Mr. Fuji, a prankster in and out of the ring, dies at age 82

On Sunday, Harry Fujiwara died at the age of 82.

He was a professional wrestler in the WWE. But, fans know him better as this man:

oembed://https%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DMr_QWT4EV5c

Now you'd think that a man called Mr. Fuji would be from Japan.

But that’s not the case. “Harry Fujiwara was … of Hawaiian descent,” says Greg Oliver, an author of several professional wrestling books.

“There were a lot of wrestlers in Hawaii. It was a popular place and there was a gym where they all worked out. And Harry worked out there. He was not a huge guy but he was pretty well built, you know about 235 pounds on a 5-foot-10 frame. And they convinced him to try wrestling, and he definitely found something he was good at.”

Oliver says this was back in the 1960s. Fujiwara soon left the islands for the mainland. He wrestled in Portland and San Francisco before heading east to the former World Wrestling Federation or WWF (Now, WWE). “That’s when his legacy gets cemented,” says Oliver.

Fujiwara partnered with another wrestler called Professor Toru Tanaka. The two won three tag team titles and Fujiwara would win two more with another partner.

“But then Vince McMahon Sr. asked Fujiwara about being a manager,” says Oliver. “He was the right kind of character at the time as Vince McMahon Jr. took the WWF national with the whole Hulk Hogan rock and wrestling thing. Mr. Fuji was your sneaky, devious manager at ringside for teams like Demolition and the Powers of Pain, or Don Muraco. The later would team up for a hilarious piece of wrestling comedy history, “Fuji Vice.”

oembed://https%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3D7MzaqCImYu0

Off stage, Fujiwara was a three-dimensional character. Oliver says Fujiwara was always polite during interviews and conversations with journalists and fans. But he was a notorious prankster with his peers. “You’d find your clothes glued together or cut up,” he says. 

Ultimately, Oliver will always remember Fujiwara as a diabolical manager.

“He’d make you laugh and he’d make you really infuriated at how he would help his wrestlers win his matches,” he says. “The world certainly lost a great character yesterday.”