Bill Apter

You know, it's funny you brought up the magazines.

And w- and I didn't realize it until much later on, but talking to Bill Apter and talking to George Napolitano, that even the writers' names, some of the editors' names, it, it was, it was all bullshit.

Yes.

Like they, [laughs]

So of course you were going to.

But the other aspect was Bill Apter's father lived in West Palm Beach.

So Bill Apter all of a sudden was spending a lot of time down in the sunny state of Florida seeing his dad and going to wrestling.

That got Dusty Rhodes on almost all the covers at that point.

I did not know that.

He, it, exactly.

And there's also the Bill Apter factor.

Now, when we did the Under the CineMat episode, uh, Apter had done an interview with Chris Jericho on the Talk Is Jericho podcast, where this subject was broached and talked a little bit about it, and you sampled some of that audio.

Subsequent to that, Bill came out with what I think is a pretty excellent, um, audiobook, uh, and book.

It had come out I think in the late '90s as well, but it was much more of a kayfabe book back then, if I remember right.

But here, Bill kind of lays out some really f- fun vignettes from over the course of his colorful career covering wrestling for the, for the Apter mags and shooting photos and stuff.

He had a pretty good relationship with Hulk Hogan, and, um, when the transition happened to Vince Jr. taking over and banning the Apter mags from covering WWF matches, Hulk still kind of had a, a soft spot for Bill, to hear Bill tell it, and would still, you know, kind of make arrangements for him to photograph him off WWF premises and, and things like that and, and still try to keep, uh, Bill Apter in his good graces.

And as part of that, Apter, uh, talks about, um, this in his book, which I think adds some color to the role he may have played in getting Hulk the role.

I know those guys were really good friends.

And Bill Apter, who you know I love Bill Apter.

Bill Apter had a really great tribute, uh, last week to Jeff, and I highly recommend everybody go on Bill Apter's YouTube page.

First of all, subscribe because it's Bill Apter.

And, uh, he had a really...

I didn't realize how close him and, how him, uh, how close him and Jeff Miller were, so definitely check that out.

Mm-hmm.

They used to have magazines that had all the different wrestlers in it, and one of the magazines, Bill Apter, had an, had a, every month had an article in there.

Yeah.

So I wrote Bill Apter and asked him where I could learn to wrestle, and he, uh, check, on the bottom of my letter he wrote, wrote, "Try Kowalski's," and put the phone number on it and sent the letter back to me.

So, and that's how I ended up there.

And then, so what was your transformation fr- how big were you when you sent that letter in to Apter?

Nope, nope.

I, I respect Bill Apter, and I respect what Bill Apter does.

He has, you know, Excel spreadsheets that he puts every wrestler's win and loss on.

I, I know what he does in the basement.