The other day, while trying to undermine Jen’s online streaming Netflix queue, I re-watched Wrestling With Shadows, essentially the Bret Hart/Montreal Screw Job story. As many people know, wrestling is indeed scripted, and to some degree “fake,” but the story of the Montreal Screw Job was very much real, or it is one of the longest-standing, existing storylines going on 14 years now.
Long story short: then-WWF champion Bret Hart’s contract was up, and WWF Vince McMahon owner felt that he couldn’t match the offer by Ted Turner and WCW (three years, $9 million guaranteed), so it was agreed that Hart would be allowed to WCW with no hard feelings upon expiration of his WWF contract. So instead of having Bret Hart lose the belt at any time before his departure, Vince McMahon waited to the very last day of Hart’s contract, deviated from the scripted finish of his final match on live pay-per-view with the assistance of several conspirators, and portrayed Bret Hart as submitting to a wrestling hold, thus stripping him of the championship, in his home country of Canada.
As a result, Bret Hart has held a grudge against Vince McMahon, and involved conspirators for the better part of the last decade and change, and only within the last two years has pretended to bury the hatchet in order to financially benefit from DVD collections, appearance fees, and for the sake of his wrestling next-of-kin.
Throughout the span of the last 14 years, Bret Hart has been made to look like the victim, a martyr, in this whole scenario, and that he did absolutely no wrong. But after reading his excellent autobiography, and now having re-watched Wrestling With Shadows, I don’t agree with such a portrayal anymore. Maybe it’s because I’m older, more jaded, and possibly a little more understanding of the business standpoint, but the way I see it now, Vince McMahon was right in his iconic post-screw job interview – Bret screwed Bret.
