During a recent edition of his House of Hardcore podcast, Tommy Dreamer revealed that he considered murdering Paul Heyman and himself at WrestleMania 17 in Houston, TX in 2001. He was not joking either and said it was the result of severe depression.
Dreamer was scheduled to make his WWE debut on the show as part of a Tables, Ladders, and Chairs match but he ended up being bumped from the card. According to Dreamer himself, he was in a very dark place in his life at the time following ECW closing down. He also turned down large money offers out of loyalty to Paul Heyman. Dreamer revealed that he moved back in with his parents and fell into depression.
Dreamer said he planned to use the lax gun laws in Texas which allowed firearms to be brought into venues, hop the rail at WrestleMania, shoot Heyman (a WWE announcer at the time) in the back of the head, and then shoot himself on live TV. He said,
“I remember I did a show there, and I saw a sign that said, ‘Guns Welcome,’ and I was in Houston. I did an indie show, and I said, ‘What is this?’ I’m from New York, what do you mean, ‘Guns Welcome’? And they said, ‘Oh, you are allowed to bring a firearm into the venue.’ I was across the street from the Astrodome. When I tell you it resonated in my head so, so much.
That I’ll tell you what I wanted to do, It’s sick that I think this. At WrestleMania, I was gonna hop the rail and I was gonna whack Paul E. in the back of the head right at the announce table, then I was gonna whack myself. The ultimate martyr, I was gonna hit my pose crack, boom, pull the trigger. Because I was that insane. Don’t know if I would have went through with it, but that’s what I was thinking about every day. I was like, ‘I will go down in history.’ Pop, boom. First they’d think it was an angle until I shot him. I was so severely depressed and so mental with rage, I needed help.
Randomly I get a phone call from a number I didn’t know … I didn’t pick up. I remember having these thoughts, and it was bad. I had a gun, I was psssh, man. Could you think about the horribleness that I would have done for my legacy? I would have ruined WrestleMania, which I love, WrestleMania. For everybody. These thoughts were so, so crazed in my head. How dare that person, he screwed my parents over and I come from a mobster mentality. In my head I was like, ‘I would become infamous,’ which is famous for the wrong reason. I’m glad I didn’t do it.
But when that phone call came from Jim Ross. Again, just said leave a message. It said, ‘Hey Tommy, it’s Jim Ross, just want to let you know we are still thinking about you, we are gonna get it done, just got to hang tight. Thank you.’”
I am so happy I didn’t do it, I am so happy that I did get that phone call, from someone who was a stranger, I barely knew the guy. There was another day, there have been a lot of other days.”
