Remembering Hot Rod

Quick Note: I wrote this original blog back on 8/7/15, a few days after the death of "Rowdy Roddy Piper".  Anyone who knows me that well will know that I was a huge fan of his growing up.  There were a few edits to it, including this note about when the blog was originally written but little else changed about it.  I scheduled this blog to be published on what would have been Roddy Piper's 67th birthday with a bit was added to add the end.

Remembering Hot Rod 

The story goes that when asked about good advice she’d received, actress Stana Katic replied, “Never marry your muse, it ruins the illusion. Some similar advice, though I do not know the source, goes something similar to “Be wary of meeting your heroes as you way wind up very disappointed and they will no longer be your heroes.” I suspect there is a bit of truth to both ideas. I will never know for sure.

Last Friday, one week ago from when I am writing this, I came home from running some errands and got on Twitter to find something shocking. That news was Rowdy Roddy Piper had died. I wanted to believe that it was one of those infamous death hoaxes that are prone to circulate via social media. However, the news was in fact true. The “Rowdy One” or “Hot Rod” or however you knew him had died.

Many fans, myself included, knew Piper has both a wrestler and an actor. During the course of his career, he did both and did so in a way that showed that he loved doing both. He was arguably one of the best villains ever in pro-wrestling and he was a legend as the heroic Nada in the sci-fi classic. "They Live”. Over the past year, he had a foray into podcasting which was short lived. In short, he was a storyteller regardless of what medium he was using at the moment to tell a story. He was also a father, a husband, and a cancer survivor.

Oh yeah… and he was one of my childhood heroes.

As a pro-wrestling fan, I frequently have found myself cheering for the heels. This is largely for two reasons. The first being that without good villains, the heroes are pretty much meaningless. (This applies to not just wrestling but to any form of storytelling. I mean what is Superman without Lex Luthor, for example.) The second reason, one that developed much later, is that playing the villain rather in pro-wrestling or a movie is so much more fun usually. I guess you could say that there is the third reason that I never got on board the Hulkamania train when I started watching wrestling but that is an afterthought to me in the long run.) The first time I watched any WWE (at the time WWF) content, Piper was one of the top heels in the company. Of course, my watching during that time was short lived. I honestly remember the old “Rock ‘n’ Wrestling” cartoon on Saturday mornings more than watching the actual matches back then. I remember Piper on that cartoon though and I remember being curious about who the characters were then. Years later, when I was more formally introduced to pro-wrestling, I managed to get a hold of tapes that included a dog collar match between Piper and Greg Valentine in the NWA just as easily as any of Piper’s WWE stuff. And by that time, Piper had just turned face going into Wrestlemania III. (I remember the Piper vs. Adrian Adonis match being one of my favorite matches at Wrestlemania III mostly because of the ending.) A few years later, I remember Piper returning to the WWE from his “retirement match at Wrestlemania III” and feuding with Rick Rude, Bad New Brown, Ted Dibease and more but as a face. In the midst of all that though Piper had begun his excursion into acting.

And to be honest, I am just as much familiar with Piper’s film work as I am his wrestling work. The first film I remember seeing Piper in was not “They Live” but a movie called “Body Slam” which was a movie where he played a pro-wrestler managed by a music promoter played by Dirk Benedict (of A-Team and Battlestar Galatica fame). It wasn’t a major release as I recall and I picked it up at the local video store on a whim. I grabbed “They Live” and “Hell Comes to Frogtown” as soon as I found them on video. I know most people know Piper’s work in “They Live” and if you don’t then go find a way to see the movie. Even today, the move holds some relevance and perhaps more so today than it did back then. Of course, Roddy also made various TV guest appearances including “Walker, Texas Ranger” (one of the few episodes of the series I genuinely liked), The Outer Limits (not one of the best episodes of the series remake but not bad) and the Robocop series. He stuck to the sci-fi and action / cop show genres mostly with some forays into other genres but he did well with what he was given. I’m not going to say that Hot Rod was a great actor but I will say that he did deliver some good performances and, more importantly, entertaining performances. I will say that a lot of times there were stuff that I saw Piper in that enjoyed solely because he was in it. He made some otherwise bland or just plain bad projects watchable and even entertaining. Sometimes, that is all that matters.

As I mentioned, I considered Piper one of my heroes as a kid. In short, I liked his style of work in the ring and found him to be fun to listen to on the mic. He came across as someone who was tough and had an unpredictable quality to him. I guess you could say he came across like a loose cannon or a wildcard. His quote “Just when you think you have all the answers, I change the questions.” summed up both what I liked about him and why. In eighth grade, I had decided I might want to try out for the high school wrestling team after we were given a three-day introduction to the sport. I did the three day clinic and the tournament. In the tournament, I wore my “Hot Rod” shirt because I was a fan. I regret nothing (excepting losing that second match by one point because I was too cautious).  I even tried to replace that "Hot Rod" shirt a few years ago but the XL shirt didn't fit right.  I still have the shirt at the moment but cannot wear it.  (And it was a Christmas gift so I can't return it.)

Regarding his place in pro-wrestling, I don’t think there will ever be another guy quite like him. Though, I would never fault a young guy getting into pro-wrestling wanting to be as good on the mic or as good in the ring as Piper. And mind you, while he was not the “a technical guy ala a Bret Hart or a Daniel Bryan”, he was still one of the best workers out there (especially for his day) when it came to ring psychology, working a crowd, or cutting a promo on the mic. And his acting? I don’t think we’ve seen his best work yet though. Before his death, he completed two movies that are due out later this year and the beginning of next year. The first film is called “The Rectifier” and it is being called a performance that really shows what he could do as an actor. The second film is called “The Masked Saint” and is a Christian-minded film in which he plays a supporting role. (He had a few other projects in various stages of production at the time of his death as well.)

I never got to meet Roddy Piper. I would have loved to and I would have been a bit afraid to at the same time. As I alluded to at the beginning, I guess I've always been afraid of meeting any the real "heroes" that I had as a kid because I'm afraid of being disappointed.  And honestly, some of that comes from seeing people, and in some cases meeting them, that I use to admire professional when I was younger turn out to be complete disappointments for one reason or another as I have gotten older.  Though, I am told that Piper was even cooler for real that I thought he might have been as a kid.

I do think I would have loved to have worked on a film with the man back when I was still working in film and television production.  I think it would have been a blast.  But most importantly: I would have loved to have simply told him “Thanks for everything.”

Publishing this blog on what would have been Roddy Piper's 67th birthday.  It just registered to me that he was about a little over a year older than my parents.   Actually, he was two years older than my dad, go figure.  And while I don't expect any sort of response to this... I will be posting a link to this blog on Twitter and tagging Roddy's Twitter account, which his family still seems to maintain. Why? because why not.   

At some point... I plan to upload a video to YouTube with commentary of me playing through the section of Saints Row IV where Roddy Piper makes an appearance.  (Spoiler: it is in relation to his role in They Live.)  My aim is to release that video later this year.

Cheers.