This week, early in the morning, Kevin Van Erich landed on Holy Land soil. His two sons, Marshall and Ross, were also supposed to come to Israel, but a complicated passport bureaucracy changed their plans. At least he himself arrived, and that's more than can be said about his suitcase, the location of which has not yet been located as of this writing. But Van Erich, who even at 66 continues to carry his affable Texas countenance, exudes kindness and love to everyone around him, and doesn't let jet lag, obstacles along the way and fatigue from the long journey to Israel weigh him down too much. After all, what is the loss of honor in the face of the hardships he endured and the five brothers he lost.
This is by no means his first visit to our provinces. He had already performed here alongside his brother in 1985, at the height of their fame as wrestlers and heroes of the WCCW, the one that 40-year-olds and southerners remember from Middle East broadcasts. "Catch," they called it in Israel, and every Saturday night entire families would gather to watch the Van Erich heroes tear up the arena. At the height of his fame, Van Erich was known in Israel like an American movie or sports star, including the posters at Maariv L'Noir. He also visited here in 2005, when he was a guest on the finale of Telenovela Inc., and even chose Israel in 2017 as the place to hold his last fight ever – alongside his sons, also wrestlers, third-generation representatives in the ring.
This time he is visiting here for mission reasons. After watching the horrors of October 7 from a television screen at his home in Texas, he couldn't refuse an offer from filmmakers Lev and Dizengoff Center — to whom he donated the legendary organization's original championship belt — to come here. Also to promote "The Iron Claw," the new feature film based on the lives and hardships of himself and his Van Erich siblings, directed by Sean Durkin and released in Israel this week under the name "The Wrestlers."
Trailer for "The Wrestlers" // Courtesy of A24 and Heart Cinemas
But he is here mainly to meet families whose loved ones were abducted to Gaza, to give a hug to evacuees from the surrounding communities and to show support for a place he sees as a second home, in its most difficult and bloody moments. Kevin Van Erich understands a thing or two about pain and looking death deep in the eye.
Therefore, as part of his visit to Israel, Van Erich visited the families' headquarters and the hostage square in Tel Aviv, where he met with representatives of the families of the abductees whose loved ones have been held captive by Hamas in Gaza for nearly 100 days, under harsh conditions.
Eli Shtevi, the father of 28-year-old Idan Shtevi, who was kidnapped from the party in Re'im after trying to help two of the party participants, told Van Erich how his son Idan was caught in massive fire by the terrorists at the car in which he was with Guy Iluz, z"l, who was murdered, while Idan was seriously wounded and lost contact with him.
A special bond was formed between the two, as fathers of sons of the same age. Van Erich strengthened his drunk and invited him to his home in Texas with Idan when he returned.
Van Erich also met with Elon Keshet, a cousin of Yarden Bibas who was kidnapped to Gaza. Jordan's wife, Shiri, and their two sons, Ariel, 4, and Kfir, <>, all from Kibbutz Nir Oz, were also abducted and are still being held by Hamas
Ayalon said that next week Kfir will celebrate his one-year birthday, which means that he has been in captivity for a third of his life. He added that the family did not know the condition of the mother and children, and spoke about the cruel manner in which Hamas uses psychological terrorism. Van Erich was very moved by the meeting and promised to support the struggle for the release of the hostages as much as he could.
Van Erich with Elon Keshet, cousin of Yarden Bibas who was abducted to Gaza with his wife Shiri and two sons, Ariel, 4, and Kfir, <>, photo: Family Headquarters for the Return of Abductees and Missing
"I don't come here as part of propaganda and I don't want to make statements, just to comfort people who are suffering," he clarifies. "There's nothing I can say to the families I'm going to talk to that will make them feel better, but I can just hug. Grief doesn't get easier. The worst part comes every morning, when you wake up and just can't stop thinking about it. You must get up, make coffee, start walking around. Just make yourself move. I wish I could tell people better things, but when it comes to grief I can only speak from my own experience. I'm not coming for that. If someone wants to meet me, I want to be there for them."
You seem to be in the minority. World public opinion doesn't exactly support Israel right now.
