so that makes me feel really good. tyler, i cannot thank you enough. this was really moving. - thank you. thank you. - thank you so much. thank you for asking me to do this. - thank you. - i appreciate it. appreciate it. harvey levin: the objects people choose to keep in their home define who they are. this is... i'm harvey levin. this is a story about the babe ruth of professional wrestling. the incredible hulk hogan! harvey: hulk hogan put an entire industry on the map, but not without paying a heavy price. hulk hogan: the knees are fake. the hips are fake. the back's full of metal. harvey: hulk hogan became one of the most recognizable and beloved figures in the world, but behind the scenes, terry bollea's life was crumbling. you literally had a gun in your mouth. yeah. harvey: an illicit sex tape would bring this american hero to his knees. you used the n-word.

if this tape wasn't leaked, do you think you'd be using that word today? but the scandal that could have broken him actually redefined him. i made a whole switch from, you know, being negative that is i'd work hard. i'm in check with myself. i'm happy, brother. harvey: hulk hogan, a life of the highest highs and the lowest lows. oh, my gosh. - it is so good to see you. - hey, my brother. usually i see you in gold's gym. that's true, in los angeles. well, we're far, far away. have a seat. well, thank you for coming. so, um, i want to spend some time going through your life. but i want to do it with things you chose to keep over the years that are important to you and help define who you are. so i'm looking at that. what is it? my dad worked construction his whole life. - right. - he dug ditches. he put the big storm drainage in the roads. this was in florida. and when i was about five or six years old, my memory is having this little gas truck.

-it was pink. - harvey:why save that? what does it represent? it symbolizes how i grew up. i grew up in a very small, square little house, 650 square feet. and he had a tough life. my mom was a housewife, and i kind of kept this truck to make me realize i always wanted to work hard but i always wanted to make sure that i raised the bar. you know, and i never wanted to be in situation like that, where-- i remember them living check to check. there was always talk about my dad's income and always talk about what bills to pay. i just made a decision that i never wanted to be in a situation like that. what are your thoughts right now, mrs. hogan? your son, the new world champion. i'm so excited i don't know what to say. you are not a tough guy by nature. - no. - 'cause it's odd that you're this-- the icon of wrestling, and you weren't really a tough guy growing up. hulk: because i was fat, and my head was so big. i got teased, but i wasn't a kid that wanted to fight. i was always really mellow, and i would avoid any type of confrontation.

even through high school, i never got in any trouble with fighting. i didn't fit in. i went all the way through high school, and i think my senior year i finally had a girlfriend. i think because i was so heavy, you know? - it was just tough. - when did you lose weight? right when i was getting out of high school. i started eating burger king once a day and drinking diet cokes, and i started getting into lifting weights. how'd your mom influence you? hulk: my mom played piano, and she was our music teacher in the neighborhood. and so she would play all the time so i got real interested in music and i was very young, about 11 or 12 years old. my dad bought me this really expensive guitar. - is that it? - yeah, that's the guitar. - that's the guitar? can i see it? - yeah. and you played this? uh, yeah, i did for many years. you were in a band? i was in several bands. let me see this thing. this is amazing. this is really cool-looking. - yup, still plays. - ( harvey laughs )

was your passion music or sports? my passion was doing anything to avoid working a real job. i was out on the weekends playing music and making money. harvey: your brother, he had a very rough going in life. hulk: he had a tough time with running around getting in trouble, you know? he, uh, got married to an older lady, had a beautiful family and passed away quite young. he just went down the wrong road. and got into drugs. - yes. - harvey: and trouble. yes. i can see it is still emotional for you and he died many years ago. as hard as this is to say, some people are in your life just to teach you life lessons, and when i look at my brother i look at nothing but positive stuff. i wish he was here, i keep a picture of him up in my house, a couple of them, and i wish he was here, but now i understand that he was in my life

