Original subtitles

I am the champion. I am the greatest.

I am the strongest! This is my proof!

I got the proof, baby.

[Narrator] A world class bodybuilder

who revolutionized the business of wrestling,

Billy Graham was the first superstar.

Superstar Billy Graham was the biggest

box office attraction in the world.

The man of the hour. The man with the power.

The man that's too sweet to be sour.

Oh my gosh!

Perfection. [Laughing]

His body was unbelievable.

He was so far ahead of his time.

He was an icon, but he was imitated so much.

Every time you watch a wrestling show,

Billy Graham influences all of them.

And most of them don't even know it.

You're looking at the strongest wrestler

in the world today.

Crowned world champion,

Graham spiraled after losing the belt.

Superstar Billy Graham lost the title

and never recovered.

He had it all taken away.

And the drugs that made him a star

proved to be his undoing.

Steroids came to define Billy.

It absolutely destroyed his joints.

The damage was done.

My dad would do anything to keep that fame

and that stardom and that status.

He was at the pinnacle. He was selling out arenas,

and then it's yanked from him.

And he couldn't accept it.

And for some people, when you get that taken away,

you don't have a lot left, except for spite.

So he went to war with Vince McMahon,

and Vince could squash you like a grape if he wanted to.

The rise of Superstar Billy Graham is fascinating,

but the decline of Superstar Billy Graham is tragic.

He overcame everything in life,

from meager beginnings,

to be the champion of the world.

But he killed himself in the process.

♪

There he is, "Superstar" Billy Graham.

Very charismatic, colorful individual.

Look at the size of those upper arms.

Ladies and gentlemen,

they border in some 22 inches.

My dad, he was always Superstar.

Since the day he was born, it was always in him.

He's always been Superstar.

My name is Capella Flaherty, and I am the daughter of

"Superstar" Billy Graham.

I remember being at a match with my brother,

and the ceiling of the arena opened up,

and the sun beams shown down on my dad,

and he just lit up.

When that light shone on him,

there was no getting away from it.

Oh, there's Superstar, there's Superstar,

there's Superstar.

He's "Superstar" Billy Graham!

He was more Superstar than he was Wayne Coleman,

at least to myself and my brother.

When he was When he was Wayne Coleman,

he was loving and he loved us.

But I think he loved being Superstar a little bit more.

Very loud, very boisterous.

Always trying to be the center of attention,

and if he wasn't, he would make sure that he was.

That's just who my dad was.

I'm Joseph Michael Miluso, and I am the son of

Superstar Billy Graham. My dad was always on...

even when the camera wasn't on him.

If you don't have a color television,

go out and hawk your car and buy a color TV so you can

see Superstar Billy Graham in living, living color.

In the late 1970s, Superstar Billy Graham

was on top of the world,

redefining the look, the style,

and the idea of the perfect professional wrestler.

Superstar Billy Graham was the world champion of the

biggest wrestling company in the United States.

The look is what made Superstar Billy Graham.

Nobody in that era, like, nobody looked like him.

I'm Dave Meltzer, and I've been covering

pro wrestling for just over 50 years.

He had the bleached blond hair and he was

a legitimately very, very strong guy.

He was very flamboyant. Whatever "it" is,

Superstar Billy Graham had it.

He had all the charisma. He had the body.

Most guys looked like Chief Jay Strongbow.

A little bit of a potbelly. A little bit flabby arms.

But Billy had a physique that was phenomenal.

The body in wrestling wasn't crucial until Billy Graham.

I'm Jim Cornette.

I've had a 40-year career in professional wrestling,

but for even longer than that,

I've been an historian.

[Grunting]

He wasn't a polished in-ring performer,

but he looked great and he could talk.

This is the beauty of a champion.

This is the brains of a champion.

Look, look, look!

Before making it big in New York,

Billy Graham had first made a name for himself

as a teenager, growing up in Arizona.

He was a competitive bodybuilder and in 1961

was teenage Mr. America.

He was a born athlete and was self-made.

When he was in his teens, he took to weightlifting and...

he would pour concrete into coffee cans,

and that's how he would lift weights.

I think that was just...

what made him feel good.

It probably gave him some strength.

