The Boogeyman is one of WWE’s most iconic characters, and he recently reflected on its origins. The WWE alumnus appeared on Buff Bagwell’s YouTube channel, where he discussed how he created his name and character. Below are the highlights, per Fightful:
The Boogeyman on coming up with the name:
“Well, Buff, I was in a very dark, dark place, man, at that point in time. When I was introduced to wrestling at 40, You know, I went into a situation where I was the oldest guy there. I didn’t want to… I lied about my age and the whole 30 thing. But I wanted a job. I love wrestling. I grew up watching wrestling. But when I joined, a lot of things happened. I came up with Boogeyman.”
The Boogeyman on his worm eating gimmick:
“Now the worms, how the worms got was I walked into Vince’s (McMahon) office and I had like, I don’t know, Madagascar roaches, crickets, maggots, all these edible insects which was actually my burlap bag that I had, that little pouch. I was gonna use that to put all the insects in that for each opponent I’d have a different insect and I’d eat them. But we couldn’t pay an infestation cost to any arena we got if one of the critters got away if that’s the arena. So the worms are the only thing we can control because they’re not going to crawl away and hatch.”