Jimmy "Mouth of the South" Hart has been part of the fantasy world of
wrestling since the brutes were referred to as "rasslers." For 18 years,
sporting flashy blazers, a mullet haircut, and megaphone, he has played
along straight-faced during every surreal moment of his pro-wrestling
career. He's hosted a talk show with a 400-plus-pound gay wrestler who
sprayed perfume in the face of his enemies; he's managed an
Elvis-impersonator, a pre-"Hulk" Terry Bollea, and the present Governor of
Minnesota; he's been publicly pantsed more than anyone in history. It's no
wonder he thinks little of having managed Intergender Wrestling Champion,
Andy Kaufman, in long johns and bathrobe, during 1981 and 1982.
As the Andy Kaufman revival reaches critical mass -- with Milos Forman's
bio-pic, Man on the Moon, Bob Zmuda's book, Andy Kaufman
Revealed!
and Bill Zehme's Lost in the Funhouse -- the comic is being deified
to death.
Stilted delineations of Kaufman's intent characterize him as a Marcel
Duchamp, his quirks attributed to artistic vision and vice versa. But Jimmy
Hart never saw Kaufman as an artistic prophet. Wrestlers, like old school
manager, "Classy" Freddie Blassie, who starred in Kaufman's indie flick,
Breakfast with Blassie, thought of Kaufman as
a "goofball pencil-necked geek."
Most of Kaufman's mystique comes from the same angle as wrestling's: real or
fake? serious or tee-hee? Before they were forced out of the
"sports-entertainment" closet, wrestlers were so in on the joke that
they never even bothered to acknowledge the joke at all. The wrestling world
was a playground where everyone played very seriously. And as an adult,
Kaufman found what every child desires: perfect playmates in Jimmy Hart and
the cast of Midsouth Championship wrestling.
In conversation, sans megaphone, Hart and his southern accent are not
consistently histrionic, but lapse into cartoonish exaggeration often
enough to
remind you what you're dealing with. He carries around a huge
Sharpie marker, acting as though he works for the many people who recognize
him on the street and ask for his autograph. He is sincere like a used car
salesman might be with his mother and he references Elvis often. When FEED
recently met up with Hart in Tampa, he spoke about the hate Kaufman stirred
up in Memphis, the days of wrestling before cable TV, and the dangers of
dinner with Latka.