"These are people who are out of date, or they just let someone dictate what to think for them. I know there are networks like Twitter, and a lot of people make statements because they want to follow each other, but there comes a moment when you have to make your own decision, fight for what's important to you. There is no way people in their vicinity would accept the killing of children, women and the elderly, abducted one-year-old babies. Who could support such a thing? Who would even do such a thing? These are animals, that's the only explanation there is. We must get rid of them and replace them with people who want to live and raise their families, instead of continuing to kill more and more people.
"I feel like I have to show people where I stand in this story. You know, it's absurd. I love Israel, but I have Jewish and Arab admirers and it is clear to me that there are quite a few Arabs there who would like peace. Hamas is a different story. They teach their children hatred, walk around with knives and machine guns. When I visited Israel in 2017, I brought a pocketknife with me, because in Texas it's considered a great gift. I couldn't find anyone here who would want it. The Jewish people are a people of peace, it is God's nature that is ingrained in you."
How did your relationship with Israel begin? After all, you were part of a not-too-large wrestling territory located in Dallas at all.
"Specifically through a Palestinian woman, who wrote me a letter in the mid-'80s telling me what a big fan she was. I didn't even know we were being broadcast in Israel. I wrote back to her that I wanted to be her pen pal or something, and she circulated copies of the letter and got a call to bring us.
"An Israeli guy named Avi Friedman and his wife Anat helped bring us here for the first time, and although I've performed in front of large audiences in my life, I've never seen such a large crowd as the one who came to see us at your place. I got a knee pick. I remember looking at the streets in Tel Aviv and heads were sticking out of all the windows of the houses, because everyone was watching us then and knew us. It left a deep impression on me."
Curse of the Van Erichs
Israel doesn't just carry good memories for the Van Erichs. During their visit here in the middle of the 42s, brother Mike suffered a seemingly minor shoulder injury, and after surgery he was discharged from the hospital, but later his temperature rose to 1987 degrees, he was diagnosed with toxic shock syndrome (a condition caused by a toxin secreted from bacteria) and his life was in danger. His devout Christian family prayed for his well-being and Mike was out of mortal danger, but was left with brain damage exacerbated by a car accident he was involved in. From there, his mental state deteriorated, and in April <> he took his own life after combining sleeping pills with alcohol. In his farewell letter to his family, he wrote that he would continue to follow them from a "better place."
Battle from the new film, photo: courtesy of Lev Cinemas
Mike's story is just a link in a chain of tragedies that befell the famous family of wrestlers. It began with the death of brother David in a hotel room in Japan three years earlier, when he was 25, as a result of an intestinal infection. Between these two, in June 1986, Kerry was involved in a serious car accident, following which his right leg was amputated. He returned to the ring and continued wrestling, this time in the WWF, hiding the prosthesis from his fans and bandmates in a boot adorned with friezes. However, addiction to painkillers and other drugs, along with run-ins with the law, led him to commit suicide in February 1993 by firing a bullet to his heart. Just a year and four months earlier, Brother Chris, the youngest and sickest of his siblings, had done the same thing with a shot to the head.
Kevin remains the only surviving of six siblings, and if anything in the count doesn't quite work out, it's only because older brother Jack hasn't been mentioned yet. It is likely that had he lived longer, he too would have found himself surrounded by his brother in a wrestling ring. However, Jack died at the age of 6, as a result of electrocution and drowning.
The curse of the Van Erichs, as many call the succession of disasters that befell the first family of American hurling, is at the center of the new film about them. "The Wrestlers" tells the story of extraordinary brotherhood, Southern simplicity and Christian values of a local family of heroes. Fearless warriors who fight every kind of evil between the ropes, but can't withstand the blows that life inflicts on them, one hit at a time. At the center of the film are Kevin and Kerry, played respectively by Zac Efron and Jeremy Alan White, star of the series "The Bear".
Kevin with Zac Efron, who plays his character, Photo: AP
What did you think when they told you that a film about your family story was being made?
