Natalya explains why carrying on the legacy of Stu Hart’s Dungeon is so important to her.
WWE Superstars Natalya and TJ Wilson recently sat down with TMZ Sports. When asked about The Dungeon 2.0, which they operate unaffiliated from WWE, Nattie said it’s their way of giving back to the sport that gave them so much.
“I’m just so lucky that for us, I started my career with TJ. We were the last students of the original Dungeon, which my grandfather’s Stu Hart started in Calgary, Canada,” Natalya said. “So we were the last students of that Dungeon. In the original Dungeon, you look at Davey Boy [Smith], Dynamite [Kid], my dad [Jim Neidhart], Bret [Hart], Owen [Hart], the list goes on and on of like really, really talented superstars.
“So for us to be able to keep that Dungeon name alive and to keep that Dungeon vibe alive. Especially because we work so closely with the women, but I think being able to give back to the men and women of WWE. And this is the thing is that we’re not really a school, maybe one day it will be a school. But at the moment, it’s like a private invite-only workshop. But it’s really cool because, yeah, we do work with people from every walk of life.
“We love being able to help people so I try not to discriminate and go we can only have the women of WWE here. I feel like if you have passion for this, and you’re — one of my favorite people to have come in is David Finlay. He’s Fit Finlay’s son; he just won the championship in New Japan. He’s just incredible what he brings to the table.
“Anybody that comes to our ring, they just, I say to TJ they have to be able to bring something to the table that inspires us, and then in return TJ or myself, we can pass on the things that we’ve learned in our journeys, which between the two of us in our wrestling careers has been almost 50 years of wrestling knowledge and growing up around it.
“So it’s just so cool, and I always say this to TJ, but it’s our love letter to wrestling. The Dungeon is our way of giving back to the industry that gave us so much.”
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