to teach me a life lesson. what's the lesson? of how to correct myself and reboot, which i've done over and over and over again until i'm finally happy with myself. how did he die? um... i'd rather not talk about that. fair enough. so, all in all, your childhood. um, happy, challenging? i look back on it now and wow, it was-- it was pretty darn rough. i mean, it could have been better but i didn't realize at the time that there was anything wrong. so i had a great childhood. - harvey:this beach shop is awesome! - hulk:thank you. well, this is like the transition. you know, i'll always be part of wrestling so there's a lot of wrestling stuff in here and you know, stuff from my career and memorabilia plus since i'm on the beach and i'm the official beach bum around here we're making the transition with the beach hats and the board shorts

so it's a beach shop for everybody that comes here to orlando. what are these? okay, these are the boots-- as you can see they're pretty worn out-- that i wore in "wrestle mania 3," and body-slammed andre the giant. harvey: this was to me the biggest moment that i can remember in your career. this-- you picked up a 700-pound guy. hulk: yes, sir. this moment etched wrestling in the wwf/wwe in history that we were not going anywhere. this was a huge gamble. we didn't know if we would pull if off. 94,000 people. i do not understand how you can lift a 700-pound guy in the air. with a lot of help from him. it was a situation, if you watched the tape, when i went to go underneath andre-- ( roars ) when andre was coming, his arm went around my neck. - right. - well, actually this way. - went around my neck. - oh, he helped you. and he pushed up on my thigh. announcer: we're seeing what this guy is really made of! what he is! the greatest professional athlete in the world today. look at this!

in front of him! i don't believe it! i don't believe it! hulk dropping a big leg! over for the giant! it's over! - harvey:but still. - hulk:oh yeah, but it was okay when i got into here. and then when i got into here, i had all this weight and i had to turn him. and that's how i tore my biceps. both biceps are torn. harvey: so that moment is when you tore the bicep? hulk: yeah, yeah. when i tore 'em. harvey: what about the back? well, my inserts-- and up here where my back's supposed to-- i've got a big hole in my back from turning him, but, uh-- was that worth it? - yeah. - oh, god. it was a one-time deal for me. yeah, one-time deal. but that moment changed my whole career because hulk hogan was off and running and hulkamania was off and running but that put me on a rocket ship. so, when you were growing up, you didn't like contact sports. - no, not at all. - you shied away from them. not at all. i didn't like any type of confrontation. so, how'd you get into wrestling? i was a huge fan. i mean, i just loved it.

i grew up watching it. but you never joined the wrestling team in high school. no, sir. i had a really good band. and right when we were getting ready to hit the road, one guy was getting married, one guy's wife had a baby and nobody wanted to go. i said, "that's it, i'm done, i'm gonna go be a wrestler." so the worst thing that i did was i went all around tampa telling everybody i was gonna be a wrestler. the first day they took me down there, they broke my leg on purpose the first day. if wrestling were not fake, would you have done it? at the time, i didn't know-- - you thought it was real. - oh, yeah. i didn't know it was predetermined back then. i guess when they break your leg, that kind of confirms it, right? but yet you didn't like contact sports. that's right. so i don't understand that. i don't either. - ( laughter ) - i just love wrestling. i was intertwined in society-- americana. i was americana at the time. so why flip it and become a bad guy? well, a lot of reasons. you have to reinvent yourself in the wrestling business and i wanted to be a bad guy because i thought i could make these good guys hulk hogans.

i would get booed so much that i could give them my oomph. that's when i reinvented myself. that's when i said, all the training, the prayers, the vitamins, all the stuff i did for the kids, i did it for the money. you fans can stick it, brother! yeah! because... if it wasn't for hulk hogan, you people wouldn't be here! hulk: i thought i'd be the ultimate bad guy, which i was. i'd beat guys up and then i'd cower like a chicken and beg for forgiveness and wanna shake hands and blow-- cheap shot 'em, you know? but the people cheered me and it backfired on me. i became hollywood hogan, that bad guy, in the back, with the black beard. and people were cheering me out of the building. it was amazing. the lines had gotten blurred at the time, so there was this big gray area in entertainment that the fans thought it was cool to cheer for the bad guy, hollywood hulk hogan, so i became bigger than ever again. ( announcer shouting indistinctly )

it's kind of a statement about america, isn't it? that all of a sudden the bad guy gets cheered. yes, sir. it's kind of scary. i've had 17 surgeries in the last 10 years. oh, my god. what's not original here? hulk: the knees are fake, the hips are fake, um, the back's full of metal. and part of my face is full of metal. i didn't get the memo about the fake wrestling. - i was gonna say. - yeah, i missed that part.

