All language subtitles for Dark Side Of The Ring s07e01 Jeff Jarrett 1.eng

With the wrestling mainstream
consolidated under a single company,

dared to challenge the status quo.

I had the balls to step out at a time
that I was young. Some people called me

stupid, naive, idiot.

I've always called Jeff Carney with a
heart of gold. Jeff Jarrett can sell you

the glasses off your own face.

Jeff Jarrett was the only person who
could have pulled off doing a company in

opposition to Vince McMahon.

They said, don't do it, don't do it. And
I didn't listen to any of them. Let's

get it all right now!

It's time for total non -stop action!

Jeff Jarrett's promotion disrupted the
wrestling landscape and rewrote the

rulebook. I wanted to create a brand of
wrestling that was different.

Jeff built this new revolution in sports
entertainment, in professional

wrestling, and it's pissing off Vince,
but there's nothing he can do about it.

We all had something to prove. There we
go!

The story of TNA is so important in the
history of pro wrestling.

TNA was the underdog. It was the beacon
of hope. And then the whole thing went

to shit.

As the foundation began to crack, a
bitter power struggle erupted behind the

scenes. Let's go!

Dixie Carter, she divided and she
conquered.

You want to bring in Hulk Hogan? Do I
think it's going to work? Hell no. At

end of the day, there needs to be
somebody who has control or power.

Jeff had all the backstabbers
backstabbing the backstabbers. It just

It was just one big, you know, shit
show. Jeff wasn't screwing Kurt's wife.

Jeff didn't take Kurt's wife.

It was a storyline.

I expect you to support me 100%.

It was embarrassing for everybody
involved.

Shut up! It's the hot mess.

How do we survive this?

Wrestling is Kirby.

I never gave a second thought that a big
power play was coming.

Through triumph and turmoil, the
company's journey mirrored that of its

I felt sorry for him. He was so broken.

My drinking went from bad to worse. It
was drink and drink and get drunk and

then blackout drunk.

He was killing himself.

It was clear that this was a different
Jeff Jarrett than I had known and worked

with for years.

Through it all, one inescapable truth
emerged.

The story of TNA is the story of Jeff
Jarrett because TNA is Jeff Jarrett.

a story of perseverance.

There's tons of lessons you can learn
from Jeff Jarrett. Whether you are a

success or whether you are a failure.

It all starts with the person on top.

I get emotional thinking about some of
the things that I've survived, but I

think you can roll over and play dead
and die a slow death, or you can get up

and fight like hell.

Trying to think how to start this.

The TNA story.

I have a completely different set of
lenses on it today than I did back in

You know, at the end of the day, when I
kind of look back on my career, there's

no way to succeed in life if you don't
have not one failure, but many.

You know, the story of TNA is the story
of a thousand what -ifs.

I look back on those early days at the
core nucleus and the timing.

In a lot of ways, it's a dream that I
don't ever want to wake up from.

TNA wrestling from the very beginning
was insane.

It really had that feeling of, oh, my
God, anything can happen.

It's a two -pound bag of sugar. Always
crazy, always over the top, always

The cages, the girls, it was a
spectacle.

I feel dirty, and I feel dirty in a way
that no shower will ever make me clean.

If you are a traditional wrestling fan,
this show is not for you.

You had your core of young talent
growing up, and you had stars

coming in. It was a very exciting time.

Eric Bischoff, Hulk Hogan, Jeff Hardy,
Booker T, Kevin Nash, and myself.

AJ Styles, Samoa Joe.

We get Sting, and now we have arguably
the best wrestler in the entire world in

his prime, Kurt Angle.

Jeff's story and TNA's story are
inextricably linked.

He was the driving force.

Do I feel validated? Do I feel right of
where I'm at today?

That is a deep question.

I was given one of the greatest gifts,
and that is the gift of desperation.

And that gift of desperation has changed
my life.

I'm Jeff Jarrett. I've been in the
professional wrestling industry for 40

and I founded TNA Wrestling.

One thing's for sure, I'm a lifer in
this business.

I idolized my father.

The wrestling world knew Jerry Jarrett
as kind of the boy next door, blonde

hair, blue eye, good looks.

But behind the scenes, he was the boss,
the promoter. We've been working very

hard to try to cut corners and cut
prices and still maintain the quality

My parents divorced when I was three
years of age. My mother blamed the

wrestling business on splitting up the
family.

