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RF Video Shoot Interview with Raven Volume 1, Disc One

This was filmed in early 2003

The Interview was conducted by Rob Feinstein and Gabe Sapolsky

Disc One runs at one hour and fifty-three minutes long




Raven starts the interview by making fun of Gabe and Rob. He is then asked if he was a fan of wrestling as a kid and he said that he loved it and wanted to be an athlete but when he got into high school he became more of a "midcarder" then talks about how he wanted to be rich and famous and watching Ricky Santana & Dave Sierra (The Barrio Brothers) on Florida Championship Wrestling and how he thought that since he was their size that he could do it too. He also claims that Santana lied to him about being a tag team champion.



On how he got into the business, Raven said that he wanted to go to the Malenko's school but was unable to find it due to poor marketing and saw Larry Sharpe's Monster Factory in Sports Illustrated and despite not really putting any big stars into the business it had the most publicity.



His first territory was Memphis and jokes about how he never thought he would be back here (Raven was working for NWA-TNA at the time). He said that after several months at the Monster Factory, Sharpe told him that he needed to work in front of crowds and stressed out like crazy trying to send out a tape of his work until Jerry Lawler called him back. Raven said that he had a great time as he hung around with Marty Jannetty a lot. Raven recalls Jannetty dumping off Candi Divine at his doorstep at 6:00am. Raven said that he had a bad match against ome short masked jobbers called the Zebra Warriors and after that became a jobber himself and was let go after an angle in which Missy Hyatt offered to date Raven if he beat Lawler and when he lost, he got slapped by Missy and was done.



After Memphis, he went to Florida as the territory was being restarted. He loved that he got to do commentary with Gordon Solie but said that the locker room was awful and calls Brett Sawyer a "piece of shit" and threatens to kick his ass if he sees him again. He was in Florida for about ten months until he got fired when after not losing at all on TV, Steve Keirn told Raven to put him over and Raven said that he "hemmed and hawed" about it and the next day Mike Graham called him up and fired him as Raven said that he realized how he knew he was fired ten minutes after refusing to job and was glad it happened there instead of somewhere else. Raven liked Graham and said that Graham himself said he had to let him go but that he could call in a few months and they would see about bringing him back.



Raven talks about a tour of Hawaii that featured other wrestlers from different territories then met Moose Morowski from Vancouver who got him a job for Al Tomko's promotion in Portland. Raven said that Tomko constantly bitched about Verne Gagne pushing his son Greg for being too small then went ahead and pushed his own kid who Raven said made Greg look like Andre the Giant by comparison. He then talks about working as part of a six-man with Tomko's kids and how they tried to have him dropkick the ref in their match for no reason then was told that a girl was threatening legal action and realied they were trying to fuck him over and got the hell out of the territory.



When he left Vancouver, Raven drove himself down to Portland in an attempt to get a job and met Dave Sierra and from that he got the job. He talks about Roddy Piper and how he wanted to see what he looked like and when Raven talks about how he used to do commentary with Gordon Solie, Piper gave him three weeks to get over as a heel commentator. Raven said that he would have quit if he was unable to get himself over in that time frame then talks about how he never waited for a promotion to push him and instead focused on how to get himself over.



Raven talks about how he dressed like a pimp and brought different women and how that helped get him laid. After that he discusses about how he drove with Len Denton and got to pick his brain.



When asked about GWF, Raven joked about how they skipped over his cocaine-filled days in Portland that were filled with banging "rats" and how all they had in Portland was the Trailblazers and that was it so they were all local celebrities and on Saturday night, their show beat "Saturday Night Live" in the ratings. He talks about how he found his valet, Ginger, at his coke dealer's house smoking crack and she had huge tits but showed up on time. Raven said he told her to dress like a sloppy whore and how her tit popped out just before they went live and how they never edited anything and has the show went on the air she was shoving her tit back in her dress. He said that Matt Borne's wife was pissed at him for putting her on the air because of how she looked but when Raven explained how she was there to get heat, she understood. After that he had a storyline with another girl named Veronica, who would go on to marry Rex King. He said that they had a mixed tags and the girl started shooting on each other. He got fired from Portland after two years and said that Len Denton was the booker and kept things at a certain level where as Raven thought they could grow and Denton thought Raven was making a play at the book and got fired around Christmas time.



After Portland, WCW called him up for a heel commentator job that paid $100,000 a year and he would still get to wrestle but realized that Denton fucked him over as back then they were close and Denton offered to talk to Jim Ross for him. After that, Raven learned that he had to do his own business in wrestling.