When he was younger, his dad used to be

very physical, abusive with him,

and my dad would get hit with the belt.

One day, my dad was just big enough,

and grabbed the belt out of his father's hand,

and that's when he knew the beatings were over and

they were over 'cause he showed,

"Look, I'm bigger than you now.

I'm stronger than you.

You can't beat me anymore."

Eager to put his physical attributes to work,

Wayne Coleman travels from Arizona to Calgary,

where a failed attempt at Canadian football stardom

leads him to the legendary Stu Hart.

♪

Billy walks into the gym and meets Stu.

Stu's just enamored by the size of this guy.

He was just a specimen beyond description.

My name is Steve Strong,

and I was a professional wrestler for 19 years,

and Superstar Billy Graham

was one of my best friends.

There's a carte blanche about the Dungeon and

Stu Hart that if you broke in with Stu Hart,

you could pretty much stamp your path to

whatever territory you wanted to go to,

and Super worked up there for a while and...

left and, started his career.

Back in Arizona, a chance encounter

with another wrestling legend

sets Wayne Coleman on the path to greatness.

We will be the International Tag Team Champions

as soon as that match comes off,

and it's going to be the greatest match.

The Graham family legacy in wrestling is one of the most

famous in the history of the business.

In the early 70s, and Dr. Jerry Graham is broke,

and drunk, and he thought,

"Maybe I need another brother."

And Superstar Billy Graham is born.

They went to Los Angeles together,

and Jerry was just a hopeless drunk.

Jerry lasted a couple of weeks, and they fired him,

but Billy had enough charisma that they kept him on.

I am a reflection of perfection.

The number one selection. You've got it.

At that time, Billy would train at Gold's Gym like

every bodybuilder would, and he was

Arnold Schwarzenegger's regular training partner,

and they were very close friends.

I was born in June of 1972,

and my father was a heel at the time,

and some fans had vandalized

my father's Cadillac, so he couldn't drive

to pick my mother and I up from the hospital.

So, Arnold picked up my mom and my sister

from the hospital in his blue Volkswagen Bug.

Here's an Arnold picture.

Here's a couple Arnold pictures.

I'm not sure where that was, but...

I think it was in our apartment on Ocean Avenue.

-Probably. -I just found this recently.

This is an original Western Union telegram that

my mother had sent her parents...

the day that she married my father.

They went to Vegas and eloped.

January 19th, 1971.

This is Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Miluso.

That was my grandfather.

"Mom and Dad. Billy and I were just married.

We really love each other. Please try and understand.

I love you both."

My mother was Madeline Miluso.

She worked in a bank in Southern California,

and he came in and...

thought she was really pretty.

She always loved his smile.

And he made her laugh a lot.

She fell in love with him. She thought he was

the most handsome man in the world.

She got pregnant with me, and they got

an apartment in Santa Monica, California.

She didn't care about the wrestling part of it at all.

She just loved my dad.

I remember Mom tie-dying clothes in our kitchen.

She was a big part of his look.

Mr. Rainbow, more colors of the rainbow.

The prettiest wrestler in the world.

Billy Superstar Graham.

The look was good, and he understood his deal

was posing and flexing and everything.

But it was really the promos.

I'm gonna take out my frustration.

I'm going to take out my wrath.

I'm going to take out my anger.

He'd been an evangelist in his younger years.

He was a traveling tent show preacher.

My dad started preaching as an evangelist

when he was in his teens.

He went all over Arizona, in particular,

speaking at churches, and did feats of strength.

When I listen to his promos now,

it's like he's standing in front of a church assembly.

It's the same thing, except it's wrestling.

Superstar, you are the greatest.

You are the strongest. You're the man of the hour!

Billy Graham was probably one of the first to use various

catchphrases that he would then start repeating.

-I'm the man of the hour! -The man with the power.

-The man with the power! -Too sweet to be sour!

Too sweet to be sour!

I mean, it's legendary stuff.

They were unbelievable promos back then.

These hands can crush coconuts.

These hands can straighten out horseshoes.

You know what his arm can do?

In 1975, Billy Graham's star

is already on the rise

when he gets a call from Vince McMahon Sr.,

New York's top promoter.