I lived with my mom.

So I didn't see a lot of my dad.

He was this wrestler that I saw on TV
from time to time.

Preteen and then into my teenage years,
I started spending summers with my dad.

His office was right next to my bedroom,
and I saw wrestlers come by the house

and pick up paychecks, and there was
these three -quarter -inch tapes that I

could watch matches.

And I think it gave me a set point on
how I viewed the business.

It's all storytelling. It's all
theatrics. It's all larger than life.

Jerry Jarrett was a unique character, so
to speak, and also the son of another

legendary figure, his mother, Teenie
Jarrett.

Jeff's grandmother was the most
successful female promoter in the entire

wrestling industry.

I'm Jim Cornette. I've been in the
wrestling industry for 50 years, and I

first job from the Jarrett family.

Jeff, throughout his entire life, his
family, everything that they had came

pro wrestling, and it was treated very
seriously by them.

I was a young teenager, and my
grandmother called, and she said, the

run my confessions up in Kentucky,
you're not going to be there, so you're

confessions, and I'm going to pay you.

And then one night, I made over $300,
and I said, I like this business.

I like it a lot.

My dad wanted me to get an education in
the industry, setting up the ring,

marketing, wrestling, refereeing.

My freshman year of college, I was a
referee, and Bill Dundee and Nature Boy

Buddy Landell came out and beat me up
and roughhoused me, and my dad came out.

He got involved.

Our plan was for me to...

Go back to school in the fall, but I
never went back.

Wrestling has been my whole life. It's
something that I hoped that my children

would go into as Jeff had.

It didn't hurt that Jeff was a great
athlete, and he was a great in -ring

performer, and he had the psychology,
and he could talk.

The definition of luck is when
preparation meets opportunity.

Young,

good -looking.

sells his ass off. Jeff Jarrett, what a
move. He put on a good dropkick.

Jeff was a territory star, and when he
got his opportunity to go to WWF, I

that was probably a real opportunity to
branch out and be something other than

Jerry Jarrett's son in Jerry Jarrett's
company.

My name's Scott DeMore. I've been in the
wrestling business for over 30 years.

Double J Jeff Jarrett was a country
music superstar.

Double J, Jeff Jarrett.

You know, probably not the character
that you ever look at and go, oh, wow,

that's our future world champion.

I can't wait to be alone with my baby
tonight.

And they had done these vignettes with
him to introduce the character, which I

thought were brilliant because they were
cheesy. But at the end, he goes, J -E

-double -F, J -A -double -R -E -double
-T, that's double J, Jeff Jarrett,

twinkle, sound effect, super cheese.

I am David Saadi, and I've been in the
wrestling business for over 30 years.

Jeff has great talent, where whenever
the cameras are rolling, he can just

it on and be that character in a
heartbeat.

And there, the skills of Double J, Jeff
Jarrett.

And then his second character was a
pissed off guy.

Don't even look me in the eye, because
that's enough to piss me off. At that

time, the attitude era was red hot.

I'll cut my hair and don't piss me off.

And the guitar really started to come in
play.

And so with the attitude era, Double J
had a new attitude.

As the star rises in the WWF, Jeff
balances the demands of his career with

responsibilities of a young family.

I had my first wrestling match April 6th
of 86.

April 8th of 86, two days later, Jill
and I had our first date.

She was a sophomore, a few years younger
than me, so we were both just kids.

fell in love, and we were both ready to
conquer the world.

She was someone that very quietly always
supported me behind the scenes in a

major way.

She never was around the wrestling
business. It was kind of from maybe the

school mentality that I went off to work
and she stayed home, and that was how

she liked it.

She had her first round of breast cancer
in the late 90s, and so I stayed home

to take care of our first daughter.

It was just a real tough time.

But she got better, and I went back on
the road, and I was kind of right in the

middle of it with Owen.

That's Ed Owen. He's a Canadian hero,
Owen is.

Owen's from Canada. Jeff Jarrett from
right here in Tennessee.

Our life experiences were very simple.

Owen Hart was the son of a wrestling
promoter just like myself.

We were both at our stage in life that,
you know, young wives, new kid, our

career. It's hard to describe unless you
really are the son of a wrestling

promoter. He was my best friend.

They were a great tag team because
they'd both been in the business and

the business since they were kids.