okay, i think i know what they are, but tell me. voila. these are my very, very, very, very, very last set of crutches. - your last set? - yeah. when i first sent my first picture to jennifer of me in the gym i was posing, showing my tricep, and behind me there must have been 80 crutches, 'cause i saved all the crutches-- you get two at a time, by the way-- from all the surgeries, and even since i've been with jennifer, i've had 17 surgeries in the last ten years. - oh, my god. - hulk:my knees, i've had three or four surgeries on my knees, each knee before i had 'em replaced. harvey: what's not original here? hulk: the knees are fake, the hips are fake. the back's full of metal, and part of my face is full of metal.

oh, my god. tell me about the injuries. i didn't get the memo about the fake wrestling. - i was gonna say. - yeah, i missed that part. it's pre-determined, you know who's gonna win or lose, but what people don't understand is that it's very physical. and back in the day in the 70's when i first started, i still got, like, teeth marks on my finger. - there's a eyetooth there-- - i can see it! teeth marks of people trying to bite my fingers. oh, my god! had my eye reconstructed a couple times from getting hit in the face, nose broken 13 times, all these teeth, these fake teeth have been knocked out six times so, it's been a wild ride. i remember reading things that you were 6'7" or 6'8". - yeah. ( laughs ) - i gotta say, you don't seem 6'7" or 6'8" and i don't know whether there's a connection here. - hulk: you're killing me. - harvey:you see, not that you're not tall, - hulk:yeah. - harvey:but you don't seem 6'7" to me. i was 6'7" before the "rocky" movie. - how tall are you now? - i'm 6'4" and a half. how could you lose almost 3 inches? fast forward 35 years later? dropping a leg drop every night on my spine,

two knee replacements, two hip replacements, nine back surgeries. when you get older, you kinda crunch up a little bit anyway. all those things added up so you know, it's very physical. there are some wrestlers and maybe a lot of wrestlers who deal with this with alcohol and drugs because of pain. - yeah. - how common is that? it's very common. when i was wrestling full time, all of us did. that was the norm to survive. it's hard to believe when you see somebody this big that steroids is not kind of the common drug in the ring. okay. - you ever do it? - yes. - yes. - there was a time you said no. yeah, one time. i've trained 20 years, 2 hours a day to look like i do. but things that i am not is i'm not a steroid abuser, and i do not use steroids.

and actually when i said no, i wasn't on steroids at the time, so i was playing with words. knowing what you've gone through, if you could make a decision again on whether to go into wrestling having become the bionic man, would you do it again? commentator 1: a running clothesline! and macho going after the eye! - oh, no! - commentator 2:a fly! commentator 1: he fly-plants hogan! oh, yeah. i'd do it all over again. so tell me what that is. well, this is the second or third attempt by stallone to get ahold of me for the "rocky 3" movie. vince mcmahon sr.'s secretary got a handwritten note. well, i called him right away, and the whole story is i flew out there, got in the ring with him. we did a couple things. he tried to hit me a couple times. "see if you can grab me pretty quick, big guy." -which i did. - harvey:this was an audition. hulk: yeah, and they were filming everything. and so, i didn't have an agent,

never had done anything before. he goes, "i'll give you $10,000 to do the movie." i went, "nah, i want $15,000." so i did it for $14,000. - no. - yeah. wait a minute, he negotiated you down from 15? ( chuckles ) well, yeah... i apologize. first of all, you should have gone for way more than 15. well, i didn't know. ( cheering ) where are my love slaves out there? thunderlips is here, in the flesh, baby! now the character was great for you know, the females. it's the ultimate male, thunderlips. look at those lips. it helped you get laid. i'm talking about it helped me attract the opposite sex. good match. hey, why'd you get so crazy on me out there? that's the name of the game. you ended up on the cover of "sports illustrated." i can't get over that, because wrestlers weren't on that magazine. and to be on the cover, that must have been a moment for you. ah, it's never happened since. i've been the only wrestler ever to be on the cover.