He weighed in at 285 pounds.

Superstar Billy Graham!

Billy was very, very excited about being at Madison

Square Garden and being in the limelight.

McMahon has a clear vision for the superstar,

with a bold plan for the future of the

World Championship.

♪

Bruno Sammartino is ready to step down

as being the champion.

He'd already had a 9-year run from '63 to '71,

and then he was champion again in the mid 70s.

Bruno was so embedded into the history of

the sport in New York.

But it was time for him to drop the strap.

You know, when you've had it for so long and so long,

there has to be a passing of the guard.

Bob Backlund was Vince's guy.

He wanted that squeaky clean guy who would go to schools

and tell kids, "Don't do drugs, don't smoke."

Bobby Backlund was my tag team partner

before he went up there.

He was a great athlete,

but his promos were the drizzling shits.

I've been raised on the farm and

climbing has been a part of my life.

Bruno wanted to lose the belt to somebody...

huge, a big man.

So, Billy Graham becomes the transitional champion.

He will hold the belt for... almost a year,

and then he will lose it on such and such date

so they can crown their new champion.

The All-American boy, Bob Backlund.

-[Cheering] -That's the deal.

So, Billy knew the day he was winning it.

He knew the day he was losing it.

He was told.

[Indistinct commentary & cheering]

But something happens. Graham wins the title.

Even though he's a bad guy,

people start cheering for him.

Billy Graham became the hottest box office attraction

in the business.

He's selling out Madison Square Garden.

The winner of the bout and

still champion, Superstar!

Every month there's 25,000 people

watching Billy Graham defend the title.

But Vince Senior always had a plan,

and he was always regimented,

and he was sticking to it no matter what.

It was strictly, we want a babyface as the champion.

And Billy was not going to be that babyface.

And this is what led to Billy Graham's downfall.

The Worldwide Wrestling Federation

heavyweight champion,

Superstar Billy Graham!

Superstar Billy Graham's reign as champion ushers in

an era of good fortune for his family.

We had a very nice house in New York.

We had maids in New York.

We had a three-story home in New York.

We had a limo. We had a lot of money.

I remember going in their bedroom,

and I found his championship belt.

I'm like, oh, this is cool.

And I took it out, and I laid it on the bed,

and I was shining his belt so the gold would sparkle

and the little gems.

And then I put it back so I didn't get in trouble.

But for Billy's wife, Madeline, and their children,

those good fortunes prove short lived.

I know he loved my mother,

but there was something going on...

while he was married to my mother.

I remember him talking to my mom when

he told her that he wanted to divorce her.

I was hiding behind the couch.

She's crying, and I'm looking at my dad,

and he's breaking my mother's heart...

right now, saying, "I'm in love with Valerie."

When I was 18 years old, I met him at an IHOP.

It was right next to the hotel where he was staying.

And I would go, and sit at the IHOP

just to get a glimpse of him.

And that particular night, they came in and sat down

at the table next to us and just started talking.

Hi, I'm Valerie Coleman, and I was married to

Superstar Billy Graham for just short of 45 years.

Basically, from the time we met,

we were together all the time.

Yeah, it sucked, but...

It was just really sad watching my parents

break up right in front of me.

It was probably almost a year...

before he told me about his family.

It was devastating.

I didn't know what to do.

I was very conflicted.

But ultimately...

I didn't leave him.

And we were married a couple of months later.

[Crowd chatter & cheering]

With a new wife and a new life,

Superstar Billy Graham feels on top of the world.

But even as Superstar pushes himself to deliver,

the demands of being champion wreak havoc on his body.

He'd always have pills around, and so

when he would call us, it's clear in his voice

that he was definitely on something.

Yeah, I mean, he was in pain. You know,

and when you're in pain, you want to take medicine.

And unfortunately, he had that type of personality

that he just abused it.

He just didn't know how to control it.

He overdosed in his hotel room in New York

several times while he was champion.

It was all pharmaceuticals, uppers, downers,

trying to get through the pain and just live with it.

He had an overdose in the hotel room.

He'd gone into the bathroom and taken

a handful of pills and came out.

And all of a sudden, his body rolls over

and he's not breathing at all.

