Originally published: August 23rd, 2023.
As Cactus Jack, a relative newcomer as a character to the World Wrestling Federation audience, staved off the 2-on-1 onslaught of Billy Gunn and the Road Dogg with the guidance of a conveniently placed, unexplained box in front of the RAW is WAR titantron, the loud noise of a chainsaw echoed throughout Nassau Coliseum. The date was December 29th, 1997, mere days before the ball dropped 20 miles down the road to ring in 1998 when Terry Funk came to War Zone in Uniondale, New York.
Only this wasn’t the return of an outlaw cowboy with a thirst for branding those who drew his ire, nor was it a return over a decade in the making. Funk wouldn’t be rocking the bedazzled cowboy hat as the same cowboy that threatened to fry the folks at Sports Illustrated and put on classic professional wrestling matches with the likes of The Junkyard Dog and Hulk Hogan in arenas throughout the north-eastern seaboard. As the chainsaw cut through the wooden cargo crate, Funk announced his presence with authority and a chainsaw, as if he were the killer in a ‘70s slasher, only not quite as scary as he emerged wearing a red shirt and overalls covered in saw dust, complimented by pantyhose over his face.
The new character, the psychotic, chainsaw-wielding Chainsaw Charlie ushered in the Attitude Era with the same man and character he helped legitimize years earlier in IWA-Japan, with a program that’d establish the premiere tag team of the most successful era in the history of the industry. Chainsaw Charlie was wacky, but that wackiness led to real danger. The name derived from John Ayers, an offensive lineman nicknamed Chainsaw Charlie for the legendary 1980s 49er squads. Ayers, who had passed in 1995, was close friends with Funk. Even when on-screen Funk seemed as lost as ever, behind it, he was as sentimental as ever.
Funk & Foley: Passing the Torch
Funk and Cactus Jack hadn’t teamed in two-on-two tag team action since a benefit show for Tom Robinson seven years prior, having since gone to war with each other in Giant Baba’s All Japan Pro Wrestling, Paul Heyman’s Extreme Championship Wrestling and Victor Quinones’ IWA, yet the first hardcore wrestling rivalry to take the tape-trading market by storm and bring the hardcore style into the mainstream was just two years before the introduction of Chainsaw Charlie, when Funk and Cactus had the Indie Dream match in front of approximately 29,000 in Kawasaki Stadium in a barbed wire exploding deathmatch, featuring barbed wire boards and a ring that was a time bomb. It was the third match involving primarily barbed wire for both competitors of the one-night tournament festivities.
When Terry was in Television City for a 1978 episode of the Mike Douglas Show, he delivered an audition promo he had cut for Paradise Alley, a pro wrestling movie starring Sylvester Stallone in his second film release after the initial success of Rocky, Hollywood’s biggest triumph of the ‘70s and the 1976 Academy Award winner for Best Picture, beating out hit films such as Network and All The President’s Men. Funk looked into the camera and cut the same promo he auditioned with, saying “Sly, you overbearing, obnoxious, egg sucking dog, I’m going to hit you over the head with a cement brick until your brain turns to jelly,” in a deep and raspy, yet twangy voice that would soon become synonymous with Terry Funk, giving him his trademark catch phrase in the process. Funk cited that the character called for a nutjob that conflated a goof and a nut. Seeing as Sly wanted to type cast, Terry transformed himself and became somebody who’d work with arguably the biggest action star of the 1980s in future projects.
Terry Funk 101: The Selfless Mentor
Those three instances may have nothing to do with each other outside of its leading role, but there’s a certain aspect to take away from each specific story. The first story is of Terry teaming with his protégé, a talent that he mentored into the most unlikely WWF Champion of all-time. Mick Foley became synonymous in that era with being the perfect foil for a heel that needed that last stamp of approval, or as those in the industry call it, ‘rub.’ In an industry where many top babyfaces are supposed to pass it forward, a majority don’t, as politics and ego clouded the old guard. Yet, Mick was debatably the most pivotal in establishing the careers of The Rock, Triple H, Edge and Randy Orton as bad guy main event players, as well as a major guiding hand for the likes of Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, and Steve Austin as babyfaces that had already begun their championship reign. That’s Terry Funk 101, and as a competitor who many of the all-time greats have called the toughest to ever lace boots, including Ric Flair in his tribute tweet, Terry went out of his way with Mick to approve arguably the biggest money-making heel tag team that’s ever been in WWE. He did it while wearing pantyhose on his face, and, according to Jon Moxley’s book, using mannerisms that current WWE higher-ups compared to Homer Simpson.
It’s an act of selflessness from a man who’d given quite literally everything to an industry to the point where he didn’t need acts of bravado on the biggest stage to cement a legacy that he knew he had already secured. Even if he did, that wasn’t who the Funker was as a businessman, securing a legacy with a deeper understanding of the business at a level few reach, coming from an old school mindset that if you didn’t make anybody, then you didn’t do your job to the best of your ability.
