Wrestling icon Mick Foley bringing comedy act to Brandon

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This article was published 25/01/2014 (4484 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Former WWE superstar Mick Foley is one funny Dude (Love).

The wrestling icon is set to take the stage in Brandon at The 40 on Feb. 18 to share stories from his more than four decades in the ring, garnering laughs from how his experience has shaped his comedic views on hu(Mankind).

Audience members will leave the show (Cactus Jack)ed up, grinning from ear to ear, and it’s those reactions that Foley said he’s thrived on as far back as he can remember.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s a few hundred people or 20,000, if I’m connecting with an audience and making them laugh, wince or even get a tear in their eye with something I’m saying, then I feel like I’m back in the ring,” Foley said from his hotel room in Ohio after performing a show the night before.

“It’s that same thing that drove me in wrestling that drives me in comedy, it’s getting that reaction from the crowd.”

While he’s played a number of characters throughout his wrestling career, sometimes simultaneously, when he’s on stage it’s all Foley.

A father, wrestler, author, actor, activist and executive, Foley draws on all his experience to keep the crowd entertained.

“It’s me up there — I’m Mick,” he said. “I will occasionally get into characters that I portrayed during my career because the fans really enjoy that, but I’m a real guy on stage.”

Throughout his career, Foley was a four-time world champion, 11-time tag team champion and the first hardcore champion in WWE history.

The 6-foot-2, 285-pound Foley doesn’t look like the typical wrester. More round than ripped, the now 48-year-old became legendary for the amount of pain he was able to endure during matches.

He has seen the inside of an emergency room as often as he has been counted out on the mat.

“Apparently some of the things I did during my career were not wise,” Foley joked. “I can tell you for a fact that if a man takes on a concrete floor for 20 years, ultimately the concrete floor gets the victory.”

Foley relied on his personality and ability to whip the crowd into a frenzy, sometimes for and sometimes against him.

But it may have been how he showcased his vulnerability that made him such a hit with fans.

“I wasn’t afraid to amplify my weaknesses,” Foley said. “Wrestlers tend to amplify their strengths to appear larger than life and almost super human. Comics find a way to exploit their weaknesses and find humour in their failings, and I did that as a wrestler, so self-deprecation is part of what I do.”

The same passion that fans connected with on screen and at live shows is what the audience will see in Brandon, he said.

“I’ll be there and I’ll put on the best show I can. No one will watch me and say, ‘There is a guy going through the motions.’ I try to make every show the best it can possible be.”

Heidi Howarth, owner of The 40, said tickets are already half sold out for the show.

Tickets can be purchased at the front desk of the Trails West Inn for $25.

Howarth also said there is an option for two shows if ticket sales continue to roll in. Foley has already added additional shows in Winnipeg, Victoria and Nanaimo, B.C., after the first shows sold out.

» ctweed@brandonsun.com