and at the time we had not deregulated wrestling, which means we didn't tell the people it was an actual exhibition and we know who's gonna win or lose at the time. we were still fighting that fight, you know, saying, "this is a real sport." and i think hulkamania just got so popular and it was a such a cult following that "sports illustrated" didn't really have a choice. what was so crazy is when i went back and i wrestled the iron sheik, it was a perfect storm. iran was holding, like, 400 hostages at the time. the iron sheik was really the real deal. he was the shah of iran's bodyguard, he was the real deal. and i was doing all-american hulkamania thing: tan, full head of blonde hair, the real american, so, it was like the perfect time for this thing to take off. harvey:and it became really almost a show of patriotism in weird way, right? yes, sir, it sure was. commentator: and now, world wrestling federation heavyweight champion, the incredible hulk hogan!

i think changed the sport and the crowd because you were the first true entertainer. and i did that because i was not the greatest wrestler. i wasn't the greatest technical wrestler, but i'd had enough that i knew how to create emotion, how to create excitement, and tell a good story when i was in there. and i just prided myself on telling stories. what was the biggest perk of being a celebrity? the biggest perk of being a celebrity... probably would have been at the airports. harvey: what? you got through faster? ( laughs ) hulk:well, you'd get through faster but then when you got to the gate, there'd be so much chaos because i'd stand next to-- "oh, is the plane on time?" and we'd get swarmed by so many people, the gate agent would go, "get him on the plane as soon as you can." harvey: that's funny. biggest drawback. biggest drawback, having to maintain and just really be cool and calm when it got extra, extra, extra, extra personal.

they get me, like, caged in and i can't go nowhere. why can't they just calm down a little bit? because you're hulk hogan. i'm hulk hogie. when you're sitting there with your wife and kids and you're eating dinner and, "oh, hulk hogan, i want an autograph! i'm your biggest fan," and their pack of cigarettes would fall in your food. - good to see you. - how are you? - are you enjoying your steak? - i'm trying. you just had to go, "i love you, brother. i'll take that picture and sign an autograph with you after i finish eating." there was a low point in all of this where you literally had a gun in your mouth. how did you get out of that? well, i got to a point where everything kinda hit me at the same time. so how'd you get out of that? i made friends with laila ali. laila ali in some ways saved your life. i really believe that, that if she hadn't called just to say hello... it might have changed.

harvey: so, what's this? this is a card from my soulmate, jennifer. - harvey:your wife. - hulk:my wife. yes, my wife. and this is a letter she wrote me. - harvey:when was it written? - hulk:oh, my gosh. well, this letter was written 12-14-15. i've known jennifer almost ten years now. so, um, this on our fifth anniversary and here's has a really cool passage in here. "you are my best friend. i am very proud of you for how you've handled the different challenges that have come up. now i feel it's time for you to be rewarded for staying in faith, time for you to help people even more. i love you so much each day. i'm totally grateful for being blessed with such a wonderful husband. love you for life after life after life, bird." - can i take you way back? - sure. so, jennifer is not your first wife. you were married actually once before to linda. what attracted you to linda? i just filmed the "rocky" movie and i was hanging out with one of my buddies that went

to high school with me here in florida. i just saw linda, was attracted to her. you know, she was a beautiful-looking lady and she was just alive with energy, you know. harvey: was she attracted to terry or hulk? i don't know the answer to that. i just think that as the pressure mounted and we got older and the kids get older, we just grew apart. was it coincidental that the marriage crumbled around the same time as the reality show? you know, i don't think you can put those two together like that. - what's up? - i can't live like this, terry! every day, it's drama. it's just ridiculous. in case you can't tell, i've had it, okay? i'm spent. - i got it, i got it. - i don't want to make it work anymore. - i'm like over it! - well, i'm done with it. i knew that one of the problems in our marriage was linda, she said, "well, i've helped you all these years

