Jacques Rougeau recently spoke with The Two Man Power Trip of Wrestling podcast regarding his Mountie gimmick in WWF and more. Check out some highlights below:
On his time as The Mountie: “To be honest with you I had the greatest moments as The Mountie in my career. I was working guys like Macho Man, I remember a match with him in England against him with Elizabeth, I had matches with Undertaker, matches with Sid Vicious of course matches with Big Boss Man just so many fantastic memories. There is nothing I didn’t do as The Mountie. I remember simple matches with Tito Santana as The Mountie or Koko B. Ware. I had so much fun with that character and I honestly made people believe that I thought I was The Mountie. That I was so convinced that they started believing. It is amazing because when you build a character and I always tell this at my school that how are you going to get people to believe in your character if you don’t believe it. I had a brother-in-law who was a real Royal Canadian Mounted Police who gave me some tricks and some moves that they used when they arrest a guy so all those moves that I used in the ring were actually legit.”
On the Jailhouse match against The Big Boss Man: “It is one of the greatest matches that I’ve ever had in my career. Ray Traylor who was the Big Boss Man who unfortunately left us was the kindest person. I had never seen Big Boss Man talk bad to anyone in the dressing room or show lack of respect. He was another Owen Hart. So working with a guy like that for a year to a year and a half around the world was a night off every night and it was such a pleasure because he would take care of my body, take care of me and I would take care of him. It was a great time in my career.”
On not being able to use The Mountie name in Canada: “I was doing such a great job of making The Mounties look bad in Canada that they suspended me on TV and I wasn’t allowed to be used on TV anymore. So the only way I was allowed to wrestle was if I took off the sleeves, the shirt and kept the black pants and they would announce me as Jacques Rougeau. Everyone knew me as Jacques Rougeau anyway so that was fun. I think they (The Mounties) took it all a little too serious. Like in movies and everywhere else there is always dirty Cops or bad Cops but they don’t ban the movie because the Cop is crooked. But I think that my character was becoming so strong that eventually they decided and voted on it and sent a letter to Vince saying that I wasn’t allowed to wrestle on TV in Canada anymore. Eventually and after that they let that character go because it wasn’t helping me at all so I took a year off and came back a year and a half later with Carl Ouellet as The Quebecers ith the same suit and our music was “We’re not the Mounties”. So I think Vince wanted to get back at them in a way.”
On the impact of the character: “The Mountie was great. I’ll never forget winning the Intercontinental Title against Bret Hart and losing it to Rowdy Roddy Piper. I had three different dolls made and sold in Toys R Us’s around the world as The Mountie and when I give conferences in schools now against intimidation. The first thing I do is because they don’t know me because they are too young and they have only heard of me but I do so many personal appearances and am on TV that when I come in and start talking to kids and I take my belt out and my dolls out they start to say, “Hey, this guy was important”. All of that was done because of the Mountie character.”