♪

I call downstairs and

I'm begging for them to come help.

And this woman comes up,

and she starts pounding and beating his chest,

and screaming, "Don't die on me!"

And she's cussing him out, "Don't you die on me,"

and she's beating him. Paramedics get there,

and they're trying to use the defibrillators and

things on him. His heart had stopped.

They, you know, shocked him back.

So yeah, that was a pretty intense time.

[Cheering]

There's pandemonium tonight!

There's excitement. Look at the people's faces.

Look at the people's expressions.

Can you feel it? Look at you.

You're excited because I am the champion.

After almost a year as champion,

Billy Graham is set to lose the belt to Bob Backlund

following the plan originally laid out

by Vince McMahon Sr.

His run was the hottest it ever was,

but I think in his mind it's like...

I'm going to prove them wrong.

I'm going to draw so big that

they can't take the title from me.

Graham went to Vince Sr., he's like,

"How can you? We're selling out.

We're turning them away."

The New York promoters had always put

their heavyweight championship on a hero,

and Vince Senior was looking for his next champion,

who was going to be Bob Backlund.

He had planned this for a year and a half,

and nothing was going to change his mind.

Ask Bobby Backlund when you see him,

how he expects to get out of the

Superstar bear hug, ask him that.

Right before he goes out before the match,

he was trying to get them to change their mind.

And they're like, "No, we're going with Bob Backlund."

[Indistinct commentary]

Bob Backlund...

I hate that ----ing guy.

Wait a minute!

Bob Backlund has Superstar Billy Graham in the air!

There may not be an escape for Graham!

He's in the middle of the ring!

Atomic knee drop!

Down to the canvas!

Backlund covers Graham: 1, 2, and 3!

[Cheering]

The World Wrestling Federation champion!

He was the biggest box office attraction in the business,

and it was taken away from him.

He couldn't understand why.

♪

All the struggles, all the pain.

Working his way up from nothing.

To being champion of the world.

Then to all of a sudden lose it.

In his mind, he's like, what was the point?

Did I do something wrong?

These guys obviously don't know greatness

when they see it.

So, it hit him very hard.

That's all that there is in this world,

is the championship belt. The greatest wrestler...

Wayne was very, very, his entire life,

a very insecure person.

It's kind of hard to believe when you would look at him,

with the physique and everything,

but he was very insecure, so he just never could believe

that he was really worth anything.

He was beaten down so much growing up,

not just the physical, the verbal abuse and

being told that you're worthless, you're no good.

You'll never be anything. You're ugly.

And he took it. He, he received that.

He accepted that, you know, and he believed it.

His entire life, it stayed with him.

Being on top, being the champion,

carrying that belt meant so much to him.

And when he lost that title, it certainly changed

everything from that day forward.

It just flat out was devastating to him.

It destroyed his ego.

One day he had started a big bonfire.

Burned all of his wrestling gear.

Boots, his jackets, his robes.

His attire.

You know, just...

He burned everything.

♪

Bob Backlund has Superstar Billy Graham in the air!

There may not be an escape for Graham!

For Billy Graham, losing the championship

was more than just a storyline.

It was a blow to his self-worth

and his confidence.

It was everything to Billy. It was his life.

It was bigger than I could even understand.

Some guys can't take it.

He wasn't mentally capable of seeing the light

in other places.

Hi, I'm Steve Keirn, and I've been in

professional wrestling over 40 years,

and I've shared a locker room

with Superstar Billy Graham.

He saw the big money was New York.

He was the man. He had the belt.

Now he's beltless. You didn't win that belt.

Somebody told you that you're gonna get that belt.

It's not real, the part about

you're a champion or you're not a champion.

It's not real.

Like a year later, Billy's running

a lawn care business or something in Arizona.

You know, wrestling on Friday nights.

I mean, he's out of it so much that...

people thought he died.

It's in the paper he's dead.

Gorilla Monsoon wrote that, "Here's tragic news.

Billy Graham has died from cancer."

And for a couple of years there...

I mean, he was right.

That Superstar Billy Graham was dead.

When he lost the belt,

that was the beginning of his decline.

And a lot of it was mental.