and you know, i didn't have a career." and i looked at the reality show as a calculated risk because my marriage was already starting to implode and things weren't good at all and i thought that maybe if we did a reality show, everybody would get busy, have a huge net worth, feel great about themselves. "oh, man, isn't that great? get a good show..." and it would just make things just channel in a different direction. that didn't happen. no, it didn't. it didn't. harvey: you know, when people get divorced a lot of times, you split things 50/50 down the middle, - hulk:yeah. - harvey:and you move on. i read that you gave way more than 50. that was a big deal. hulk: it was a huge deal. my understanding was it was about 70% you gave up. ( clears throat ) there was a low point in all of this where you literally had a gun in your mouth. how did you get out of that? well, i got to a point where everything kind of hit me at the same time: the divorce, my whole world falling apart, both of the kids were with linda. and that's how i ended up playing with a gun. so, how'd you get out of that?

i made friends with laila ali and during the day i had several phone calls and i picked it up and said, "hey, i'm just checking on you, i wanna make sure everything's cool. you know, we haven't talked," because we were doing "american gladiators" together. - harvey:right. - i said, "everything's fine, everything's good." i'm crying, you know, sitting in the bathroom. did she have a sense? she knew something was wrong with me. so she literally calls you when you're holding this gun. - yes. - wow. and just her saying hello to me and saying, "hey, we're just checking. i wanna make sure everything's okay," that pretty much woke me up. in that moment, i said, "you know what? there are a lot of good people out there." so, laila ali in some ways saved your life. i really believe that, that if she hadn't called just to say hello, you know... it might have changed. have you told her that? i can't remember if we've talked or not. so let's talk about jennifer. tell me how she changed your life. hulk: oh, my gosh. she just, um--

we just kind of hit it off, and to be around somebody that was enlightened and real spiritual, which i didn't even understand. every single day now is a good day for me. i don't have good and bad days. i've got good days and i've got better days. what went through your mind when you first heard there was a sex tape out? i mean, you used the n-word in this sex tape. that was the nuclear bomb, right? yeah, it was. if this tape wasn't leaked, and suppose there was no gawker trial, you think you'd be using that word today, when you got angry?

so tell me what this is. dying to see. well, this is the legal pad that i had in court with me during the gawker trial,

and what i did all day long was write. i just wrote all day long. were you following the trial with this? no, i wasn't following the trial. these are just, like, affirmations, you know? "i am only victory." "perfect health." - in the middle of the trial? - "god fights and wins all battles." "still and stay centered." if you read all the stuff, i was praying the whole time. this is all "god, god, god, god, god." yeah, i mean... when i would go in there, i would walk in-- i would walk in with light, with this high vibration. i'd write-- you know, i'd pray for these very talented lawyers of gawker to see the error of their ways and become great lawyers and help people. why did you sue in the first place? i sued basically because i never wanted anything like this to happen to anybody else. when they first put the tape up we were very kind and asked them to take it down. when they said no, i said, "okay, that's it." the allegations in that lawsuit state that approximately six years ago, the clems secretly videotaped mr. hogan having private, consensual, intimate relations

in a private bedroom. in the beginning of the trial, my attorney david houston got an email from a lady whose husband had just committed suicide. a person he was having an affair with sent him a tape and he took his own life. i said, "i know that feeling. i understand that train of thought," and i never wanted anybody to go through anything like i went through, and at the end of the day, you know, the first amendment needed to be protected, our privacy rights. it put a very... bad part of your life on public display. and that must've been an issue for you before you decided to sue. hulk: it was, but this, um... was much bigger than me or much bigger than my career. this was something that, you know, i've said it before and i'm not joking around. you know, as a wrestler, that was a great part of my life, but now that i understand why i'm here, wrestling was just set-up. it was just a set-up, a stepping stone for who i am

