The Evel Interview - Page 2

Rx: Is that why he's keeping it in Canada?

EK: Yeah. Don't worry about him. This guy's the funniest prick in the world. He knows he's got stolen stuff. He said ‘I bought it from a German conglomerate.’ But that's all right, don't worry about it. He let you see the stuff?

Rx: Yes, sir. We went to Canada because we saw this guy hawking your stuff in a motorcycle shopper magazine. We get up there and he gives us the run-around for most of the afternoon, and finally takes us to his pawn shop and shows us the stuff. He’s got the goods.

EK: He isn’t even a #@%!ing motorcycle dealer?

Rx: No sir, it's a #@%!ing pawn shop.

EK: Yeah, I heard you went up there and met him and he took you to the pawn shop.

RX: We talked to him on the phone.

(Stairway to Heaven is now kicking in the background.)

EK: This is stressful.

Rx: So he's got a pawn shop and it's full of your memorabilia, but not your bikes. They were somewhere else, but he took us to see them.

EK: He's a phony. Believe me. Has he got the Harley-Davidson?

Rx: He’s got the one with the playing cards painted on the gas tank, a black jack hand.

EK: He's a #@%!ing liar. Let me tell you something. Wait a minute. Harley-Davidson gave me three XR750s. I have one, locked up here in town – Mike and I have it in our warehouse. The other one was donated to the Smithsonian Institute World Museum of Natural History. The last one was stolen by Karl Green, a guy that used to work for me. That's the only ones that I ever got from them. And I have an agreement with Harley that I would never sell them, loan them, or do anything with them. This guy is lying, see, he don't have one.

Rx: I’m just telling you he's trying to move your stuff.

EK: He's a #%ing liar. He don't have a bike. I’d like you to do me a favor. I’ll furnish you with doc-uments, actual certified documents that nothing of mine is to be sold, auctioned or anything. They sold it anyway. Tell them you’ve talked to me personally, and that you know that I have never sold anything to anybody, and that anybody who buys anything is buying it under false pretenses.

Rx: What about the backup rocket bike? He's got the Skycycle.

EK: The Skycycle he’s got is the one that was shot across the river for a test shot, not the real one.

Rx: He swears that this really belonged to you.

EK: Yeah, it probably did. He's been put on notice, he's been served papers, he's been told that these were stolen.

Rx: Well, is it all right if we ask you some other questions, like do you ever ride bikes at all anymore?

EK: Yeah, sometimes.

Rx: When's the last time you rode a bike?

EK: (To his girlfriend Crystal) Hey, when's the last time I was on a bike?

Crystal: You rode one in the Little Caesar’s commercial.

EK: In the Little Caesar’s Pizza commercial. And I don't really remember anybody laughing at me 'cause I killed (the motor).

Mike Gray: I was laughing at you.

EK: I said I don't remember killing it!

Mike Gray: No, when you pulled up the first time, you wanted to shut it off, you let the clutch out...

EK: No, I stopped it on the #@%!ing spot, yeah, I had to. My motor-cycles never had any brakes on them, and I pushed them to start them because they never had any starters on them, either. Because my left leg is hampered, it's hard for me to reach a brake.

Mike Gray: We were doing a commercial for that medical device and he had to keep going out into the street and back into the parking lot to stop it for the camera. The first time he did it, when he stopped, he killed the motor...

EK: Nothing phases me!

Rx: So tell me, Mr. Knievel, how did you hook up with the Pain Stimulator guys for the info-mercials?

EK: They sent me a letter and they sent me a Stimulator and asked me to use it.

Rx: Did it really work?

EK: Yeah, it's a good product. You know what this does? (Evel pulls out a highly modified stimulator called the Pain Stimulator that looks more like a stun gun than a gadget and touches it to his arm without flinching.) Oh, turn that son-of-a-bitch up.

Rx: It looks like a stun gun.

EK: That’s a great product, boy. Great product. (Evel turns up the juice, leans over and zaps a frightened McGuyver on the fore-arm. McGuyver spills his beer.)

McGuyver: Oh my god!....

EK: That son-of-a-bitch is powerful. See, what this does, it disrupts the nerves that send signals to the brain that tells it you’re in pain. It upsets it and scrambles it. (Evel zaps me, and I am moment-arily incapacitated and even more confused.) I guess it’s a little more powerful than the old Pain Stimulator.

Rx: (Shaking) Are you going to work with this company, too?

EK: Yeah.

Rx: What’s this one called?

Girlfriend: Electrical Acupuncture.

Rx: Are they still selling the Stimulator?

EK: No, they seized them. That’s because the asshole that we all put our faith in, the owner and chairman of the board of the company, he didn’t do things right.

Rx: So the FDA won’t let you sell it anymore?

EK: Not until he does it right.

Rx: Do you spend a lot of time golfing now?

EK: Every day, yeah. And it’s work. I have this beautiful little friend I golf with (Crystal), she never gets mad on the golf course, she always helps me, makes me peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to go on the golf course with, and she NEVER loses her temper and she’s a great player. She has a great smile, she even had a little ball with a smile on it. A little pink smile.

Rx: Does she ever make you feel like you are her caddy?

EK: (Sarcastically) No, she just treats me like you wouldn’t believe. She grabs my clubs for me, she never swears or cusses…

Girlfriend: What kind of pill are you on?

Rx: I met Robbie a month ago in Seattle. He came to a Supercross and I got him tickets and stuff. Do you ever talk to Robbie anymore? Do you guys get along?

EK: I saw him at my grandmother’s funeral. I wish Robbie well, I just don’t tell him what to do ‘cause he’s in charge of his own, uhh, ship now. He sets his own sails.

Rx: In your opinion the wind is blowing in the right direction?

EK: He’s the master of his own ship, but in my opinion the wind is blowing in the wrong direction. (Evel shuts the tape off momentarily to discuss this more off the record.)

Rx: All right, this is a question you’ve been asked a million times: How many bones did you break?

EK: 37.

Rx: What was the worst one? The worst crash?

EK: It was Vegas by far, the Caesar’s Palace jump… (Talking to someone else) Hey, this guy’s doing an interview for Hustler Magazine! (Woman walks up and Evel puts his arm around her waist) Of all the thousands I’ve been with, she’s probably in the top three or four. (Everyone laughs) I’m serious!

Rx: Evel, did you know that you weren’t going to make that jump, that you were going to crash on landing?

EK: No.

Rx: Because it didn’t look like you had a lot of room.

EK: I thought it was a piece of cake, a piece of #@%!ing cake. It wasn’t the jump – it was the landing! I landed on top of a van. I parked the van there for a safety ramp, and I put a piece of steel across it and the steel was flimsy. When I hit it, it bounced me up in the air and right over the top of the handlebars. My shocks were bad and they only had a little bit of travel, and it just through me right over the handlebars. It was horrible. I was unconscious for 30-some days that time. Boy, it was horrible.

Rx: When you were jumping, did you know you were going to make it every time, or were there times that you went out there and you had no idea what was going to happen?

EK: Yeah, there were times that I thought I might get... Well, that I couldn’t make it.