WWE Shut Down Meeting Between Bray Wyatt And Charles Manson

WWE have courted controversy during the company's long history, from wanting OJ Simpson to work a WrestleMania match shortly after his murder trial, to booking Sgt. Slaughter as an Iraqi sympathiser during and immediately following the Gulf War.

One meeting that WWE wouldn't approve, though, according to former WWE writer Nick Manfredini, was Bray Wyatt meeting Charles Manson while the cult leader was in prison.

Manfredini, who worked closely with Bray Wyatt on developing his character, revealed on Wrestling with Freddie that a former teammate of Windham Rotunda's worked at the prison where Manson was incarcerated.

"So, he was very Charles Manson-inspired, right? My YouTube search history back then was just Charles Manson and cult leader for anybody who looked it up. So I've probably seen every Charles Manson quote, every video, every promo that he ever cut. We were trying to take little pieces from each one, and that was the style we wanted to go for," Manfredini said.

"To get off topic, Charles Manson - I don’t know if this story has ever been told - Windham’s teammate, former teammate in college football, became a prison guard at Charles Manson's prison. Allegedly, this guy showed Manson the Bray Wyatt promos, and he wanted to meet him, and this was a whole thing. I swear. It is 100 per cent true, and so, Mike Rotunda knew about it, and I think he brought it up to somebody. I don't know if it was Hunter or Vince or someone and they immediately squashed it. Obviously, that's terrible," he continued.

"Because they were like, 'Can we shoot a Network special with Charles Manson?' It was immediately squashed, and then afterwards, I was like, 'Let's just go. Next time we're in Northern California, me and you, let's just put on a hat or something. Nobody will know it's you. Let's just go meet him.' I thought more about it and obviously it was a terrible, terrible idea. Would have been a good story but, a bad idea... It was like, wait a minute, this would be so fun - weird to do. But, obviously, Bray Wyatt probably would have never seen TV again if we did that."

Charles Manson was the infamous cult leader of The Manson Family who directed cult members to carry out murders. Manson was convicted of seven counts of first degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in 1971 and spent the remainder of his life in prison until his passing in 2017.

H/T Fightful