and what i'm meant to do and be. no matter what happened to my career, this was so much bigger. what went through your mind when you first heard there was a sex tape out? i mean, you used the n-word in this sex tape. in referring to brooke's boyfriend at the time. what goes through your head to say, "i will still fight even if that comes out," because that was the nuclear bomb, right? yeah, it was. when i knew that was coming out, all the lawyers said, "if you want to stop, you can stop. you don't have to go forward. there's a huge amount of money being offered. this will never see the light of day." i went, "i can't do that." - why? - 'cause i'm not that guy. i have to be able to look at myself in the mirror every day. i have to be accountable. i have to be able to live with myself. and what's so cool about it is it did really wake me up. it really slapped me and woke me up, and it made me realize how powerful words are. for the people that know me and love me,

they know who i am, you know, they know i'm not a racist, but i understand that people that didn't know me judge me, just from those words. that's all they had. if this tape wasn't leaked, and suppose there was no gawker trial, do you think you'd be using that word today when you got angry? - no. - why? no, i've tried to clean up my whole life, you know? i've made a whole switch, almost a shift, from being negative, or fighting, scratching, and clawing, 'cause i work hard and i move forward. i'm in check with myself, so all this stuff comes back around. you have to be what you say you are. how do you think the black community views you right now? what's so crazy is the black community has never backed away from me. as far as, you know, the black community and using the word, that's not part of who i am now. that's not part of my language because i understand how powerful words are. you know, growing up in south tampa, where we came from, it was a situation where, when you played baseball and basketball

and ran around in south tampa it was just common knowledge 45, 50 years ago, but it's not that way anymore. harvey: you heard you were gonna get $140 million. - hulk:yes, but-- - harvey:what went through your head? hulk: i just broke down. they said $143 million, i was like, "what?" it just blew me away. i just didn't expect it. it just was overwhelming. harvey: you eventually settled for $31 million. are you set for life? i was set for life before i had that money. i'm happy, brother. things are good. .. that the wwe broke ties with you. - yes. - did you expect that was gonna happen? ( clears throat ) no, i didn't. i-- when i heard this was going to happen, i called them on a thursday or friday, and i said, "there's a chance that this verbiage may come out." as i hung up the phone that night, they fired me at 5:00 in the morning. and it really caught me off guard.

i didn't expect it. because the wwe knows who i am. i'm not that person. that's not who i am and not what i do. so why do you think they did it? i think they did what was best for business. they were worried about losing sponsors and network support. i expected something different. is that the most painful thing in terms of the fallout? it was tough. it was tough, you know. it hit me hard. you know, there's-- i've been through a lot of highs and lows, when you look at a 40-year career. just... gone. now that time has passed, do you think they'll ever ask you to come back? i'm not sure, you know. would you come back if they asked? i don't know. i want to get into a tough subject, the car accident. nick was in a car, and he had a passenger in the car, who was john graziano, former marine.

who, um, to this day is in a vegetative state after the car crashed. .. do you at all partly blame yourself? with expedia, you can book a flight, then add a hotel, and save. ♪ everything you need to go. expedia with advil's fast relief, you'll ask, "what pulled muscle?" "what headache?" nothing works faster to make pain a distant memory. advil liqui-gels and advil liqui-gels minis. what pain?

i have my good luck rock right here. so tell me about the rock. well, this is a rock that i got in high school. - you kept it? - yeah, i kept it, ever since 12th grade. me and a buddy of mine had a big cooler of beer and we're standing up drinking beers, and we picked this thing up and went, "oh, this looks like the cro-magnon man." you know, we had a little beer buzz on. it looks like a skull, and we went, "that's a good luck rock." and i gave it to my buddy to keep, and we argued about it, and i said, "no, you keep it ." so he had it for a while, and got married and had kids, and went through a bunch of drama and things turned out okay, and he gave it back to me. he goes, "you take the rock now." and i kept it for several years, and then when i went through the divorce, the kids were kind of torn, and i told my son nick, i said, "nick, i've got the same power as your mom, 50/50. so if you want to stay here with me in florida, you can stay here, or if you want to go with your mom you can go with her." he goes, "you know, dad, i really want to take care of mom." i said, "well, here's my good luck rock. take it with you and, you know, just take care of business." so nick took off to california and a few years later when everybody got settled in and everything's okay,

