Bray Wyatt worked with wrestling legend to create his WWE persona, Mike Rotunda recalls (Exclusive)

Bray Wyatt's father, Mike Rotunda, recently discussed the inspiration for his late son's WWE persona.

Wyatt initially appeared on WWE's main roster under the name Husky Harris before reinventing himself as Bray Wyatt in NXT. In 2013, he re-debuted on the main roster as a villainous cult leader alongside Wyatt Family members Erick Rowan and Luke Harper.

In an interview with Sportskeeda Wrestling Senior Editor Bill Apter, Rotunda said Bray Wyatt was based on Robert De Niro's Cape Fear character, Max Cady. He also revealed that his son spoke to wrestling legend Dan Spivey, formerly known as Waylon Mercy, about his gimmick change:

"That [Cape Fear] was a totally creepy movie, the character, and I know Windham collaborated with Danny Spivey a little bit about that, like the Waylon Mercy gimmick. That De Niro movie, Cape Fear, was off the hook." [5:32 – 5:53]

Spivey performed as Waylon Mercy in WWE in 1995. Like Spivey, Wyatt often wore a Hawaiian shirt and cut eerie, softly spoken promos.

Watch the video above to hear Mike Rotunda explain why Wyatt did not receive an induction into the 2024 WWE Hall of Fame.

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Mike Rotunda's favorite version of Bray Wyatt

After an eight-month break from television, Bray Wyatt returned in 2019 as the excitable host of the Firefly Fun House children's television show segments. He also introduced the horror-themed Fiend character.

Mike Rotunda enjoyed his son's work as The Fiend, but he preferred the original version of Bray Wyatt:

"Myself, yes, Bray Wyatt," Rotunda replied when asked to name his favorite Wyatt persona. "I thought they could have got a ton more mileage out of that because that was something very different. Not that I didn't like The Fiend because he kinda caught that up in his mind, which was totally different also." [2:42 – 3:04]

Wyatt won the WWE Championship in 2017 before capturing the Universal Championship as The Fiend in 2019 and 2020.

A former WWE producer, Mike Rotunda, was there to witness his son's rise up the card throughout the 2010s:

"Those were the days I was producing, so I got to see how fans reacted to all the Bray Wyatt stuff. Not that I was on his shows every night because back then, as a producer, you would do SmackDown and next week you would do RAW live events, and TVs, both of the TVs, so I myself personally Bray Wyatt was the coolest, and something that stuck out to me that was the coolest thing that WWE had for a long time." [3:07 – 3:42]

Mike Rotunda added that Wyatt drew inspiration from several people when he was young, including comedy character Pee-wee Herman:

"Pee-wee Herman [was one of Wyatt's favorites]. He was a big fan of Beetlejuice movies. He liked different stuff, and he would memorize stuff as a young child. He knew all the words to Beetlejuice, just that animation with the characters just kinda stuck out in his mind, and he recreated a lot of that stuff on his own terms at a certain point in his life. He was kind of a horror fan of horror movies." [3:53 – 4:34]

On April 5, Mike Rotunda will be inducted into the 2024 WWE Hall of Fame alongside his brother-in-law and U.S. Express tag team partner Barry Windham.

When would you like to see Wyatt join the WWE Hall of Fame? Let us know using the discuss button.

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