He did not think that there was a whole lot in GWF. He had to take a second job as a male stripper to pay the bills and thought it was great as he got even more pussy and drugs. He changed his name from Scotty the Body to Scott Anthony as he wanted to try to become an actor and felt he needed a last name.



Raven got to WCW after making a name for himself in the independent scene in Atlanta. He said that DDP got him the job after he went to Dusty Rhodes and told him to hire Raven. He then said that Dusty did not like him after what he did in Florida but DDP convinced him and he worked a dark match and got himself over then after that Dusty promised to make him into the next Ric Flair as he had the look of today. However, Bill Watts came in and decided that Raven was a "stooge" and that was the end of that. Raven hates Watts and said how he used to help his son Erik. He said that he used to ride with Steve Austin and Brian Pillman and how they were hilarious and that Pillman would be reading vocabulary books in the back. Raven talk about how Watts never booked him on house shows either and the only time they booked him was on the night of his 10th year high school reunion, the only day he wanted off. Watts said he never gave a reason for why he let him go and said it might have been because he was Jewish but Raven didn't care and tells Watts to fuck himself.



He talks about how Atlanta had tons of hot chicks at this time that any guy could get a "10" because there were so many of them, even the girls working day shifts at the "titty bars" were smoking hot.



After WCW he went back to Memphis and thought his career was half-over as he felt he was too small for the WWF. The WWF ended up calling and wanted him to be a manager, which he interpreted as a manager who wrestles but found out it was just for a manager.



 He said that he took the Johnny Polo character as someone who had a lot of leisure time and brought a lot of ridiculous stuff to the ring. Raven talks about Vince getting him behind the camera but not in front of it.



On the Quebecers, Raven said Jacques knew enough to distance himself from him to get the heat on himself. Regarding Adam Bomb, Raven said that Bomb thought he was a legit manager and would ask him to make rental car arrangements and other things.



Vince made him an associate producer of RAW and got a salary and health insurance as a result but wanted to be on camera as a performer. Vince felt there was a disconnect between Raven and the Johnny Polo character.




He came up with an idea on "All American Wrestling" to put on a nostalgia match and that allowed him to sit in the library and watch old matches all day but was not allowed to select matches with guys that Vince was feuding with.



Raven now talks about how he would party with Shane McMahon until 4:00am just about every night. He also said that Shane could hang right with him. He also said that the boys thought he was kissing Vince's ass by doing this but in reality he was pissing him off for keeping his son out all night. Once he left the WWF the friendship ended though as he talks about how that happens in wrestling all the time. He then jokes about how Shane could drink like a motherfucker and got tons of chicks. He said that he is fearless and a "tough motherfucker."



On quitting the WWF, Raven said they took him off the air and he was unhappy. The guys in the locker room thought he was crazy for giving up $100,000 a year and benefits but he said he got into wrestling to wrestle.



After the WWF, Art Barr contacted him about being the third member of Los Gringos Locos in the AAA promotion but said that Konnan wanted that job and made sure to bury him so he would not get the job. He said that Konnan and him are friends now though. Raven said that Barr told him his character was based off of his Scotty the Body character but also said that Barr was a notorious liar as well. He did say his character had some similarities to Scotty the Body.



After that he met DDP who told him to go with a grunge look and adopt a tough guy gimmick after watching the movie "Point Break" and Raven dressed like that and listened to alternative music at the time anyway so took that and stuff from his "fucked up" childhood and created the Raven character.



While living in Philly, he saw ECW for the first time and was blown away. He originally talked to Jim Cornette to get into Smoky Mountain but all he did was blow smoke up his ass and never got brought in after all. Raven said that he needed a TV show to display his character depth and said he had to get into ECW and DDP called Paul Heyman. Page then called Raven up and his roommate woke him up after a night of partying and he was still fucked up on Halcyons. DDP told Raven to call Heyman and he did and got brought in after that.



Initially, Heyman thought the Raven character was going to be the Scotty the Body character in grunge clothing but after his first promo, Heyman saw that it clicked and had no idea he was going that way. Raven calls Heyman the greatest mind in wrestling that he had ever met.



He said that Axl Rotten was a very good worker and a lot more talent than people give him credit for and thought that Mikey Whipwreck was a more interesting version of the 1-2-3 Kid because he had depth as he was scared to do anything. He credits Heyman for hiding Public Enemy's flaws and said that Johnny Grunge was an awful wrestlers but funny on promos and could bleed well.



Raven's idea was to stay in ECW for four months to get Dreamer over then go to the WWF but liked ECW too much and didnt think the WWF would take him back.