And at that point, they'd given Owen the
blue blazer gimmick. And he would fly

into the ring for this big grand
entrance.

And that's why he ended up in a ceiling
in Kemper Arena.

Authorities in Kansas City are
investigating the death of a

wrestler in a spectacular stunt that
went wrong last night.

Owen Hart was being lowered by a cable
into the ring when he suddenly plunged.

The audience had to be told it wasn't
part of the show.

There was no wrestling storyline. There
was no angle.

And my best friend.

died in a work accident.

Ladies and gentlemen, when you're doing
live television, a lot of things can

happen, and sometimes they are not good.

The Blue Blazer, as we know, is Owen
Hart, was going to make a very

superhero -like entrance from the
rafters, and something went terribly

here. All of a sudden, Owen's fallen.
Owen's what?

Owen fell.

Owen's hurt. Owen's... He was coming
down on a cord, and all of a sudden it

snapped, and he dropped, and they were
pumping his chest.

Jeff literally had to stand there and
watch them wheel Owen

out. First off, Owen Hart, I'm praying
for you, buddy.

I've said before I can't believe I
didn't stop the show.

I believe Jeff was the next matchup. I
don't know how he was able to pull off

that match. Nothing would have happened
being there.

Owen fell 82 feet to his death.

And I was in the ring and walked through
the crater that his body left.

I have the unfortunate responsibility to
let everyone know that Owen Hart

has died.

That had to just tear your heart out.

In this business, I guess you got a lot
of acquaintances.

Very few friends.

I wondered for many years and never
voiced it.

Why did Owen have to pass away?

He's the good guy amongst all of us.

Didn't drink, didn't smoke.

Didn't cuss hardly.

Great husband, great father.

Great guy.

So, survivor's remorse.

I think I never wanted to face losing
him, but stuffing

it and putting on an emotional mask that
I'm here to go to work, never take time

to grieve, never take time to be Jeff.

In a lot of ways, that was the beginning
of breaking me down.

Following the death of his friend Owen
Hart, Jeff Jarrett grows frustrated with

his role in the WWF.

At the age that I was, I could wrestle
all night, every night.

And so I was ready to go to work, but I
wasn't a part of the main event crew.

Jeff didn't have the size and he didn't
have the over -the -top gimmick like a

Stone Cold Steve Austin or The
Undertaker or something like that that

As a main event level star. But at the
same time, he was the Intercontinental

Champion. However, Jeff's contract was
coming to an end. And he had another

option down south at the competition,
WCW.

So before he left the company, he was
going to have to drop the

title to China.

China, let's finish this thing once and
for all. I was owed about three or four

months worth of money.

Walking in the building that night, I
knew I was never going to have any more

leverage than before I dropped the bell.

He walked around the building, and he
came back. He said, I think I'm going to

need $100 ,000.

I knew that Vince wanted Chyna to become
champion, and he knew he owed me a

payoff. And I just made it very clear,
you don't have to pay me, and I don't

have to wrestle.

The ball's in your court.

And Vince just nods at me, and I nod
back at him.

Shook hands, left.

Well, then Jeff walked around the
building again when they came back. And

said, well, what is there to lose?

And so I asked for more money,
considerably more.

Jeff said, you know, I think I'm going
to need $200.

And that was it.

Vince pulled the check out of his suit
pocket, smiled, handed it to me, and he

said, Jeff, I really enjoy doing
business with you.

I think the tape will show that when
China pinned me 1, 2, 3, I don't think

there was one person sitting in their
seat.

And then within 24 hours, I would jump
from a WWF pay -per -view to a WCW

Joining the WWF's biggest competitor,

Jeff enters WCW already showing signs of
decline.

despite the recent arrival of a former
colleague.

I met Jeff Jarrett when I was the head
writer of Raw on WWF television.

My name is Vince Russo, and I was the
head writer, producer, and on -air

for TNA Wrestling.

When I was working at WCW, I put the
belt on Jeff because Jeff was a great

heel.

Then, in a shock to the wrestling world,
Vince McMahon purchases WCW. That's

right. I own WCW.

And for Jeff Jarrett, a fallout is
devastating.

Here's the thing. If Vince needed you at
some point, he would forgive you. If

Vince didn't need you, he didn't need to
forgive you. Well, there's Jeff

Jarrett. He never forgave Jeff.

