Charles Manson Wanted To Meet Major WWE Star

Charles Manson was interested in a WWE star.

After a failed run as Husky Harris, Windham Rotunda returned to WWE’s developmental territory, Florida Championship Wrestling, in desperate need of new ideas.

Over the following weeks, Rotunda morphed into Bray Wyatt and recruited Luke Harper and Erick Rowan for what became known as The Wyatt Family. During this period, Wyatt leaned heavily into presenting himself as a cult leader-type figure as he and the family plotted their takeover.

Like all good cult leaders, Wyatt often spoke in riddles and used ‘The Family’ to do his bidding while trying to control everyone around him.

Much of Wyatt’s work at this time was inspired by cult leader Charles Manson, who served as the figurehead for the Manson Family through the 1960s and into the 70s. Cult members were eventually found guilty of commiting nine murders in July and August 1969.

Manson was later found guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder for seven of the deaths.

Charles Manson Took Interest In Top WWE Star

During a new interview with Freddie Prinze Jr. on his Wrestling with Freddie podcast, former WWE writer Nick Manfredini reflected on working with Wyatt on his character. Manfredini confirmed that much of Wyatt’s early character was inspired by Manson before revealing that the cult leader actually wanted to meet the WWE star.

“So, he was very Charles Manson-inspired, right? My YouTube search history back then was just Charles Manson and cult leader for anybody who looked it up. So I’ve probably seen every Charles Manson quote, every video, every promo that he ever cut. We were trying to take little pieces from each one, and that was the style we wanted to go for.

To get off topic, Charles Manson — I don’t know if this story has ever been told — Windham’s teammate, former teammate in college football, became a prison guard at Charles Manson’s prison.

Allegedly, this guy showed Manson the Bray Wyatt promos, and he wanted to meet him, and this was a whole thing. I swear. It is 100 per cent true, and so, Mike Rotunda knew about it, and I think he brought it up to somebody. I don’t know if it was Hunter or Vince (McMahon) or someone, and they immediately squashed it.

Obviously, that’s terrible… Because they were like, ‘Can we shoot a Network special with Charles Manson?’ It was immediately squashed, and then afterwards, I was like, ‘Let’s just go. Next time we’re in Northern California, me and you, let’s just put on a hat or something. Nobody will know it’s you. Let’s just go meet him.’

I thought more about it, and obviously it was a terrible, terrible idea. Would have been a good story but a bad idea… It was like, wait a minute, this would be so fun — weird to do. But, obviously, Bray Wyatt probably would have never seen TV again if we did that.”

In a recent interview, Alexa Bliss described Bray Wyatt as a “creative genius” as she reflected on their time working together. Bliss worked closely with Wyatt during his run as The Fiend before he was released in July 2021.

A new version of Wyatt returned to the company in late 2022, but unfortunately, the star’s new vision was never fully realised as he sadly passed away on August 24, 2023.

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H/t to Fightful