A Chat with NBC's 'American Gladiators' Titan and Crush

NBC's "American Gladiators" is a competition in which amateur athletes compete against body builders known as gladiators. The NBC show originally aired on cable television from 1989 to 1997.

The new American Gladiators came back for NBC's All-American summer lineup, beginning this past Monday. Titan

Titan

It has returned to primetime NBC with much higher production costs, a new venue, with new events and special effects. "American Gladiators" still contains some classic events from the original show including The Joust, The Wall, Hang Tough, Assault, Powerball, Gauntlet and The Eliminator.The new events are Rocketball, Vertigo and several others.

The show is hosted by professional wrestler Hulk Hogan and professional boxer Laila Ali. American Gladiators began Monday and there will be 12 additional episodes airing, the last episode is the week of August 4.Monsters and Critics had a chat with Titan and Crush.AM: Our readers love your show and so do I. And I spoke to Phoenix and Toa at the NBC summer preview day and they shared with me on their one day that they get to eat anything, what they ate, and it fascinated me.
I wanted to know what your guilty pleasures were on the one day that you can let loose and eat whatever you want?Michael O'Hearn: Go for it, Gina. I’ll let you take that good one.AM: Be honest.Gina Carano: I think my mom’s fettuccine is probably my guilty pleasure.AM: That’s it? Just a little bowl of fettuccine?Gina Carano: Oh no. If I’m doing a whole day then, you know, I’ll fit in some ice cream, fettuccine. I don’t know, Italian food and sweets. That’s my guilty day.Michael O'Hearn: Well I think they were asking like that one pleasure day because that sounds like your regular diet.Gina Carano: Oh yeah.Michael O'Hearn: I’m being serious. That’s what you’re eating every day.Gina Carano: Whatever.Michael O'Hearn: I’m pretty wild, though. As for me, I’m crazy. I go…Gina Carano: Oh, you’re insane.Michael O'Hearn: I go wild, yeah. I’ll have like six ounces of chicken and a half a cup of rice and some salt with it. That’s my crazy meal.AM: That’s your crazy meal?Michael O'Hearn: That’s wild.AM: Really? Toa has you beat… with like two cans of spam and like four pizzas. And that’s for breakfast. So you don’t go really, really crazy?Michael O'Hearn: I’m so tame it’s scary.AM: There are a couple of new challenges. Can you talk about your favorite challenges that you like to do that you feel you excel at and why?Michael O'Hearn: Wow, new challenges - you know what? I think the Rocketball for me was a blast. It’s a new game. They get launched about 40 feet into the air on some ratchets. And, you know, for me it’s just fun because you’re just getting, you know, thrown around like a kid.And then also, obviously, I like the big hit that you get to put on the person when you get to the top of the pole. So for me, Rocketball is the new game that I love.Gina Carano: Rocketball was fun from the new events. But I like some of the old events. I like Joust, the Earthquake because you get to wrestle and be more physical, and the Tournament because you get to suplex people off the top.How have previous season's winners Evan and Monica transitioned into the fold?Michael O'Hearn: I think they’ve done a great job. I think Monica is going to be one of the top starters out of the girls. I think she’s a tremendous athlete and I think she proved that last year. And then Evan is still just an animal on the Wall.Gina Carano: Yeah, they’re awesome. They look great, too. They really transitioned into their characters really well.Titan (Michael), you’re the only competitor to appear on both the original and the new one. what’s the major difference from the Eighties and Nineties version?Michael O'Hearn: Gees, the - definitely the size of this. We used to film over at the Mary Tyler Moore Studio in Burbank.And it was not a huge auditorium. And now with this new - being at the sport arena, we have so much more room. We move quicker through the games and then just the athletes are, at this stage, you know, more advanced.Gina Carano: And you just like us better, right?Michael O'Hearn: All but you.Gina Carano: Rude.Michael O'Hearn: I love my Gina.Gina Carano: We’re fighting.Why didn’t you keep the name Thor?Michael O'Hearn: You know what? It - that was a studio call.
