RIP Guy Hauray

[El-P]

Wow. Just learned listening to Meltzer that Guy Hauray died at 77. For us French fans from the 80's and (as far as I go) 90's, he was basically the equivalent of Gorilla Mansoon/Jesse Ventura (the later when he turned heel in the later years). Great talker with a smooth as silk elocution (and great vocabulary too). My favourite memories came with his heel turn, he was just godlike at it, Ventura/Heenan level of greatness to me. To this day with my father we still refer to the routine he did during Royal Rumble 93 when he asked about a hundred times about Bob Backlund "What's his name already ? How old is he ? I can't see him...", to the exasperation of Ray Rougeau (and of course he only managed to identify Backlund at the very end when he was getting squashed by Yoko and got into a maniacal laugh while Rougeau was totally appalled, just classic stuff). Although I also was a fan of Carpentier, it was Hauray who was really was the glue to me and it was never the same when he left after WM X. Hauray pretty much turned me into a pro-wrestling fan, as the announcing was what made you a fan then (come on, squash matches with the Bushwhackers and Brutus Beefcakes, you know the announcing was 90% of the job).

[SirEdger]

Guy Hauray played a bigger role in pro wrestling in Quebec that most people would imagine.

Hauray first started as coach & consultant for numerous artists like Cyndi Lauper and Michael Douglas and he met Édouard Carpentier, who would become his long-time associate in 1977 in a movie festival for French actor Alain Delon. In the meantime, Gino Brito wanted to relaunch pro wrestling in Quebec following the passing of his father Jack Britton but couldn't get access to the Montreal Forum because he didn't have a TV contract. Brito then went to New York to see if someone would be interested in investing in the promotion and Vince McMahon Sr suggested him to talk to Frank Valois. Eventually, they convinced Andre the Giant to invest in the territory to create Promotions Varoussac, who would be the controlling entity to what would become Lutte Internationale. Brito & Valois would then bring Guy Hauray and Hauray was responsible to go to TV stations to pitch the idea of bringing Quebec wrestling back to TV. The first TV station that Hauray would convince would be Télé 7, who carried Lutte Grand Prix in the 70s. Gino Brito would even use ABC-22 in Burlington to invite fans to tune in for Lutte Internationale on December 7, 1980 for the next week. Guy Hauray would then join Édouard Carpentier on commentary.

Hauray would be in that role for Lutte Internationale from 1980 to 1984 when CFCF-12 also wanted in and problems ensued between Lutte and Hauray with concerns of having too many hours of the same product in the same market (imagine saying that today!). Eventually, Lutte wanted to buy the TV rights from Guy Hauray but Hauray wasn't satisfied with what he had and threatened to leave for the WWF, not realizing that Hauray had total control over wrestling on Quebec TV. Lutte thought he was bluffing but they went horribly wrong as in December 1984, Lutte Internationale was replaced on Sunday morning by WWF Superstars of Wrestling; Guy Hauray had been in talks with WWF since 2 months prior to sell them the TV rights in Quebec.

Hauray would become Vince McMahon's go-to man when it came to French TV and appointed him as EVP of European business since Hauray's company, Poly Spec Tele Video, had all the rights to WWF TV and would export the product worldwide. Many might have heard the rumors of WWF trying to book a WWF Championship match between Hulk Hogan and Dino Bravo at the Olympic Stadium in 1989. Turns out that Vince had mandated Guy Hauray to see if that was a feasible project but in Guy Hauray's words, it would've been a logistical nightmare because it would've been impossible to place giant screens in appropriate areas for all fans to see everything. However, it was very much something that Vince was thinking about. Over the years, Guy Hauray would also work with Marc Blondin and Raymond Rougeau (following Édouard Carpentier's 1 year suspension for comments he had made) and would do so until 1994 when he decided to retire and leave the company because he didn't want to move to Stamford to record commentary for the weekly TV shows like Vince wanted him to.

Another interesting thing; Guy Hauray would then move on and would be working for Ted Turner as his personal coach. In fact, Ted Turner even asked him to create a French TV pilot for WCW but Hauray refused, knowing what it meant to be in competition with Vince McMahon and did the same for a local promotion in France who wanted to launch a promotion on Canal +. Hauray would eventually create "neurocoaching" and would spend the rest of his professional career working in that field (Hauray had a Bachelors degree in cognitive psychology and a Masters degree in social anthropology from UC-Irvine and UC-Berkeley) and huge conglomerates like CNN would use his training methods. Even if he didn't talk a whole lot about pro wrestling in recent years, he was always proud of what he had done with Édouard Carpentier and the business in general.

For me, Guy Hauray was a big part of my childhood with Édouard Carpentier. They were not Gorilla Monsoon & Bobby Heenan in terms of dynamic but their significance for French speaking wrestling fans is as huge.

