The Godfather's Attitude Era run almost started off much differently.
Speaking with the Scheduled for Two Falls podcast, Charles Wright detailed his return to the WWE in 1997 and how the original idea was to reimagine the Papa Shango character. As it so often happens, however, plans changed.
"For some reason, they convinced me to come back as Papa Shango, but it was going to be a lot different. The makeup was different. Jerry Lawler had done the facepaint and it was going to be a lot different. I had lost a lot of weight, I was looking good, different outfit. I thought this might be fun, let's do it. So I show up to TV, right, this is the God's honest truth, I show up to TV and they're like, "Vince [McMahon] wants to talk to you." I'm like, "cool, good with me, let's go." So I go talk to Vince and he goes, "Charles, change of plans." Change of plans? He goes, "tonight we're going to put you in the Nation, you and Ron Simmons are going to wrestle The Undertaker in a handicap match and you're gonna go over." I'm just kind of like, "what?" Then somebody comes in and goes, "we made you a little outfit, why don't you get with Mark [Calaway] and Ron and work something out and we'll talk later." I'm just like, "okay, business, as long as you pay me what you say you're going to pay."
Wright explains that this was the first time he'd met Ron Simmons. The two talked, but neither knew what was going on. The following week they were told that Dwayne Johnson would be joining the group. Vince had plenty of ideas for The Rock and was confident that he would be a mega-star.
"Let me tell you something, once I get the people to hate this kid, meaning The Rock, when I turn him, he will be the biggest thing wrestling has ever seen. That's what Vince told me and Ron Simmons. So then we talked to The Rock and we had to fight his ass for a while because he didn't want to wear the hat. He refused to wear one of the hats, right. Nation of Domination. He refused to wear a hat. Then he didn't want to wear the colors. We were like, listen if you don't wanna be part of this shit then don't be part of it, don't do it, get the f**k out. We don't care, you know. We're doing you a favor. You ain't doing us a favor. He ended up putting a little black/red/green thing on his tights. We were like, "you either put something on or we ain't gonna do it, man, this is it." So after that, it was cool man. Cool dude."
The Godfather wishes he could have ridden with The Rock for longer, but enjoys the time they spent together. He's happy for the success Johnson has had in his career, saying that it couldn't have happened to a nicer person.
Recently, The Undertaker observed his final farewell in WWE at the 2020 Survivor Series event and Charles Wright was there to celebrate with him and he brought along other members of The Undertaker’s backstage clique, the BSK.
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