We went back to Phoenix,

and he didn't know about withdrawals.

And he just cold turkey stopped taking pills

on our road trip.

And we were in this ran down little hotel in New Mexico.

And he had a grand mal seizure.

And I called paramedics,

and they thought he tried to kill himself.

I said, "Well, he didn't try to kill himself,

he's actually trying to live."

And instead of going home, he went into a rehab.

But it didn't work, it didn't last.

I was so afraid of him dying, I,

and I, you know, was naive enough to think

I could love him back from whatever brink he was on.

[Buzzing]

Broke and frustrated by his stagnant career,

Graham seeks to reinvent himself and get back into

the business that made him famous.

He was so crestfallen that he wanted to reinvent himself

and do it in a vindictive style that would say,

"Screw you if you didn't want that original Superstar.

I'm going to give you something else."

He comes back to the WWF.

Bald head, much smaller.

Looked like a completely different guy,

and he claimed that he had left wrestling and

he'd become the world's martial arts champion.

When I give him the Superstar chop,

the people will fall out of their seats.

Will fall out of their seats! Drop dead...

I watched him one of the very first times, I think.

And I said, "What the ---- is he doing?"

This isn't the Superstar I remember.

Superstar Billy Graham!

He would just do karate chops. He'd have a black belt.

Just like kind of stood there, was pretty immobile,

you know, it was like really lame.

And his wrestling wasn't good at all at that point.

He was covering up his body all of a sudden,

like with his judo jacket on, you know,

and he looked kind of hokey,

kind of like a guy that fell out of a...

third grade judo class.

It was so bad, and he just looked so defeated.

He just was not the same person.

It was something he did out of being desperate

to get back into the limelight.

Superstar in big trouble!

Unfortunately, Billy's body started giving out.

He started getting hip injuries.

That was a sad time.

I look at him when he was like that and it just

makes me so sad because he was so thin,

he was so high on pills,

and he did not know who he was.

Everything has been said, everything has been done.

All the preparation, everything is ready.

He just looked so sick to me.

It's hard for me to look at him during that time.

It really is, I don't like it.

That's one of the darkest times of my life.

Wayne started using pain pills and sleeping pills again.

That's when he became emaciated and,

I mean, he looked like he was dying.

It was a horrible time.

I mean, McMahon had aspirations to push him

to the moon, but Billy lost his mojo.

It was gone.

Look at this. Look at the shot!

Less than a year into his return,

Billy Graham leaves the WWF for a second time.

Who knows what the plans were for him?

Because before too long, Hulkamania is running wild.

Hulk Hogan, he drops a big leg on him!

He's down for the count.

1, 2, he's got him!

The way the business was growing,

McMahon kind of transitioned into making Hogan his

ideal version of Superstar Billy Graham,

and embellishing that character,

and creating someone that maybe he felt like

he didn't do enough of for Billy Graham.

My pythons are ready!

The largest arms in the world!

Superstar Billy Graham will put the 22-inch

python arms around your body and squeeze.

The promo skills, the posing.

All of that stuff, it came from Billy Graham.

Hulk Hogan, he was wearing boas and things like that.

I want to know one thing, brother!

Superstar started, "Brother, brother."

"Hey, brother. Hey, brother.

How are you doing, brother?"

I got the Hulk Hogan war bonnet on now, brother.

Literally, though, everything from, you know, the ear.

Wayne ripping the shirt off and

throwing it out to the crowd.

You name it, he did it.

Look at the videos, there's Wayne doing it.

You're gonna see a lot of number one contenders

come and go, brother.

But there's only one Hulkster.

There's only one Hulk Hogan, Daddy!

My dad deep down knew that, you know,

Hulk was younger and more relevant at the time,

and was probably a little jealous.

Vince had said that if the

Billy Graham of 1974 was around in 1984,

he could have been Hulk Hogan.

-Unbelievable! -[Cheering]

The former World Wrestling Federation heavyweight champ,

now working out every day and training with a vision,

a vision of being back in the squared circle.

Superstar Billy Graham is on top of his game,

and the future is mine.

The pythons are back.

In 1987, following his first failed attempt

to reinvent himself,

Billy Graham once again attempts a comeback.