And Vince fired Jeff on the air. You
know how Jeff spells his name?

That's J -E -double -F. Well, you know
what?

Hmm. I would suspect that we'd spell it
a different way after tonight.

That would be capital G -double -O
-double -N -double -E.

Gone. That was Vince's way of rubbing it
in because Vince doesn't want to just

take you out. He wants to take you out,
humiliate you, spit on your face, and

walk away while you're down on the
ground bleeding.

Jeff Jarrett, so famously, walked out of
WWE and his career, it seemed like he

would never return.

My name is Matt Hardy. I am one half of
the iconic tag team known as the Hardy

Void. Being in the pro wrestling
business his whole life, I mean, any

being that's going out and being slammed
on wooden steel, 10 nights back to

back, and then driving 300, 350 miles to
the next town, traveling nonstop.

That's how he's wired.

We're cockroaches. You can't kill us
all. You think you've killed us all, but

you can't kill us all.

Coming back home from that final nitro,
I knew that I didn't know what was

next. But I did have the blessing or the
curse to understand that if Vince buys

the number two, that wouldn't be good
for him or the industry.

So now WCW is out of business.

All the territories were gone.

There's nothing else. There's a lot of
wrestlers. Don't have anywhere to go.

Everybody knew it was Monopoly, so it
wasn't a good thing.

I'm Scott Stout. I've known Jeff Jarrett
for 40 years.

Unless you're going to do independence
or Japan, yeah, there's no other place

work.

If Vince McMahon doesn't fire Jeff
Jarrett on that last Nitro,

There's no reason for Jeff to sit there
and go, oh, shit, there's no place for

me to work. I better create one.

I started a series of collective
conversations with my father about, I

start a promotion.

And I knew that I wanted to tap into
that country music audience, Midwest,

Southeast, WCW footprint. I wanted to
tap into the NASCAR fan base.

I'm going all in.

And the original seed money came
straight from Jeff Jarrett's bank

Jerry Jarrett's bank account.

Together, Jeff and Jerry devised a bold
new business model for a wrestling

promotion.

The Jarretts came up with this plan
where they were going to provide a $9

week pay -per -view. WWE was the only
game in town at that point. Their pay

-views were $40 or $50 a month.

I'm the Finister Minister, Father James
Mitchell, and I was part of TNA

Wrestling from the very first show.

Jeff was just really savvy, just like
his dad was.

And he also knew every swerve and...

bullshit wrestling trick that the guys
tried to play on promoters. Before they

can make their promotion a reality, the
Jarets must find an investor willing to

back their vision. Drove down to
Birmingham, Alabama to meet with a guy

Richard Scruci.

He was CEO of HealthSouth, a top five
organization in the world.

I knew Richard personally, but I was
ready to present to him as a

I had my presentation, and he said, as
crazy as it may sound, I think we can do

something here.

And he said, how much do you need?

I was elated.

And once you clear that hurdle, you go,
oh, we thought that was the hard part.

But the real hard part is coming up.

With the money secured and the concept
in place, only one thing remains, a

As I'm forming this plan, I said, what's
the name of our company?

We're coming off the Attitude Era. I
also knew that on pay -per -view, we

have to worry about TV 14. We can
definitely push the envelope.

I wanted something in the branding of
the name to make a difference.

Something showbiz.

Something wrestling.

Something to jumpstart what's going on.
Something with alliance or association.

Something that was an alternative.
Something to differentiate yourself from

competition. Something that's crazy.

Let me make this clear to everybody
watching at home. It came from me.

Tits and ass.

Now, when I told my mother I was working
for a company called T &A, she'd say,

tits and ass? What kind of pornography
are you involved in?

Total nonstop action. And I went, that's
different.

It says exactly what it is.

Okay, now it's time to go to work.

But the problem was...

There definitely was a lot of people
backstage thinking, this is doomed to

failure. We'll get one or two shows out
of it. This is just like a blow -up

interface.

You want to talk about DNA?

I got your total non -stop action right
here, baby.

On June 19, 2002, total non -stop action
debuts live on pay -per -view.

turning the Jared's dream into reality.

It was the first show that I'd ever been
the boss, the executive producer.

I knew a lot was riding on the line.

There was a manic energy backstage.

Right before they're about to go on the
air, the ring broke.

They weren't sure they were going to be
able to put it back together.