So that was their call and also, I didn’t have long hair this time around. I got rid of that, you know, that long, blonde hair so they go, oh, we’ll call him something different.What do Hulk Hogan and Laila Ali bring to the show?Michael O'Hearn: You know, I think they’re both bigger and like personalities. I mean, Laila Ali is the daughter of Mohammed - incredible to have someone there and she’s a real fighter. She’s 100% a real badass.And she’s just a sweetheart. So I think having those people that were in the sports industry now being hosts is a tremendous benefit to us relative to somebody that was just a host before coming in.These are people that have actually been in the arena, been doing it, know what it’s like to fight and get out there and mix it up. And then Hulk Hogan is just an icon.Gina Carano: Yeah, people just love Hulk and the character that he brings. And then - and Laila is - she just cracks me up. I just love watching her and her little comments and all. She’s really quick-witted and I think they both do an awesome job.Gina (Crush) what else do you do?Gina Carano: I’m a professional fighter, mixed martial arts and I’m actually going to fight May 31. I committed to my fight career.Acting female, especially in the sport that I’m in. I think a lot of people get confused - a lot of females get confused and they think they have to act like guys just to fit into a male dominated sport. I think that’s what makes me stand out is I am completely myself. And I’m still very much a tomboy, but yeah, I do act female and I do smile. Michael O'Hearn: If I didn’t know what she did for a living, I mean, I really do think she’s the most feminine of the Gladiators. She’s very, very funny, very soft-spoken and very sweet. She doesn’t come off as a fighter like you would think most girls do. They would have to act tough or something and she doesn’t come off that way. It’s great.What’s the best part of being famous?Michael O'Hearn: The free gifts.Gina Carano: The free gifts?Michael O'Hearn: All the free gifts you get.Gina Carano: You got free gifts?Michael O'Hearn: I get free gifts.Gina Carano: I didn’t get any free gifts.Michael O'Hearn: I got some watches and some sunglasses and stuff. I’m like wow.Gina Carano: What’s the best thing about being a celebrity? I guess people want to listen to what you have to say a lot more. They’re a lot more interested.Michael O'Hearn: It’s nice. They put you on a pedestal, so if you do have a cause or something you believe in, you can actually talk about it and people take more attention to you - and that’s the best thing.What charity or causes mean something to you?Michael O'Hearn: Yeah. For me it’s just dyslexia, learning disabilities and trying to teach people to - kids, you know, that, you know, stay in school, keep pushing through, athletics can help you, you know, deal with it.
But the main thing is just stay true to yourself and believe in yourself that you can learn to read and write.Gina Carano: And for me, I think that American Gladiators has helped me balance out my fight career and so that I can play, it’s given me something else to balance it out so I just don’t have to worry about, being a fighter.I’ve got this other avenue of entertainment now, but it’s kind of opened up more possibilities for me because I know I can’t fight for the rest of my life.
what I’m kind of promoting right now is females in the sports like martial arts and that seems to be taking off. And so - and American Gladiators has definitely helped that.Have any love connections formed between the Gladiators?Michael O'Hearn: Going for the dirt are we now? Go for it, Gina.Gina Carano: I’m not at liberty to say. I just don’t know. Maybe I just didn’t pay attention.Michael O'Hearn: So, how’s the weather out there?What are some other new games?Michael O'Hearn: Skytrack is - it’s similar to the old game we used to have on the original Gladiators, the old G, where we’d run around a track that was obviously upside down on top of the ceiling of the sports arena.But this one, you’re only using your arms and you’re chasing down the contestants. So it’s a lot of upper body strength and speed. It’s a great new game.