he gave me the rock back. so this is my good luck rock. let's talk about your kids, actually. what about the reality show? were they positively affected, negatively affected, not affected? hulk: you know, i think it took them out of the rhythm of that normal friendship with their friends, the camaraderie and going to school and being on a schedule. home schooling and you gotta film every day and you gotta have a mic on you at 8:00 in the morning and it doesn't come off till midnight sometimes. i think it was too fast, too much. it's probably a little bit our fault because they've been getting away with murder and we've just been letting it go. a lot of this is our fault. i want to get into a tough subject, the car accident. police investigating a horrific car accident in clearwater, florida involving pro wrestler hulk hogan's son. 17-year-old nick hogan released from the hospital today after the car he was driving hit a raised median, flipped around, smashed into a palm tree. police say hogan was driving at a high rate of speed before the crash and both he and a passenger had to be air-lifted to a nearby hospital.

the passenger in the car was john graziano, former marine, who, to this day, is in a vegetative state after the car crashed. do you, at all, partly blame yourself? there was a time when i did, you know? i've learned to forgive myself, nick, everybody, part of the race team, everybody that lived in my house, everybody that was there and wasn't there. everybody that pointed the finger and blamed, you know. it was a very tough situation, all the specifics, the no seat belt, the rain, all of it added up to just a very bad, tragic situation. you know, i just had to forgive everybody, even myself. john graziano's dad did not. august 26, 2007. everything changed because of the senseless, reckless acts of nick bollea. what al-qaeda could not do to my son, nick bollea did in a matter of minutes. i can only imagine the things john could have accomplished

with the rest of his life. thank you. harvey: it doesn't sound like he forgave. hulk: well, like i said, i've forgiven everybody, you know, even mr. graziano. one of the reasons john was living with me was because there were several attempts, physically, to hurt him on his life when he was at home. so... i understand, you know, the venom and the negativity and i just had to you know, release it, and just forgive everyone. harvey: nick was in jail for this. hulk: no one has ever been put in an adult prison, or even gone to jail for the situation nick was in. reckless driving with serious bodily harm, everybody in florida gets probation except for nick. you think it was because of your celebrity? hulk: i don't know what-- i have my opinions, but i don't know the answer. harvey: would i be wrong if i said that that spotlight got put on him 'cause of you? yes, you would be spot-on right. not wrong, you'd be right. i do want to talk about the jailhouse tapes. you guys had talked about doing another reality show,

making some money off of that. the point of it was, if you were in my shoes, and your 16-year-old son went to jail and they put him in an adult prison. they put you in the shu, which is a very small, small cell, when you're by yourself, isolated, and when you get a panicked phone call from your son, "oh, my gosh, dad, i can't see out, i can't-- i don't know where i'm at, duh duh duh duh duh, and you get calls from duane "the dog" chapman. that "you've gotta get him out of there. after four or five days he'll start chewing on his own tongue." sometimes, you know, they'll eat worse things, you know, their own feces if they don't get out of there. and what i did on the phone was read to him, you know, "the secret," "the power of now," eckhart tolle stuff, or the bible to him. i did everything i could including talking about a reality show and we'll get back in front of the camera and we'll turn this into a positive.