Heyman was the one who came up with the idea for Stevie Richards to be Raven's flunky. Raven said he made him wear daisy dukes and cut off shirts off hair bands to make him look like a putz. He said that Richards was a great worker. They never hung out at that time but are friends now. Raven said that is drug and alcohol problem was at an all-time high and made Richards his errand boy as he even paid him as much as Heyman did. He tells a story of how he wanted Richards to wear a bald skin cap to look like Baron Von Raschke as it was meant as a "funny homage" to his heroes.



Final Thoughts: Very good stuff. Raven does talk non-stop and strays off topic but he is engaging and entertaining most of the time so it is all good. If they asked more about his partying you could have had some insane stories too.

Disc Two will be up tomorrow.

Comments

  1. Doesn't he mention being tight with Gorilla Monsoon in this shoot?


    Fucking love the idea of Gorilla Monsoon and RAVEN being kindred spirits and just chilling.

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  2. Everybody got along with Gorilla.

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  3. He mentioned very briefly

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  4. The Raven/Sandman anthology from RF is pretty epic. I wouldn't recommended it to anyone in this forum, however, because garbage wrestling.

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  5. You mean the pair of shoots they've done? Those are excellent, although the second one does stutter and lag at times.

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  6. One of my all time favourite shoots.

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  7. No, not a shoot, every single match and promo from their feud in ECW. Title changes, house shows, the debut of Lori and Tyler etc.

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  8. Oh. I think I have that set, I know I have the Raven-Dreamer edition, I'd have to double-check and see if I also have Raven-Sandman.

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  9. Yeah Raven/Dreamer is next on the list. Also want desperately the best of PE.

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  10. "Who the hell hired Raven?"

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  11. The same guy who booked Hogan to win at Wresltemania 31

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  12. Gunther the Nasty LoserNovember 13, 2014 at 1:25 PM

    "at his coke dealer's house smoking crack and he had huge tits but showed up on time."


    His dealer was stacked

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  13. Who the FUCK voted for Raven?

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  14. Gunther the Nasty LoserNovember 13, 2014 at 1:25 PM

    *fuck

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  15. Another solid review, by the way.

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  16. "His lips are turning blue, daddy!"

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  17. Raven/Sandman Part 1 is the greatest shoot of all time.

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  18. One of my favorite stories

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  19. Thanks man, I appreciate it

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  20. I switched it.
    Had to rush to get this up today.

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  21. Thumbs up for Bayless!

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  22. Was it fuck? Thanks for the correction. That makes it funnier.

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  23. The Ghost Of Meekin's MoobsNovember 13, 2014 at 2:07 PM

    What are the chances of Raven doing color commentary with JR for GFW?

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  24. The Ghost Of Meekin's MoobsNovember 13, 2014 at 2:07 PM

    That should be incredibly short

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  25. The Ghost Of Meekin's MoobsNovember 13, 2014 at 2:08 PM

    Monsoon and Johnny Polo were a damn good team

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  26. Nah, someone like TPE were PERFECT for Paul E. Not good enough to be on top, but good enough to have their glaring problems hidden in the ECW "style".

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  27. "Daddy, Daddy his lips are turning blue."


    Ah, Fonzie.

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  28. Shut up Ghost of Meekin's Moobs.

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  29. The Ghost Of Meekin's MoobsNovember 13, 2014 at 2:49 PM

    Fuck you

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  30. I suggested this the other day. He could be great, but it could be a train wreck if he isn't taking it seriously.

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  31. I'd like to think that deep down, Gorilla Monsoon was all about bitches, money, and correctly hooking the abdominal stretch.

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  32. "Side salto. Side suplex. Side something. Side order of fries, I'm getting hungry."

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  33. The Monsoon/Polo pairing was one of the most underrated broadcast teams in history. They had a hilarious dynamic of essentially a grandpa and his bratty grandson.

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  34. PE stuff hasn't nesecarily aged well in some instances but by the time they left you really couldn't argue with them saying the ECW Arena was the House at Public Enemy Built.

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  35. Damn straight. Gotta hook the foot behind the leg!

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  36. I remember those two cracking on HBK for looking chubby during a cage match with Jannetty. And Johnny Polo referencing The Doors and getting one of Gorilla's classic exasperated responses.

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  37. "That wasn't the first time you did ecstasy."

    "Alright, it was my second first time."

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  38. Same here. Just wish Rob had better audio quality at the time.

    I remember having to turn my TV all the way up just to hear it when I bought this back in 2004.

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  39. Not to worry Brian, Raven goes into even more detail about his partying as the shoot goes on.

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  40. "Paul E ... I save lives!"

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  41. is it just me, or is DDP the coolest guy ever?

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  42. Johnny Polo and Gorilla Monsoon have some great commentary on coliseum home videos from 93/94... sounds like both just blazed a j together before sitting down... fun stuff

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