[El-P]

8 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

Hauray would eventually create "neurocoaching" and would spend the rest of his professional career working in that field (Hauray had a Bachelors degree in cognitive psychology and a Masters degree in social anthropology from UC-Irvine and UC-Berkeley) and huge conglomerates like CNN would use his training methods.

That part that is all over his Wiki, I always kinda suspected bullshit. I mean, the "neuro-coaching" stuff is totally in the realm of fake science that is all over "coaching methods" and whatnot. Wasn't there an instance of Carpentier saying Hauray turned into some sort of "guru" (as in coaching guru rather than cult guru, but still bullshit though) after their relationship fell apart (for a reason that never was clear to me) ? I kinda remember that from some board a long time ago. 

[SirEdger]

Hauray and Carpentier did have a falling out over the years but they reunited in 2008 and they patched things up (Carpentier died in 2010 I believe so it was the last time they saw each other). I'm not really familiar with the neurocoaching stuff as I learned about this while reading the article that Pat Laprade wrote about Hauray's passing. I also believe that he had a falling out with his son but that I can't 100% confirm.

[El-P]

I got aware of this stuff years ago when someone (but maybe it was even on the old Smarkchoice board, to say how long it is) mentioned meeting Carpentier and how he told him that Hauray had turned into a sort of "guru". So I checked back then and found the infamous "neuro-coaching" site, which really reeks of stuff like Neuro-linguistic Programming, which is basically complete bullshit.

Doesn't surprise me that much, really, Hauray always had that super convincing tone and deep, charming voice when he wanted too, he probably was one hell of a salesman and public speaker as showed by his talent on selling me fucking Boris Zhukov vs Nikolai Volkoff as some kind of super hot feud when I was 14 !

Anyway, he was truly one of the greats, for sure.

[SirEdger]

There was a gap of time between 1991 and 1993 where I could only access wrestling by videotapes since we didn't get cable TV in my household until 1993 (WWF disappeared from basic TV in 1991) so I was stunned to hear Guy Hauray in a Bobby Heenan type role on commentary and being absolutely offended by Doink the Clown coming to the ring with a cigar in his mouth (apparently Guy couldn't stand the smell of cigars) and I wish I could've witnessed heel Guy a bit longer because Jean Brassard took over in his position shortly thereafter in 1994. Although Jean Brassard gave me fantastic memories lol

[El-P]

I want to say he turned heel in like the Fall of 91... I think. He was so damn funny in this role, and Carpentier acted so annoyed. "Tu rêves en couleur Carpentier !"

18 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

I wish I could've witnessed heel Guy a bit longer because Jean Brassard took over in his position shortly thereafter in 1994. 

No shit. I never could stand Brassard, really. Hauray leaving in 94 almost made me quit watching, it was really hard at first to get used to Brassard's annoyance. I can't believe they got Rougeau & Brassard back in the 2010's ! (well, it's absolutely fitting with their demos and obsession with the past though).

Also, Christophe Agius must be quite sad, because he's absolutely the spiritual son of Guy Hauray as a heel announcer. 

[SirEdger]

It was weird getting used to Jean Brassard but I grew very fond of his color commentary ("Espèce de saltimbanque à moteur!") and his PPV Control Center reports always cracked me up. Saw Jean Brassard pop up in numerous TV shows lately like L&O SVU and MacGyver recently.

[sek69]

So did they have he same announcers for France and Quebec? I always hear from folks in both places that while each place speaks French on a technical level it's actually kinda different. 

[El-P]

11 minutes ago, sek69 said:

So did they have he same announcers for France and Quebec? I always hear from folks in both places that while each place speaks French on a technical level it's actually kinda different. 

Hauray and Carpentier were French (well, Carpentier was born in Poland I believe) but they lived in Montreal, so as long as they were in charge, I don't think there were much differences (apart from promos for house shows in Quebec). I'm not too sure how it worked in the 00's and on, as French announcers Agius/Chereau work for a French TV channel and I think Rougeau/Brassard (whom we got in France after Hauray left) got put back on for the Quebec version in the 2010's. I have no idea if Agius and Chereau were the announcers for Quebec TV during the 00's and 10's.

But yeah, we all speak French but there are big time differences. The other day I was watching a Quebec movie (from Monia Chokri) and some parts were subtitled, and thank god because when quebecers speak slang, I get about half the words at best. 

[sek69]

Makes sense. I know sometimes I'll watch a movie and there will be a Brit or Aussie character speaking slang and I have no clue what's going on. 

[NintendoLogic]

It's like back when Oasis was a thing and MTV felt the need to provide subtitles for Gallagher brothers interviews.