There were people running around saying,
we're doomed, and oh my God, it's time

to back up and go home.

The ring literally got put back together
as we were coming on the air. When I

think about it, it's crazy.

It's all about total nonstop action.

Things got rolling along, and you

may have been a little disjointed, but
that's what happens with a live show.

You know, at the end of the day,
everything came off the way we wanted it

After the first show, it was a

real education for my father and myself,
knowing the grind and knowing that you

have to keep the show going.

Jeff and Jerry are determined to make
their company a destination for the best

wrestling in the world.

We wanted to have the traditional
heavyweights with the NWA title and

have the WCW slash NWA footprint.

And I was a huge fan of Lucha Libre
wrestling, European wrestling, Japanese

wrestling. There was a crop of young
independent talent that could do things

that heavyweights couldn't. And so I
wanted to brand it that way. And that

the X Division.

Can't talk about TNA.

without talking about AJ Styles.

He was, from the very first show, he was
the guy pegged to be the future, and AJ

was a super talent.

Though TNA gets off to a promising
start, questions remain about its

power.

You have to be a survivor to wrestle
wrestling.

There's too many things that try to go
against you, that cut through a

I knew that when TNA first started
that...

It wasn't going to be a competition to
the WWE, but it was going to be an

alternative. And there's money to be
made and glory to be had in that.

Determined to make TNA a true
competitor,

Jeff brings in a polarizing figure from
his past.

In time, the move will spark a conflict
pitting father against son.

Jeff said to me, Vince, I need you to
write my TV.

It was a no -brainer, and I went to work
for Jeff. Next week is a new day!

I knew that we weren't going to ever
succeed if we didn't try different

My vision for TNA was to be just
anything goes. There are no rules.

This was going to basically be an adult
version of GLOW.

crazy, crazy characters, whatever we
wanted to do, nothing like the WWE.

The Johnsons!

There was a tag team called the
Johnsons, which were supposed to be a

penises that wrestled.

Operation Sex Begins Now!

Go do your business!

I was working in WWE at the time, and
Vince McMahon was curious, we all were,

and we watched a couple of shows, and
there was a scene with him.

That was in a trash can, having fun with
himself.

What do you think I'm spanking my
monkey?

Hey, little girl, how would you like to
have a little forage? Those are some of

the things that my dad would just want
to pull his hair out like.

It was so over the top for him that he's
like, we're never going to recover from

that. I wanted to masturbate in a trash
can and Jerry Jarrett wanted to do 1970

USWA. Here we are on pay -per -view.
We're supposed to be different. No holes

barred. We were on two completely
different pages.

I will shoot your kneecap off. Whoa!

Oh, my God. I never thought I'd be happy
to see that.

People want to be entertained. And there
are about this many people that are

entertained by guys jumping around in a
ring for 40 minutes.

The existence of Vince Russo and the way
he talked about professional wrestling

was insulting and offensive to Jerry
Jarrett on a personal level. There's

lot of discussion, a lot of rumors about
your relationship with Vince Russo.

I'm confused about the man.

Jerry Jarrett hated me from the jump.

Jeff wants me to write the TV.

Jerry wants to write the TV.

To be in the middle of a father and a
son, it was a horrible spot to be in,

I did not enjoy it.

I knew Vince would lean more into the
tits and ass side of it. Risque pushed

envelope with that type of content. And
then my dad loved action. So the yin and

the yang between Russo and my father, I
always thought was a healthy balance.

It was a very exciting time to be there,
but they were always teetering on the

edge of disaster.

Just as TNA's unique vision begins to
take shape.

A shocking development threatens the
company's very existence.

We were putting all the pieces together.

You have the production. You have the
talent.

We are almost there.

And then I got the call from
HealthSouth.

Hey, Jeff, the funding is being pulled.

Okay, so it's over.

Congressional investigators have
subpoenaed Richard Scruci to testify.

weeks after its launch, TNA is rocked by
a scandal no one could have

anticipated. Scruci's world first began
to come apart last March when one of his

chief financial officers went to federal
prosecutors and confessed that Health

South, at Scruci's express direction,
had been overstating its profits hugely

for years.

I got into the office at 9, 9 .30 in the
morning after Wednesday night's show.

And I'll never forget it on
speakerphone.

And Hell South said, Jeff, Richard's got
bigger issues to worry about.

And so we're going to quit the funding.

