AEW's Tony Schiavone Looks Back On WWE Hall Of Famer Kevin Nash's Oz Character

Gimmick-wise, WWE Hall of Famer Kevin Nash was stuck with a few abysmal ones before finding his footing as one of the most popular stars of the late '90s. Even if fans have never seen the character perform, most are at least aware of his portrayal of Oz, a bizarre green-cloaked figure who lumbered to the ring in a latex grandpa mask before taking it off and wrestling as himself. 

It was a head-scratcher for certain, but recently on "What Happened When," Tony Schiavone revealed some further insight as to why the character might have been created.

"I'd heard, 'We've got this movie. We've got this iconic movie that everyone knows,'" Schiavone recalled. "And everyone knew of 'The Wizard of Oz,' right? Who didn't know of 'The Wizard of Oz?' 'Why don't we take it and use it to our advantage, and use it to cross-promote?' That's what I had heard."

Ted Turner owned the rights to the Metro-Goldwyn Mayer (MGM) film catalog, which included "The Wizard of Oz." However, it was another three years before he launched the Turner Classic Movies cable channel in April of 1994, three years after the Oz character had already been dropped. Nash, on the other hand, joked in VICE TV's docuseries "Who Killed WCW?" that the Oz gimmick was conjured up simply because Dusty Rhodes "took acid."

Schiavone was asked if he was surprised that Nash reached the heights he did when looking back on Oz. "It doesn't surprise me," Schiavone said. "I don't think I thought that Kevin Nash would become this big iconic star that he became, but I always thought that Kevin Nash would become a bigger star than he was [as Oz]."