King of the Deathmatch & Hardcore Innovation
One performer he did that with is the aforementioned Foley in the aforementioned 1995 King of the Deathmatch tournament. Deathmatches are the red-headed stepchild of professional wrestling, even as the dated, bromidic perception on the style slowly fades. Before CZW, GCW and their ‘outlaw mud shows’ started ‘killing the business’ in the modern climate, Terry innovated the style overseas with Atushi Onita before bringing it into American prominence and giving Heyman’s ECW the legitimacy it required. Terry saw an art form where other workers saw unnecessary violence in a match that they didn’t understand. But as a groundswell built up and a movement began, the hardcore wrestling scene had one of the greatest in-ring performers that ever graced the squared circle, in a time where some of the top promotions didn’t see a fit for an old school mind focused on the evolution the next generation would take.
That isn’t to say Terry hadn’t had his share of crazy, hardcore programs previously, but they weren’t quite in the realm of explosive deathmatches. For every time he said that Dusty sucked eggs in 1980 Georgia Championship Wrestling blood feud with Dusty Rhodes, or had a feud with Ric Flair so violent that it called for a classic I Quit battle in November of 1989, he’d have three or four mat classics despite his character being a layer short of a lasagna. Deathmatches weren’t what American audiences had familiarized themselves with leading up until the 1990s. Funk had started as the prototypical every man in professional wrestling in his father Dory’s promotion in ’65, progressively over the years becoming more jaded and crazy.
The Many Faces of Terry Funk
Over the course of the 30 years leading into the mid-1990s, Funk became remembered fondly in a variety of ways. Funk had defeated Jack Brisco for the NWA Worlds Heavyweight Championship in ’75, as the master of the spinning toe hold, and one of the best fundamental professional wrestlers in the history of the sport. Funk and his brother Dory Jr. had continued a legacy of technical excellence that the NWA had to offer in Florida. In the early ‘80s, it was his CWA feud with Jerry Lawler that culminated in an Empty Arena Match in the Mid-South Coliseum, where the only in-person witness to Funk trying to blind Lawler with a stick of wood was Lance Russell and a camera-man.
He’s remembered by a mainstream audience as the sadistic cowboy who hunted announcers and ringside attendants for sport on Championship Wrestling, or his WWF Championship contest against Hulk Hogan that aired on NBC when the WWF took over for Saturday Night Live in the primetime time slot on the first Saturday of 1986, with the lasting visual of Funk dragging his manager Jimmy Hart up the aisle by his pant sleeve. Perhaps, a majority of folks recognize Funk from his roles in ’80s blockbusters, portraying Robert Loggia’s muscle and the guy who threatened to kick Patrick Swayze out of a bar if he didn’t drink, in Over The Top and Roadhouse, respectively.
A Legacy Across Generations
It’s therewithin that Terry Funk’s ultimate legacy to a fan shines. An entire generation who enjoys a blood sport frowned upon by traditionalists appreciates Funk as the guy who broke away from tradition to establish their favourite subgenre of professional wrestling. Yet, the previous generations that enjoyed him all witnessed an entirely different side of Terry Funk. You can ask any wrestling fan who grew up during one era of a career that spanned over fifty years and every person will mention Terry Funk, yet every person will have a different fondness of a different time.
Off the screen, Funk was the hardest worker, the most legitimate tough guy, and considered the biggest sweetheart of a human being. He represented every man in the simple way he enjoyed his leisure away from professional wrestling taking care of his ranch, yet he was progressive in the way he looked at the world, the business that built him and spread the love as much as possible to those who knew him. He entertained millions, sacrificing his health and body in the process to make sure that the audience felt the show was worth every cent they spent. This piece doesn’t do Terry Funk justice, but to watch Terry Funk was to watch a genius at his craft, while also creating more opportunity for the foreseeable future in an industry that was cutthroat and exclusive when Funk rose to greatness.
For making professional wrestling his life and a better place to be, while also providing generations countless memories, Terry Funk leaves the world fondly remembered and arguably the most innovative and important professional wrestler of a bygone era. Before he was a crazy old man he had a screw loose. Before he had a screw loose, he was NWA Worlds Champion when it was the most elusive prize in the sport. Yet, through all three, he is beloved for entirely different reasons. All of them sound, and all of them combine for a legacy unlike any other. Funk epitomized everything that a professional wrestler is supposed to be. Tough, believable, authentic, entertaining. He could out talk anybody, outwork anybody, and if you pissed him off enough, he’d just nail you with a metal garbage can. Funk normalized the deathmatch style that had been rampant with stigma given to it by those in his era, while also doing his best to solidify rising stars. Funk cared for the betterment of the industry before his merit, and for that, he’s a rare breed.