[SirEdger]

45 minutes ago, El-P said:

Hauray and Carpentier were French (well, Carpentier was born in Poland I believe) but they lived in Montreal, so as long as they were in charge, I don't think there were much differences (apart from promos for house shows in Quebec). I'm not too sure how it worked in the 00's and on, as French announcers Agius/Chereau work for a French TV channel and I think Rougeau/Brassard (whom we got in France after Hauray left) got put back on for the Quebec version in the 2010's. I have no idea if Agius and Chereau were the announcers for Quebec TV during the 00's and 10's.

But yeah, we all speak French but there are big time differences. The other day I was watching a Quebec movie (from Monia Chokri) and some parts were subtitled, and thank god because when quebecers speak slang, I get about half the words at best. 

Actually, they stopped airing WWF programming in French in Quebec I would say, at the fall of 1998. I don't even know if Raymond Rougeau & Jean Brassard kept doing the PPV commentary afterwards. But we never had Agius & Chereau here. WCW did eventually air in French with Marc Blondin and Michel Letourneur from the mid-90s to 2000 (I remember they that they were airing WCW PPVs scaled in several weeks at the very end instead of Nitro) - Blondin had been doing WCW on Quebec TV for years - all the way back to 1992-1993 with Richard Charland as the color commentator. Blondin eventually did commentary for TNA and Impact Wrestling with Sylvain Grenier and PCO later until 2014 or 2015 maybe.

[El-P]

20 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

Actually, they stopped airing WWF programming in French in Quebec I would say, at the fall of 1998. I don't even know if Raymond Rougeau & Jean Brassard kept doing the PPV commentary afterwards.

That's kinda crazy when you think they kept the French market during the 90's when business was down. They lost Canal + when Bischoff got it for Nitro in late 96, wo then we got WCW with... gasp... Blondin & Letourneur which from memory were godawful. But by 97 I had switched to satellites and English channel so I got both WWF and WCW in English (which basically helped me a whole lot with my English as I spent countless hours listening) and ECW (at first in German !). I know that in the early 00's Rougeau was announcing the PPV's with another guy whose name I don't remember.

20 minutes ago, SirEdger said:

But we never had Agius & Chereau here.

Too bad. They are clearly very differents from the guys from the previous generation, Chereau being a legit sport broadcaster (he was still doing other sports while doing WWE) and Agius basically a superfan, but damn they got *great* judging from the PPV's I was watching in the mid 10's (just for the live threads here, really). For the generation raised on John Cena, they are the voice of pro-wrestling in France. WWE really fucked its audience when they stopped doing the PPV on TV two years ago. Agius constantly refers to Carpentier & Hauray's catchphrases and idiosyncrasies.

[C.S.]

What a fantastic fucking thread. I never would've fathomed that kids on the other side of the world weren't listening to Gorilla, Heenan, etc. and actually had their own commentators instead.

6 hours ago, SirEdger said:

the article that Pat Laprade wrote about Hauray's passing

Do you have a link to this?

(Well, if it's written in French, that won't really be of much use to me.)

 

[SirEdger]

Yeah, unfortunately for you, it's in French. I basically summed up the gist of it in the description I did in my first post in this thread (I left out most of the neuro-coaching part because that wasn't that important to the topic)

[El-P]

There used to be some old video of Hauray as a heel being ridiculous during the shows introduction, but apparently this was taken down. Someone uploaded him and Carpentier in 1991 (in front of a green screen, there were not at the Trocadero !) a few months/weeks before the heel turn, so he was straight as an arrow there. Like the guy says in the description, they really were like two lovable older uncles, very "vieille France" by the standards of time, Carpentier often talking about French wrestlers from the 50's and 60's (basically some you can read about in @ohtani's jacket thread). Carpentier was also bullshitting a lot like any old carny would.  I probably still use some "Hauray-ism" in my everyday life without thinking about it (fuck, I know I learned the word "intrinsèque", which is fairly high level vocabulary, listening to Hauray during a Haku squash !!!)

 

[Robert S]

21 hours ago, El-P said:

That's kinda crazy when you think they kept the French market during the 90's when business was down. They lost Canal + when Bischoff got it for Nitro in late 96, wo then we got WCW with... gasp... Blondin & Letourneur which from memory were godawful. But by 97 I had switched to satellites and English channel so I got both WWF and WCW in English (which basically helped me a whole lot with my English as I spent countless hours listening) and ECW (at first in German !). I know that in the early 00's Rougeau was announcing the PPV's with another guy whose name I don't remember.