i did everything i could to keep my son from mentally defecting and losing him mentally. how's he doing now? he's doing great. he's on track. he got a degree in mixing and mastering, so he does a lot of deejaying stuff, and he's selling different car parts and you know, he sells used cars and stuff. harvey: what about brooke? she went to nashville, she wrote songs. she works it, doesn't she? hulk: yeah, brooke's been beating it up. i'm telling you, she's been on the path for quite a long time. four years in nashville as a songwriter. now she's back in la still doing music and doing the entertainment stuff. she hosted a new show called "fashion hero" that got picked up overseas in a lot of different countries. she's out beating those streets, trying to find the bridge. what's your wish for your kids? hulk: greatness, happiness, consciousness. more than anything, just being aware that life is good, that people are good. just always be happy and positive, you know. you said something a couple of years ago and made me wonder maybe the next thing could be politics.

you said, "i'm ready to be trump's running mate."

you know, maniacs, in seven days and seven nights god created the heavens and the earth. and on the eighth day he created a set of 24" pythons. and then, on the ninth day, i created hogan's beach shop, brother. ( cheers, applause )

this is the ribbon from the grand opening. when we opened hogan's beach shop orlando, we had a crazy crowd out front, with tons of hulkamaniacs, red and yellow, you could see it for miles. and this was the ribbon that we cut for the grand opening. did you ever wonder, especially around the time you stepped away from wrestling, is that gonna continue, 'cause there are a lot of people that get forgotten when they retire. i was wondering. you know, i was wondering, but, you know, i've been around so long, and the public knows me so well, i kind of, like, etched my way in, you know. some people sometimes call me the babe ruth of wrestling. so it's really cool to have people say those things about you, you know. you miss wrestling? tremendously. how so? what do you miss about it? oh, my gosh. um... anybody that's ever had a good workout-- you know, once you get done working out, you've had that good sweat. oh, my gosh, it makes my day. sometimes when you wake up in the morning you don't feel good. "oh, i don't feel like working out." but after you train, you go, "yeah, all right, i'm ready."

it's that times ten. do you enjoy it more now when people come up and they-- 'cause i saw this outside your shop, where you walked in and everybody kind of swarmed. whatcha gonna do when hogan's beach shop runs wild on you? ( all yelling ) harvey: is that kind of that thrill, "they haven't forgotten me," and it may not be 20, 000 people. but sometimes 15 can do the trick. hulk: yeah, it really is just like-- it's an affirmation. it makes me feel that everything i did actually meant something to all the fans. you said something a couple of years ago and made me wonder maybe the next thing could be politics. you said, "i'm ready to be trump's running mate." first of all, why'd you say it? well, because i was probably crazy at the time. it wasn't about how good you were for the job,

it was almost like how popular you were. and i thought i had a legitimate chance, back in the day, you know, of running. but when you said that about trump... like i said, i was out of my mind. would you ever think about running in clearwater or in orlando or somewhere around here? you're extremely popular, well-known. interesting to you? well, i've thought about it, you know, about clearwater, mayor of clearwater, governor of florida, you know. i've thought about it, but it's just been a thought. your life, your career, has kind of been defined by huge, incredible highs, and a lot of lows. why did people stick with you through the highs, the lows, through all these decades? because everybody has scars on 'em, you know. a kid, young boy or young girl,

high school, college kid, older adult, came from a family that was divorced, scar. parents were alcoholics, scar. boyfriend broke up with me, scar. dui, scar. someone bullied you, scar. there are so many people out there just like me that have scars... things you said that you shouldn't. right, exactly. scar. they look at me-- i didn't call myself a hero. i didn't call myself a role model. my fans did. and i think i'm tangible, they relate to me because i've got so many scars on me, you know, and i'm still standing. like stallone said, it's not about how hard you get hit. it's about getting hit, getting back up and moving forward. what's the one thing you want to do before you kind of go into the sunset? the one thing i want to do before i go into the sunset. wow. ( laughs ) i'm tapping out. cut.

that's a good one. - i made hulk hogan tap out. - you got me. - that's the end. thank you. - you got me. i love that. - thank you so much. - life is so good, brother. i couldn't even answer that question, life is so good. >> sanctions, the latest round of sanctions called an act of war. >> giving away her first-class seat to democratic congresswoman sheila jackson lee, she spotted lee in that seat. >> we see the best of america and the souls keep up. >> we remove the bond of love and goodwill between citizens. ♪