Billy's not the same, the fans aren't the same,

and Billy was more considered an old timer

by '86 and '87.

He tore his body up. He had his ankle fused.

They had a steel rod that went from the

bottom of his heel through his leg.

His spine was collapsing. It was an absolute mess.

It was, the steroids had eaten him up.

Billy was pumping a lot of steroids in his body still.

He'd always been on steroids.

He was one of the original users of steroids in wrestling.

To him, it was normal.

He didn't care, you know, what anybody thought of him.

Because he still, first of all,

he knew he had to do the work.

Anybody can take steroids,

but not anybody is going to have a physique.

He had a big ego...

and he took roids to look good,

just like Arnold Schwarzenegger did.

All the bodybuilders of the 60s and 70s.

Anybody in my industry in the 70s and 80s,

they were playing with steroids because they saw the

effect on promoters when they had a better body.

♪

He was really struggling mentally with it.

I think he wanted to be who he was back in the 70s,

and it wasn't going to happen.

He would get in these moods.

He could get really incredibly rageful.

He never was physically abusive to me,

but he would destroy the house and

he could be very intimidating.

So, if he wanted to shot in his hip, you know,

I would have to give him the shot.

But I would stab him.

That was just my only thing I could do.

I would use it like a dagger or dart and

do it as hard as I could.

The mental anguish that he was going through,

I'm sure was amplified also by the physical pain of

his body, and the fact that he wasn't in the ring.

He wasn't wrestling, which is what he wanted to do.

Even as he got older,

he always talked about how he lost that belt...

and that he shouldn't have lost it that soon.

I'm like, well, Dad, that's the way that

it was supposed to happen.

But I think that once he lost that,

that was his downfall.

Billy never, ever, ever, ever,

ever forgave Vince McMahon Sr.

for having him drop the belt to Bob Backlund.

When this segue wayed into the early 90s,

I think Billy was just going, how can I hurt Vince McMahon?

To be successful in pro wrestling,

it's an absolute must to take steroids.

From 1985 to 1991,

McMahon and a doctor conspired to

distribute steroids to the wrestlers to enhance

their size and muscle development.

Dr. Zahorian was the wrestling commission doctor,

but then he became close to some of the wrestlers and

he became their drug supplier of prescription drugs.

He sent, through the mail,

thousands upon thousands of pills

just to my husband alone.

He made a ton of money, got very, very rich

off of their suffering and their addiction.

Billy testified for the prosecution.

Here was, you know, the former world champion

on the witness stand talking about his life and

history with anabolic steroids.

But he didn't go after Vince and

he didn't go after Hogan then.

And then, Hogan goes on Arsenio Hall.

I saw a guy on a program, named Billy Graham.

What's up with him?

Well, Superstar Billy Graham, apparently, in the 70s,

was one of the top wrestlers...

Hulk says something to the effect,

"Oh, he's just like some old time," like,

that he was nobody. That he was a nobody.

That's when things started changing with Wayne about

the way that he felt about Terry, about Hulk.

And he apparently was a heavy duty steroid abuser.

Graham was furious at Hogan for using his name like that

because, hey, Hogan was doing the same steroids.

So Billy was really mad and so,

at that point he went and said that, you know,

"Hogan did steroids. I know he did steroids."

Of course he did steroids.

And Billy had the bitterness against Vince too.

That's how it really manifested.

And because of that, we end up on

The Phil Donahue Show.

Superstar Billy Graham.

I'll tell you what, he's won his share.

It's Billy, it's Bruno, it's myself, and it's Meltzer.

And then we found out that McMahon was,

in fact, going to be there.

They wanted to do a story on the steroid use in wrestling.

The tension you could cut with a knife.

And Billy wanted to unload.

The selling of drugs by Dr. George Zahorian

has gone on for 15 years

in the World Wrestling Federation.

Billy said, "I shot Hogan up with steroids."

I've injected the man myself probably a half a dozen times.

And Vince just goes, "You're lying.

You never shot Hogan up with steroids."

When he Vince looks at him, and he says,

"Superstar, you know that's not true,"

I literally started to cry in the audience.

I knew when Wayne was lying.