It's kinda similar in the German speaking market. There was a WWF boom from 92 to let's say 96, especially in 94 and 95. In 94 alone, they ran 46 shows in Germany, Switzerland and Austria doing very good business. When domestic business picked up again, they seemingly did not even care when they lost TV in early 98. When they got back on TV by the end of that year, it was on a fringe station in a death-slot (though that was not solely WWF's fault; the station that they were on from 93 to summer of 95 tried to move programming from 10 pm to Sunday afternoon as they were doing such good ratings especially with kids and teenagers, that station almost got its license removed for that so most later TV station were very careful about when to air wrestling, even though 9 pm would have been perfectly fine according to all rules). It took them forever to get back to a level, where running shows became profitable again.

Regarding ECW in German: do you remember the TV station? The only ECW on German free-TV that I remember was as part of a 1 h show (on DSF), that was usually 1/4 h new WCW, 1/4 h old WCW, 1/4 h ECW and 1/4 h SMW or something similar (I think they even had a AAA match or two there). That would have been ca. in 98 and 99. Initially, that show included some WWF as well, which apparently was the reason for WWF cancelling their contract with DSF (for two years, from early 96 to early 98, WCW and WWF were on the same free TV station, as insane as that sounds considering that was the time of the Monday Night Wars).

[El-P]

17 minutes ago, Robert S said:

 Regarding ECW in German: do you remember the TV station? The only ECW on German free-TV that I remember was as part of a 1 h show (on DSF), that was usually 1/4 h new WCW, 1/4 h old WCW, 1/4 h ECW and 1/4 h SMW or something similar (I think they even had a AAA match or two there). That would have been ca. in 98 and 99. Initially, that show included some WWF as well, which apparently was the reason for WWF cancelling their contract with DSF (for two years, from early 96 to early 98, WCW and WWF were on the same free TV station, as insane as that sounds considering that was the time of the Monday Night Wars).

Hum... now that you mention it, maybe I'm just mixing things up as I do remember watching some WCW in German on DSF indeed, including I do believe some German house show (I think ? Or was it a WWF show ?). I remember watching ECW on an English speaking channel called Bravo. Not sure if I ever did in German now that I think of it. I think I watched WCW Souled Out 97 in German !

[Robert S]

1 hour ago, El-P said:

Hum... now that you mention it, maybe I'm just mixing things up as I do remember watching some WCW in German on DSF indeed, including I do believe some German house show (I think ? Or was it a WWF show ?). I remember watching ECW on an English speaking channel called Bravo. Not sure if I ever did in German now that I think of it. I think I watched WCW Souled Out 97 in German !

DSF showed the 97 WWF Raw, Shotgun and Superstars tapings from Berlin (with the Bulldog vs. Owen Hart European Championship tournament final) as a single show (I think before any of it even aired in the US). In the same year, there was a WCW house show that first aired on a pay-TV platform related to DSF (I think to kick-off that channel) and I guess with some delay also on DSF itself (maybe on New Year's Eve, where they usually aired PPV's for 6 hours straight starting at midnight). I think 97 was also the year where DSF stopped showing WCW PPVs (and moving them to the pay-TV platform), though Souled Out definitely still was on free TV.

[SirEdger]

You guys in Europe were so lucky to get the PPVs on free TV while I had to go with the scrambled feeds in hopes that I could get decent quality. (Although I did have perfect quality for Badd Blood 1997 (in black and white) and for some reason, I was able to watch ECW Guilty as Charged 2000 literally for free)

[El-P]

Canal + was not a free channel though, so although we did not have to pay for the PPV's itself it was still not free of charge either. We did not get the IYH PPV's either, and I think when they switched to WCW they only showed 5 or 6 a year too (might be wrong on that).

We did get some Saturday Night's Main Event I remember. Also, I started to watch around the fall of 1990 and the first PPV that was showed was Survivor Series 91 (which I missed because we were on the road to my grandparents place and I only saw the last match !). Maybe some had been showed before, not sure about that. First PPV I saw was Royal Rumble 92 (lucky me !).

[ohtani's jacket]

How delayed were the PPVs? We had PPVs on free-to-air TV in New Zealand, but they were months behind. 

[El-P]

26 minutes ago, ohtani's jacket said:

How delayed were the PPVs? We had PPVs on free-to-air TV in New Zealand, but they were months behind. 

At first I remember it was a good two months behind. It might have gotten a bit better after a while. Usually the Royal Rumble was around the Winter vacations (which was great) which basically happen the soonest in mid-February. In the mid 90's maybe it was only a month or so behind, Mania was usually in early May or something.

[SPS]

On 1/17/2021 at 2:24 PM, SirEdger said:

Over the years, Guy Hauray would also work with Marc Blondin and Raymond Rougeau (following Édouard Carpentier's 1 year suspension for comments he had made) and would do so until 1994 when he decided to retire and leave the company because he didn't want to move to Stamford to record commentary for the weekly TV shows like Vince wanted him to.

What did Carpentier say to get suspended?