Looking back on a gem of a career: an injury may have ended his ring run, but the consummate optimist is ready to begin the next chapter of his life - Interview: Diamond Dallas Page

ENVISION IT AND IT WILL happen.

Spend any time with Diamond Dallas Page and you'll hear that phrase often. He not only delivers that message to others, but he also lives his life by it. There's certainly no denying that it's worked for him.

Beginning his dream to become a professional wrestler at the ripe age of 35, Page defied the critics by achieving his goal and then slam-dunked the naysayers by winning the WCW world title three times (all after the age of 43) and receiving mainstream notoriety during wrestling's boom period in the late `90s.

Page, however, did not envision the manner in which his career inside the ring would end. He retired last June after a freak accident during a match aggravated some serious neck problems. The injury came just as he felt he was starting to turn a corner in WWE.

Never one for self pity, the perpetually positive Page simply turned his attention to the quest of another dream, this one belonging to his wife, Kimberly, an aspiring actress who formerly was a Nitro Girl and a valet in WCW, With Page no longer under a WWE contract, the couple headed to Los Angeles in August 2002 to pursue acting careers. Page is also working as a professional speaker.

Page recently sat down with WRESTLING DIGEST to discuss his devastating neck injury, his abbreviated stint in WWE, and life after wrestling.

WRESTLING DIGEST: Can you give us the details surrounding your decision to retire, beginning with the "Smackdown" match against Bob Holly in April of last year in which you suffered a neck injury?

DIAMOND DALLAS PAGE: I threw Bobby into the turnbuckle and came running in, and I took a pretty stiff boot from him. Then he followed up with a clothesline that literally knocked me out. He suplexed me and asked me if I was OIL I said, "Yeah, I think I'm all right." Then I go to suplex him off the top and we're going to the finish.

Well, as I'm climbing those ropes, I'm still a little dazed. I suplexed him, and I'm so concerned with laying him flat, which I did, that I didn't land flat. I landed on the top of my shoulders and my neck. Imagine coming down with 260 pounds on your shoulders, and I'm following it with the momentum, and whiplashing myself down into him. My foot came around and jackknifed and hit him right in the groin.

When we hit, I could feel the shocks down my hands. I thought I broke my neck. I rolled around a little bit, and then a couple seconds later I moved my fingers, and I'm like, "Oh, thank God." Then I hear Bobby screaming in pain. I'm thinking: "What the hell is he bitching about? I know I laid him flat." We asked each other if we were OK. I said, "Let's just do it," and we finished the match. We came to the back, and Bobby and I hugged each other and thanked each other for the match.

He said, "Man, I'm sorry about kicking you in the face with that boot." I told him not to worry about it. Then he's rubbing his biceps, and he said, "I know I got you with that clothesline. I thought I tore my biceps, but you got me back." I looked at his huge arm, and my jaw was imprinted on it, but I'm wondering how I got him back. He said, "You kicked me so hard in the groin that I thought my groin was on fire." I could feel my neck seizing up right there. I walked up to the trainer and I told him what the scoop was.

I ended up seeing three doctors. My first doctor said, "Diamond, how much longer do you want to do this?" I told him I'd like to do it another year. He said, "Let me see if I can change your mind." I had built up bone spurs in my neck. They were right up against a wall and no spinal fluid was going up in there. One doctor said I could go back if I got an operation, but the other two said no way. It would have taken me over a year to rehab that kind of injury. If I was 37, I probably would have done it, but not at 47.

Finally it was Vince McMahon and Jim Ross who said, "What are you going to feel like when you're 50 or 60 if you do this now?" They wanted me to become a color commentator, which was an honor for me to hear from them. But I had to turn down the offer. I was burned out on the business and I really did not believe I could give Vince what he wanted. I had already made that mistake once when I did the stalker thing.

WD: Speaking of the stalker angle, in which your character menaced the Undertaker's wife, the manner in which it was booked almost guaranteed that it Wouldn't get over. What are your thoughts on it?

DDP: I don't blame anybody because it was my choice to do it. I had a whole different vision, but when Vince and Shane McMahon gave me the stalker idea, I know they didn't think it was going to be as bad as it turned out to be. I should have said, "Vince, it's a great idea, but not for me, because people aren't going to buy it. Me stalking another man's wife? Have you seen my wife?" But I eventually turned things around. I was told by one of the guys who talked to Vince all the time that Vince thought I'd lost it in the ring. Well, when I started having matches with the young guys like Christian, who were bumping like crazy, I turned Vince around, and it made me very proud. That's why I was so bummed when I got hurt, because I had just turned my career around.

WD: You mentioned having a different vision when you entered WWE. What was it?

DDP: People's Champion vs. People's Champion. The Rock vs. DDP. I should have stuck to that vision, but I broke away from it. If I would have done that, I could have happily retired. I'd have put the Rock over right in the middle of the ring. We'd have torn the place up, and the interviews would have been unbelievable. After meeting the Rock just one time, we clicked so well. I came back and told my wife, here's how I'm going to show up in WWE: "The lights go out Over the PA, you hear, `Who's the real People's Champion?' Spotlight on me. `You're looking at him.'" They would have booed me out of the building.

WD: Has it been difficult being away from wrestling?

DDP: It was tough being away from the business the first six months, but I needed to get away. In the beginning, I still watched a lot, and then I just stopped because I wanted to take a real break from it. I didn't take a break for close to 15 years. Mick Foley, who is one of my closest buddies from the business, said it's like when you break up with a girlfriend--you don't want to talk to her all the time.

WD: How is the acting career going?

DDP: It is as hard, or harder, to break into than wrestling. It requires a lot of luck and work ethic. The first thing my wife and I did when we came out to Los Angeles was enroll in acting classes separately, and we both ended up in the same place: Howard Fine's Acting Studio. He's the Lee Strasberg of this era. He's actually been a wrestling fan since he was a kid, and he's done private coaching with the Rock. He has told me that I have that "thing," that sense of self, and that if I apply the same work ethic I did in wrestling, I'll be very successful here. I'm also taking a singing for actors class, which really has nothing to do with my singing voice, but it's to strengthen my voice for doing voiceovers. I've been doing voiceovers for several months now, one audition after another. I did an animated pilot for Disney called "Extreme Fairy Tales," and a part in "Tarzan II" is between me and Randy Savage.

WD: Have you set any long-term acting goals?

DDP: Three years from the day I got here, which was August 27, 2002, I will be in a major movie as the lead heel against the Rock, Vin Diesel, or whoever the action hero is at that time.

WD: What else have you been up to since you retired from wrestling?

DDP: This whole time I've been working on my motivational speaking with renowned speaker Dan Clark. Dusty Rhodes was my mentor in wrestling;, well, Dan Clark is my Dusty Rhodes in professional speaking, just like Howard Fine is my Dusty Rhodes in acting.

WD: A lot of wrestlers leave the business, but few can stay away. Will you return to WWE in the future?

DDP: Without question. If Vince wants me to come back at some point, I will. The first time I tried out in WWE it was for Jesse Ventura's spot as a color commentator after he had left in 1990. Of course, at the time I was nowhere near ready for that spot, but now I sure as hell am. [WWE executive producer] Kevin Dunn always said that my voice cuts right through the crowd. Today it does that times two. In three years or so it will be times five, because I'm constantly tuning my instrument.

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