"I wasn't approached, no one contacted me. It was just a rumor online. At one point, my daughter called me and told me they were going to make a movie, that's how I found out. I didn't talk to any of the production people, but I was a little worried and called the director, because when I realized that the name of the film was going to be 'The Iron Claw' (the name of the famous grip he and his brother used to hold their rivals in the ring) I thought they were going to hit my father's name, Fritz, hard.
"I thought it would be like the well-known story about the great evil father who beat his sons and forced them to wrestle, and that's not true at all. I love my father so much. He was the best and most respected man I have ever known. So in the film it's a father who really expects his sons to follow in his footsteps and be wrestlers, because that's how it is in Hollywood movies, but my real story was different - so I called the director and told him I was worried about it."
And what did he say?
"That everything he's going to put into the film is based on things he's heard me tell. It was important to me that the audience know that we really loved each other, and Dad too. He was a man among men. He had to be strict with us, because my brothers and I could have caused a lot of trouble."
In the film he really is portrayed as a tough father, too often.
"My father raised us in a rigid way. We were whipped with leather belts on our backs when we did something wrong, but we knew we deserved it and it was clear to us that if we were caught, we would be kidnapped. Hollywood critics claim that this film portrays a kind of toxic masculinity, but the people in the American South... That's how our ancestors raised us. We got kicked in the ass, yes, and that's why we're good kids. Fritz wasn't that bad. He was a rough father, but I was a rough son. I needed an education sometimes, all my brothers actually, and we got it. The Bible says, 'The darkness of his tribe hates us,' and Fritz had many sons."
On the right, the Van Erich family in the film. On the left, the real family: in the middle Fritz and above him on the right Kerry, David and Kevin, photo: courtesy of Lev Cinemas
The father, who died in 1997 and whose real name was Jack Burton Adkisson, is an important part of Hwan Erichim's story as the patriarch who steered his sons' lives and careers in the wrestling league he managed. His choice of ring name "Fritz" adds an element of irony to his Southern family's long-standing loving relationship with Israel, because when he himself began wrestling in the 50s, in order to exploit his rough features and attract attention as a fearful, terrifying and hateful wrestler in the years after World War II, he chose to portray an evil German as part of a pair of wrestlers with a clear affinity for the Third Reich.
Later in his career, his sons inherited their father's ring name - although they themselves played positive characters. It is funny, then, to think that the fabricated name of the all-American family that loves Judaism and Israel originates from all places in Nazi Germany.
"My father raised us in a rigid way. We got whipped with belts when we did something wrong, but we knew we deserved it. And it was clear to us that if we were caught, we would be kidnapped. In the southern United States, that's how our ancestors raised us. We got kicked in the ass, that's why we're good kids."
"Yes," says the son. "When I met the late Shimon Peres, that was the first thing he wanted to talk to me about. I told him, 'You know, in wrestling, there's no money in being in the middle. You want to be loved by the audience or most hated. There is no middle ground.' My dad was a pretty big, ugly guy, so he wanted to be hated. A Nazi is the most despicable creature, so he decided to go in that direction. There were others who did, but none of them had the iron grip. My father could break a block of wood with pliers, bend silver coins. We all had a good grip, but my father's was crazy."
They like to frame your family story as a curse, but it's actually a story about depression.
"Well, I don't think any of my brothers were depressed except Kerry, and that was because of what he put himself through, you know. I really don't know how my brothers thought. I think they wanted to be together again, and they just did it. But where drugs are involved, you can't expect rational thinking."
"I have Jewish and Arab admirers, and it's clear to me that there are quite a few Arabs who would like peace. Hamas is a different story. They teach their children hatred, walk around with knives and machine guns. The Jewish people are a people of peace, it is God's nature that is inherent in you."
The Continuing Boys
Like any classic Hollywood story, Kevin Van Erich's has a happy ending. His personal catharsis comes in the form of the enormous family he built, four children and 13 grandchildren. After living in Hawaii for two decades, he returned to the United States and now spends his time between the island group and Texas, surrounded by his new family tree.