I think he had an enormous amount of guilt over it,

after it was all said and done.

He's human.

Just a human being, just a man.

And he was bitter and he was hurt. I mean,

when you've been physical since you were ten years old

and all of a sudden he's crippled.

And there's this awful, awful bitterness

towards certain people.

And Vince happened to be one of them.

Struggling with addiction and financial ruin,

Billy's relationship with his children unravels.

There is a difference between a dad and a father.

Father's somebody who in every aspect

is always there for the children.

And my father was a dad because...

he got my mother pregnant with me,

and that's kind of it, really.

I mean, I hate to say this, but my father

never really paid child support ever.

So my mother, she went back to working at the bank.

My mom was working a lot, doing 2 or 3 jobs,

but she would make sure that me and my sister ate.

She always was verbal about how hurt she was,

but she loved him 'til the day she died.

I mean, my mother...

never remarried.

He'd moved on.

He married Valerie, fell in love.

We were part of his past life.

He never helped us.

There was never a father figure in my life.

I never respected the guy, as a kid.

I never respected him as I got older.

He made me very angry

about how he treated myself,

and my sister, and my mom. Got me very angry.

I mean, it was heartbreaking,

you know, because I look at him and I love him.

You know, and I just wanted him to want to be with us.

And he didn't want it.

He just didn't want it.

♪

Joey knew that my dad, I think,

loved me more than him.

My brother was born sick.

He was born with a hole in his heart.

So I think because my brother wasn't perfect,

my dad kind of pushed him aside a little bit.

He would forget my brother's birthday all the time

because my dad didn't really

care about him.

When I was 18, I changed my name from

Joseph Cole Coleman to Joseph Michael Miluso,

because Melissa is my mom's maiden name.

I decided I was...

moving on from who my dad was in my life,

and I was hoping it hurt him when I did it.

That destroyed him.

It broke his heart completely.

He hurt me my entire life.

I made him upset or mad at me?

Tough shit, I don't care.

He loved those kids so much.

He didn't know how to be the dad

that he wanted to be.

He never had a role model.

Unfortunately, so much of his life was defined by his dad.

I'm very happy that he found Valerie and

they were in love for so long because

they truly were meant to be together.

I don't like the fact that he treated us

as if we weren't there anymore.

I just knew that my dad was full of shit,

but I accepted it because I loved him.

But my father was not invited to my wedding,

so my brother gave me away.

♪

I was lonely, I was depressed.

And I'm telling you, I felt every emotion that

you brothers have felt in your life.

Alienated from his children and the world of wrestling,

Wayne Coleman returns to his roots as a preacher.

He didn't have anything else,

and he knew he was good at ministry.

So, he went back to that.

I think as he got older, he went full blown

with the church, and maybe to make amends to God

for the sins that he committed in his life.

He truly believed,

and I believe it as well,

that his true calling was for ministry.

Wayne wrote a play called The Empty Ring.

It was Wayne's life story, and it was a wrestling ring,

but it was empty for him, right?

There was no fulfillment.

And Jake The Snake played Wayne's part.

I wanted my daddy to look me in the eye, and say,

"Son, I'm proud of you."

[Slamming]

He couldn't do it.

One scene was a hotel room, and he,

he overdoses in the scene, and it shows him like

taking the bottle of pills, and...

it's very dark, and there's a lot of demons

all around, Jake. They're swirling, like,

trying to get him.

But ultimately, it's a redemption story,

and it was so emotional for me to watch that

because it was so real, you know?

And it was his life, and it's what we lived.

You can see, like this peace and this joy inside of him.

But even as Graham finds peace,

the damage to his body from years of wrestling and

drug abuse continue to take their toll.

He had contracted hepatitis from I think a cut on

his knee, from wrestling, is what he told me.

His liver was like turned to a rock.

And just the years of abuse on his body and

all the drugs he was doing.

One night we're laying in bed, and he coughed,

and I felt something wet...

hit me in the face.

And I jump up and turn on the light,

and I'm covered in blood.

And he was bleeding out.

We got to the hospital, and they said there was

nothing they could do for him.

That's when they told us he's got

stage four liver disease.