And then Vertigo - Gina, did you ever try it?Gina Carano: In practice I got to try it once and I loved it.Michael O'Hearn: They don’t get me up there. The bars will break. I’m 265 pounds, so they don’t put me on that stuff. They leave me on Joust and Powerball, and Earthquake.Gina Carano: Me, too. And then we’ve got that new event, Sideswipe, which was pretty cool. They - all the Gladiators connect themselves to a rope and the contender tries to jump across from platform to platform to go back and forth to see how many points they can get and - while the Gladiators are swinging in on them like Tarzan. So it’s a pretty cool event. It’s really awesome to see.Michael O'Hearn: It’s pretty violent, too.Gina Carano: Yeah, it’s awesome.Fourth of July plans?Michael O'Hearn: I cook it up. I’m a chef. I cook up some steaks and some bar-b. Yeah, I’m a big barbecue guy, hang out with the family. I come from a big clan up there in Seattle, so it’s good times.Gina Carano: Yeah, I head to Lake Tahoe and kind of just - do up there - they do a little fireworks show and barbecue, drink some beer, hang out.Any film work for you Michael (Titan)?Michael O'Hearn: Well they’re working on a script and all of it’s pretty surreal to me. when I got the first call to come in and meet with the producers at Millennium - to sit down and talk about playing Conan, it - first of all, just a dream come true to follow in that kind of footsteps.But after only one season of American Gladiators and then already be pulled in for a project which has a budget of $100 million, it’s mind-blowing. And they don’t have a script at this time, so they’re working on that and the director.
As for Hercules, they have a script and I got to read it this weekend. And let me just say that will be a blast. It starts out right from birth, how he came about, the battle within his family and where he came from. That’s I can really say about that - both of those.AM: So I had a little breakfast with Hulk Hogan a few Fridays ago and he told me he calls you the Mariah Carey of the Gladiators because you’ve got a porcelain complexion thing going on. So I wanted to know your secret.Gina Carano: Um…AM: I’m talking about Titan.Michael O'Hearn: (laughs) Sorry, Gina. Had to let you catch that one for a second. Yeah, I got some good skin. You know what?Gina Carano: Oh my god (laughs)…Michael O'Hearn: (laughs) I’m a caker and what I mean by that is I wear night lotion 24/7. I really do. I just cake it on and leave it. And everybody goes why is your - why are you sweating? It’s like no, it’s not sweat. It’s just night lotion.I’ve always done that. My mom has always done that and she always used Oil of Olay and just kind of put it on there. And just beautiful porcelain skin. And then my industry is I came from being on the covers of magazines and winning Mr. Universe and everything. And I knew that the face had something to do with it, and had to try to keep it around being 176 years old now.AM: Gina, you mentioned MMA and that’s a sport close to my heart. My youngest son is a Varsity player on the wresting team in high school and he loves MMA too Gina Carano: Yeah.AM: Would American Gladiator ever have celebrity athletes on to see if they have the stamina and skills to compete with you in these obstacle courses - someone like Bas Rutten or Randy Couture, or some tennis person or pick any athlete. Would that be something that the show would entertain?Gina Carano: I hope so. I think that they’re definitely thinking of new ideas all the time. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a Celebrity American Gladiators coming up in the future, not at all.Michael O'Hearn: We did that on the original American Gladiators. We had celebrities come on there. And I think that’s something they’ll definitely do. I was thinking try to get 50 cent or Dean Cain to come on there, or Tyra Banks.I’d like to see Tyra Banks joust.Gina Carano: Yes.AM: Titan, you mentioned some learning disabilities and what not in school, and how you used sports to kind of elevate your confidence and your cache, and come up.Michael O'Hearn: Yeah.AM: it’s really important. And I was wondering what sports you did, and were you on the wrestling team?Michael O'Hearn: Oh yeah.AM: Were you in football? Did you just work out?Michael O'Hearn: No, I - in high school I played football and wrestled. I was an All American football player and a State Champion in wrestling three years.AM: Wow. What weight class did you wrestle at?Michael O'Hearn: I was a heavyweight.