There was an eerie, eerie silence.

What about the line of credit? It's
pulled.

Are you going to fund last night's show?
No.

Okay.

It made front page news.

It was a crazy time.

So I knew that I had a massive amount of
work in front of me

with a very short time frame.

There was no more money in the account,
and so I started making calls.

I went out with Jeff, and he'd been
drinking a little bit. Then he broke the

news to me about HealthSouth.

And I know that's why he was drinking.

Jeff was very distraught. Jeff was very
depressed.

I was going to all my vendors and
contractors to let them know that, hey,

funding's been pulled, but I'm going to
go find money. But if you want to jump

off this train now, I completely
understand.

One of those contractors is Dixie
Carter.

President of a public relations agency
hired by TNA.

Dixie Carter told him he needs to have a
conversation with her parent.

He had no idea who her parents were and
what they were worth.

Her father was the owner and chairman of
Panda Energy International.

If you're like everybody else in the
world, who the is Bob Carter and what is

Panda Energy?

Come to find out he's a multi -multi
-millionaire in Texas.

Next thing you know, me and my father
were headed to Dallas to meet with

father. And so he wanted to take a look
at this potential investment.

If I won the Powerball lottery for $50
billion, I would not

start a pro wrestling company under any
circumstances.

It is a pain in the ass.

We go into our presentation, have the
conversation.

Bob Carter looked at me,

Jeff, how much of your money do you have
into this thing? And I told him, and he

said, okay, we've got the private plane
for y 'all. We're going to take y 'all

back to Nashville, but we think we can
do some business here.

And that was the beginning of the Carter
-Jarrett relationship.

That was just an absolute gift from
heaven?

To keep this company going, we were
still in business.

You've never seen anything like this on
Spike TV.

In 2005, TNA secures its biggest
opportunity yet, a national television

its flagship show on Spike TV.

By the time TNA got Spike TV, they had a
strong roster.

They had great production, and they had
a very loyal, rabid fan base that they

could count on being there every week.

We started on a one -hour show off
-prime, so that's Saturday nights at 11

Eastern. The numbers we did were
fantastic, and we were getting traction

really truly becoming an alternative to
the WWE.

As Impact becomes a hit on Spike TV and
DNA turns a profit, Jeff Jarrett's

company continues to innovate.

With the surgence of the UFC and the
Octagon, I really wanted the six -sided

ring. The six -sided ring, that was what
was so unique about TNA in the early

days. My name is Jeffrey Nero Hardy, and
I'm a professional wrestler, and I've

known Jeff Jarrett for at least 30
years.

When I went to TNA for the first time, I
walked with Jeff to the curtain and

looked out there, and it was my first
time seeing the hexagon ring.

And Jeff said, what do you think? And I
said, oh, man, it looks like the future.

I wanted to give a more sports -oriented
feel as opposed to entertainment

-oriented. The six -sided ring became
part of TNA's identity.

I'm D 'Lo Brown, professional wrestler
for over 30 years, and I was the

-slash -agent for TNA Wrestling.

A lot of the fans had hooked on to TNA's
identity, and part of that identity was

the ring, was the look, was the above
-the -rope wrestling technique. You

AJ Styles diving over top rope,
Christopher Daniels moonsaulting off the

whatever, either skipper or tightrope
walking on top of a cage.

But even as TNA's fortunes improved...
fan criticism of its top star becomes

increasingly difficult to ignore.

In case you didn't know, I am the NWA
World Heavyweight Champion.

Is there an argument to be made that
Jeff Jarrett shouldn't have held the

for a thousand plus days?

Absolutely.

Jeff Jarrett was not one of the
favorites of the fans. They thought that

somebody else should be put in that
spot.

But, I mean, I don't think Jeff ever sat
there going, hey, I'm doing this

because it's for me. The last thing you
want to do business -wise is put the

title on somebody you can't trust.

Jeff Jarrett knew he wasn't going to
walk out on himself.

He wasn't going to hold himself up for
more money.

TNA was his baby. He had to get it
started, and he had to...

get it to the point where it was flying
on its own.

Despite the success, trouble is brewing
behind the scenes. As Jerry Jarrett

clashes with the Carter family
intensify, he grows disillusioned with

company and his son.

My dad came to a point in his life that
me and him were not going to be seeing

eye to eye on anything by any stretch of
the imagination.

