on my syndicated Hart Beat Radio podcast, one of the most interesting and controversial characters in the history of the wrestling business, my former Stampede Wrestling colleague, the inimitable David “Dr. D.” Schultz, who has just written a fascinating book on his life in wrestling career and subsequent career as a bounty hunter, called “Don’t Call it Fake.”
I can still fondly recall, back in the early 1980’s, just after I had taken over the role as booker (matchmaker/scriptwriter) for my dad’s promotion and we were looking for a new top heel to replace Sylvester Ritter (later to gain fame as the Junkyard Dog), who had just left, and one of our wrestlers, Leo Burke, told me that he had worked with a dynamic new heel in New Brunswick, named David Schultz, whom he highly recommended.
I mentioned this to my dad and we invited David to come out to work for us. The rest, as they say, is history, as Schultz would prove to be an instant success, with his colourful promos, charisma and ability to generate heat. He would remain a fixture in Stampede Wrestling for the next several year as one of our top heels, working in singles against up and coming young baby faces such as my brothers Bret and Keith, my brothers-in law Davey Boy Smith and Jim Neidhart and veterans such as Leo and Bobby Burke, Mr. Hito and Sonny Two Rivers.
Schultz also would form a hot tag team with another equally dynamic young heel – the Dynamite Kid, both of whom were managed by this iconic heel manager named J. R. Foley. Schultz and Dynamite, I’m proud to relate, had an incredible series of matches against me and my brother Bret (the original Hart Foundation!), which were among the hottest matches ever in Stampede Wrestling, with several near riots, but sell out crowds nearly every night.
After that, Schultz would form another iconic tag team with one of his buddies from Tennessee, the flamboyant Honky Tonk Man, that also was box-office magic.
Throughout that stretch, not only was Schultz one of the hottest heels we ever had in the territory, ranking right up there with other legendary villains, like Killer Kowalski, Archie “the Stomper” Gouldie, Abdullah the Butcher and Al “Mister Murder” Mills, but he was also a great mentor – teaching younger guys, like Bret, Davey Boy, Neidhart and other young guys, like my brother Owen and Japanese stars, such as Georgi Takano, Junji Hirada and Hiro Saito, the intricacies of ring psychology, getting heat and how to cut promos.
After Schultz left Calgary, he headed for Verne Gagne’s fabled AWA promotion, where he would have a legendary series of matches with another equally dynamic, up and coming baby face from the South – Hulk Hogan, who had just gained notoriety from his role as Thunderlips in the movie “Rocky III”.
After an incredible run in the AWA, Schultz and Hogan would head to Vince McMahon’s WWF promotion, where they would reprise their AWA feud, with Schultz playing heel to Hogan’s face character. Schultz, at that time, was gaining rave reviews as one of the hottest heels in the business and his feud with Hogan would help lay the groundwork for Hulkamania and, ultimately, the first Wrestlemania.
Shortly before the initial Wrestlemania, when he was on a shown New York, at Madison Square Garden, Schultz was approached, backstage, for an interview, by ABC television reporter John Stossel. Stossel disrespectfully suggested that wrestling was “fake” and demanded that Schultz confirm this – which was akin to waving a red flag in front of a bull, to any old school type wrestler. As a consequence, Schultz, in defending the wrestling business, angrily slapped Stossel and demanded to know if that had been fake. Stossel later would sue Schultz and the WWE for damages and was awarded, I’m told, over four hundred thousand dollars.
Subsequent to that, the WWF, whom I heard had encouraged Schultz to do what he’d done, fired Schultz. I can recall, at the time, that there was a lot of outcry within the wrestling business over that whole incident. Most of the old school wrestling fraternity, including my people like my dad and others like Dory Funk Sr., Verne Gagne and Leroy McGuirk, who had long been staunch defenders of the business themselves, felt that Schultz should have been commended rather than censored for having chosen to stand up for the business and were quite pissed off that Vince McMahon had chosen to fire him. I agree, wholeheartedly with that rationale.
In any case, that pretty much would mark the end of Schultz’s wrestling career and he soon after embarked on an equally unconventional and high risk line of work – being a bounty hunter. In his new career, Schultz would cross paths with a far more sinister crew of real life heels and scumbag, often having to risk his life in having to arrest the crooks and low lifes. David has now chosen to write about his adventures and misadventures in both wrestling and bounty hunting in his soon to be released biography “Don’t Call it Fake,” which will be available on Amazon and should be a great read.
In closing, I’d like to thank David for the enormous contribution he has made to the wrestling landscape and for always having chosen to defend and uphold the propriety of our business. Hopefully, he and Vince McMahon can someday reconcile their differences, as I believe he’s a lot more worthy of being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame than many of the other less deserving candidates who have already been inducted into the hall. I’m not really holding my breath, waiting for that to happen, though.
Anyway, on that note, I’ll call this a wrap, but will look forward to catching up with you all next time. Happy Valentine’s day to all the romantic types out there.
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