A correction to the days of the ring also found - in the form of sons Marshall and Ross, talented wrestlers themselves who admire their father and decided to follow in his footsteps, even if during their planned visit to Israel it was not possible. "Our father had a deep love for Israel all our lives, ever since we were kids," Marshall said on a Zoom call with him and his brother Ross. "We had pictures and Israeli flags at home," he says, then picks up his sweatshirt to reveal a short shirt with the IDF insignia on it. Brother Ross, next to him, wears a Star of David necklace.
Being a scion of the Van Erich dynasty is a double-edged sword. Nobility and tragedy are bound together.
Marshall: Yes. My father didn't want us to enter the world of professional wrestling, because for him it was a bit painful. After his brothers died, he continued to wrestle, and everything about Resling reminded him of them. That's why he wanted to get out of Texas, stay away from wrestling as much as he could. Then my brother and I, when we turned 18, decided to go to the wrestling school of legendary wrestler Harley Rice. My father laughed, because he couldn't believe how colliding his worlds were. His present and past met. I'll never forget that when we started wrestling, the look on Dad's face was intact. It was weird."
Marshall, Kevin's son: "Sometimes we sit down with him at dinners and he says, 'It's like I'm sitting with my brothers again, you sound just like them.' That's our father. You might think he's living a happy life, he's really a joyful person."
Ross: It's kind of crazy to see how happy he is now, especially after thinking he couldn't experience joy. Now look at him, he has a lot of children, the world celebrates his life in a movie, there is light at the end of the tunnel. I can't tell you it's not stressful to be Van Erich, but these are the cards that were handed out to us."
In a way, you are his fix.
Marshall: That's a beautiful way to put it. Sometimes we sit with him at dinners and he says, 'It's like I'm sitting with my brothers again, you sound just like them.' That's our father. He's very different from anyone else you'll meet. When you talk to him, you might think he's living a really happy life, because he's so happy. He's just really a joyful person."
"Be tougher than life"
He really did look extraordinarily complete. The impressive, blue-eyed, golden-haired man who attracts attention wherever he sits down, carries himself calmly, radiating acceptance. His eyes convey goodness and there is not an ounce of bitterness in him, not even in the face of bitter memories of crushing lifetimes that are now coming up so publicly.
Was there a part of you that feared that the film would make you relive some pretty terrible years and periods in your life?
"yes, in a way there was, but, you know, everything that's out there has really happened to me, and some people have gone through worse things. Those like you here in Israel know that there are people who have suffered and are suffering much more than I have. Everything happens for a reason. It's a story about a man who is completely crushed, and maybe he can help someone.
"I loved my brothers so much and to experience this pain over and over again, there were moments when I asked, 'What now, God?' but what can I say? Is that unfair? This is the mighty God. I'm only here to worship him. All these disasters that befell us – I knew there was a reason behind them, even if I didn't necessarily know what it was. I can't look at my brothers' story as if it was just bad. I mean, it was a terrible thing, but when I think about all the things we experienced together all over the world, the time I had with them was only positive."
Were there moments that were still difficult for you to watch?
"There's a scene that caught me. I don't want to spoil anyone, but there's a section where all my brothers meet in heaven. Kerry arrives by boat and meets everyone, including Jack, my older brother who remains 6 years old, and so he appears there. That's my favorite part of the movie and it left me choking back tears."
There are those whose collection of such tragedies would have led him to question his faith.
"I was angry, yes. I said some harsh things to God, but it was never without reverence. I didn't doubt God, I just asked Him what He was doing. I knew he was here with me. These are things that are hard for me to talk about and I'm not in a place to preach, but I have a quiet today that I never had before.
"In fact, there was a time when I thought I could never be happy again. I lost that feeling. It started with David's death, which was very difficult for me, really knocked me down. I was depressed when Mike died, but it was like an echo of David's death and I was already emotionally numb. I lost 18kg at that time, my eyes were tearing up all the time, so I wore sunglasses to hide.
"On top of all that, we went bankrupt at that time. People slowly stopped coming to watch the fights because for them too, our story was difficult, but what doesn't kill is tempering. Without concepts like battle, combat and struggle, words like achievement, success and victory have no meaning. Life is hard, and sometimes we have to be tougher than it. A person who has overcome is a better person than he was."
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