He has to have a transplant.

He was getting sicker and sicker and sicker.

And, he's like,

"Capella, I've only got like six weeks, max."

Ravaged by Hepatitis C,

Superstar Billy Graham faces a fight for survival,

requiring a liver transplant

just to stay alive.

Knowing that he might not wake up...

He called Vince, and he just asked him again

to forgive him, and he told him that he loved him.

And he thanked him for everything

he'd ever done for him.

But that tells you his heart, what was on his mind

were the people that he had hurt.

You know, people...

the things he hadn't forgiven himself for.

Vince was gracious enough,

and he was very kind, thankfully.

'Cause he didn't have to be, even then, but he was.

This poor girl had died and donated

all her organs that could be donated.

Thank God for that, because I really thought

he was gonna, that was it.

That was it for him. And then a short while after that,

I told him, I'm never gonna forget all the things that

happened in the past between you and Mom

and me and Joey.

But I'm an adult now, I'm pregnant.

You're going to be a grandfather, and...

I can forgive.

I was given 21 more years with him.

You know, God, for whatever reason,

he had his hand on Wayne's life,

and he never let go, and he never gave up on him.

He was a walking miracle.

♪

In January 2023, after two decades

of battling liver and heart issues,

Graham is hospitalized once more.

All the times he got sick, I'm like,

my dad's always bounced back.

I'm not worried about it.

And me and my sister talked for about six months before.

She's like, "Do you think we should go see him?"

And I'm like, "He's fine, he's fine.

He always gets sick. He always gets better."

I was still conflicted if I was going to go or not,

I just, I had had enough.

You know, if he dies, he dies, okay?

God's going to take him.

And that's just what happens to us.

We live, we die, and...

You know, as much as he had disappointed me...

for most of my life, I wanted to make him happy at the end.

For a while, I was like,

why the hell should I go see him?

Why should I put myself out to go see my father

in Arizona, when he never did anything for me?

I mean, what am I supposed to do?

And then I saw some pictures that Valerie posted,

and that's when I saw my dad...

as my dad.

He wasn't Superstar anymore.

He is going to die.

So that's when I went to go see him.

He started actually telling me some stories

about my mom.

And, it sounded like he was very...

very remorseful about how he treated her...

how he wished he could have been a better person, and...

when I heard that, I knew he was dying.

And I looked at him and...

his body was...

he was, he was just...

I hate to say it, but he was so small.

He had no muscle anymore, and I looked at my dad like,

oh my God, this is not

Superstar Billy Graham anymore.

My brother had flown out there before I did, so...

I bought a ticket and I flew out there by myself.

I played him Bob Dylan, and that meant a lot to him.

I put that music on, and he closed his eyes,

and he put his head back, and he got this little faint

smile, his best smile that he could give at the time,

and he just was so happy to be listening to Dylan.

And it made me happy that I could do that for him.

You know, and the next day...

Valerie and I are talking to the doctors, and we're like,

"You know what..." Valerie was like, "It's time."

My sister was with him at the hospital,

and I was home, and I could hear my dad on the phone.

I told him, I said, "Dad, you know,

we've had our problems in life.

We've had a lot of issues with each other.

I've hated you for a very long time,

but I always understood you were my dad.

And I always have loved you, so I just want you

to know that I've always loved you."

And...

♪

The last words he told me...

I could hear him.

♪

Trying to get the words out.

He just said, "I love you,"

and that's the last thing...

That's the last thing I heard from my dad.

♪

[Whispering] Yeah, that was it.

And it wasn't the Superstar.

It was my dad.

♪

He's been gone for 17 months.

But there's no relief.

There's not, I just miss him.

I can't even describe it, so...

He was appreciated, he was loved.

He was admired, he was respected.

He is Superstar Billy Graham!

[Cheering]

He's missed, you know, he's missed by so many

that he would never have imagined missed him.

But he is.

It's a tragic story because of somebody

who had it all and who lost it all.

I am happy that he had God in his life.

I'm not happy about all the other things,

but I am happy that he is my dad.

I understand where he was coming from more now.

The job he had and the life that he was trying to have

and who he wanted to be.

He was Superstar Billy Graham.

♪