The worst struggle I've ever had in my
life.

I was emotionally and personally with
Jeff, and then it just became a living

hell when I had to deal with the
Carters.

After 60 years of wrestling, no one was
going to tell my father how to run a

wrestling company.

He felt his legacy was being tarnished.

He was sour on the Carters. He was sour
on me. He was sour on Russo. He was sour

on so many things.

And he became bitter.

The tension built, and rightly so, the
financial component of it, the Carter

family, them feeling pressure.

It was never outright said, but kind of
implied, that Panda was a little

stressed, wanted to see a little
daylight.

And my father came to me a couple of
times, and he's like, son, we got to get

out. This isn't going right. The Carters
are not treating us right.

To get out of his contract with TNA,
Jerry engineers a scandal, hoping it

get him fired.

Jerry Jarrett told me, I don't want to
do this anymore.

He had a connection with this Russian
guy who had a big background.

And instead of taking him to TNA, he was
seen in the WWF office.

Picture was taken with Jerry Jarrett and
the guy there in front of the WWE logo,

and I'm sure that was contrived by
Vince.

It's being positioned as high treason.
Because you clicked on WWE .com and the

first thing you see is Jerry.

I didn't see Jerry at TNA again after
that.

I was surprised.

My father, he knew what he was doing.

Dad, I think we need to take a little
break.

And we hung up the phone and didn't talk
for several years.

I'm well aware of my character defects.

I'm well aware of my upbringing and how
I process things and the transactional

nature that I was raised in.

My mom was very transactional. My dad
was very transactional. I was estranged

from my mother. Now I was estranged from
my father.

It really hurt me.

Jeff's father, Jerry. And that's when
things went from bad to worse. When my

wife's breast cancer had come back a
second time.

Already estranged from both parents,
Jeff faces his greatest challenge yet

his wife, Jill, receives a devastating
diagnosis.

I've got three young kids.

My wife gets sick.

And when it came back, and the type that
it came back, I knew we were in a rough

road.

At that time, I had stepped out of the
ring, and I was trying to focus strictly

on home life and business. I knew one of
them had to give.

He loved her so much, and to see
somebody he loved so much dying, and him

helpless, I thought that.

At this point in time, we had moved the
creative meetings to Jeff's house

because Joe was...

really deep in her battle, and Jeff
rightfully wanted to be close to home.

It was really hard because I hadn't seen

her in a while.

And the Jill I knew was so vibrant and
smiling, and she was an athlete,

and she was always healthy.

No, she was just an amazing person, you
know, just a great girl, you know,

smart and, you know, beautiful.

I witnessed

a

woman fight for her life.

Day in and day out.

And the thing that she was fighting for,
I knew she loved me.

She loved her parents, loved her
siblings.

But she loved her girls.

And that's what she'd cry out at night.

She didn't believe her girls.

And I carried that with me for a lot of
years.

She passed, you know, 1 o 'clock in the
morning.

I walked down to the dock by myself to
kind of gather my thoughts.

I'm standing on the dock, got my watch
on, and I look down at it.

And I see May 23rd.

I said, you found him a gun.

Owen Hart died on May 23, 1999.

So I knew in some kind of crazy way,
everything's going to be all right.

You know, my mother, to the day she
died, hated the wrestling business.

My dad, come to this time frame, we had
our estrangement.

Neither one of them came to the funeral.

Jerry Jarrett was one of the great
wrestling promoters of all time, but

Jarrett was not a perfect person.

After Jill's passing, I was trying to
survive as a father and really trying to

survive as a businessman on every level.

I knew that my single biggest job moving
forward was going to be a provider.

for my three little girls. And so, to my
detriment, just like the

passing of Owen, very little grieving, I
went right back to work.

Next time on Dark Side of the Ring.
There was this power play, if you will,

orchestrated by Dixie Carter, who I'd
hired.

She wanted more, and she wanted more of
the credit.

At some point, it came out that Jeff had
been romantically involved with Kurt

Angle's wife, Karen.

And a lot of the boys, they turned the
nose up at it.

It's just not what you do.

This was Dixie's excuse to put Jeff to
the side once and for all.

This is a real chess movement, Dixie.

She manipulated all of them every step
of the way. She was going to try

to get him out.

And she finally got a wish.

At that point, I knew that my time had
come to

an end at TNA.

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