The Undertaker is a professional wrestling character used in WWE. The character was portrayed by Mark Calaway from 1990 to 2020, and briefly by Brian Lee in 1994. Widely regarded as one of the greatest and most enduring gimmicks in professional wrestling history, the character is celebrated for its theatricality, macabre themes, and Calaway’s strict dedication to maintaining kayfabe (the presentation of staged performances as genuine).
The character was originally conceived by Vince McMahon, Chairman of the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, later WWE), as a modern, menacing derivative of 19th-century Wild West morticians popularized in classic television westerns. Making his formal debut at Survivor Series in November 1990, the initial version of the character—later dubbed "The Old West Mortician"—was introduced as an emotionless, impervious-to-pain zombie clad in a black trench coat, gray striped tie, stetson hat, and gray funeral gloves.
The underlying premise of the gimmick was "death personified." To ground this grim persona, the character was given a fictional hometown of Death Valley, a signature "Rest in Peace" catchphrase, and an arsenal of funeral-themed aesthetics, including his trademark finishing maneuver, the Tombstone Piledriver (a wrestling pin that forced the opponent to resemble a corpse with their arms crossed over their chest). Through the years, the character underwent numerous evolutions, gradually transforming into a more mythical, supernatural, horror, and later a cult-like figure before shifting entirely into a biker persona. He eventually returned in hybrid form, blending elements of his previous incarnations into one definitive version of The Undertaker character.
Performance aspects The Deadman identity
Under his undead, funereal, and macabre horror-themed gimmick, in which The Undertaker is subtitled "The Deadman", he routinely took to alarmist tactics to disrupt the focus and confidence of his rivals. Often, these alarmist tactics were morbid and applied the use of props that reflected demise as the consequence of a wrestling match against him: caskets (sometimes personalizing casket designs to represent his opponents), body bags, corpse-like effigies, cemeteries, hearses.
To that end, the gimmick evoked funerals and death down to finer details, such as in the character's birthplace of Death Valley, catchphrase of "Rest in Peace", signature finishing maneuver of the Tombstone Piledriver, a wrestling pin that had the opponent resemble a corpse with their arms crossed over their chest, etc. Adding to his many effects of treating his wrestling matches as funeral services, The Undertaker frequently served a list of specialized matches that were personalized to his Deadman gimmick: Casket Match, Body Bag Match, Buried Alive Match, Last Ride Match, Hell in a Cell, Boneyard Match, etc.
Filled with bells and whistles, The Undertaker's godlike superhuman presence and indignation were signaled by funeral tolls, settings of pitch-black darkness and blue/purple semidarkness, flickering lights, hazy fog, thunder, lightning strikes, and other bone-chilling scenes and sound activity. Portrayed as miraculously resilient to destruction, The Undertaker yielded numerous resurrections, which sometimes gave way to reincarnations of his Deadman gimmick. While maintaining his general character premise as death personified with accompanying alarmist tactics throughout all sagas of the Deadman, each incarnation took on its own distinct appearance and characterization. For example, some Deadman incarnations were unearthly and zombie-like while others were Goth and comparatively more human.
Beginning early on, The Undertaker's persona was complemented with histrionically spooky, wailing manager Paul Bearer, introduced to represent and guide The Deadman. Playing a key role, Bearer used an urn to transmit mysterious powers to The Undertaker that had supernatural healing effects on him during combat. Also linked to The Undertaker's Deadman gimmick were the druids–a team of mysterious, incognito cult-like members, completely disguised in black hooded clergy robes. A mysterious choir chanting sounded whenever the druids presented. The druids typically appeared for the purposes of removing The Undertaker where he had seemingly been extinguished by his enemies (as opposed to EMTs or medical personnel used for the rest of WWF/E talent). The druids were also seen reproducing The Undertaker in recovered, wrathful states to those same enemies who were thought to have extinguished him.
The Undertaker took to many trademarked idiosyncrasies and themes, including a stylized throat-slashing gesture, grimacing facial expressions fit with eyeballs rolled back so that only the whites of his eyes displayed, backwards hair-whips so as to expose his ominous facial expressions, fixed stares on adversaries, protruding tongue displays, jolting of his head with a fury so that it faced the direction of his antagonists, his celebratory take-the-knee pose, sonorous vocalizations, collectively labeling his fanbase as "Creatures of the Night", voice of God-like promos in which things were interrupted with dimmed lights and thunder while The Undertaker's communications were heard booming throughout the arena with no physical trace of him; messages filled with death threats of a deeply posthumous insight into impending corpse decomposition, maggot feasting, unsouling and so on. A main attraction of the Deadman gimmick, The Undertaker mesmerized his opponents and viewers alike through elaborately "bone-chilling" entrances. The character's godlike powers were routinely put on display in these moments, triggering lights back to the arena either gradually or suddenly dependent on his either slowly or abruptly raised arms.
During the vast majority of his wrestling career as the Deadman, The Undertaker used an extended remix of Frédéric Chopin's Funeral March as his theme music. WWF Composer Jim Johnston embellished on the Chopin march, using the historic melody as a pre- and post-chorus to a main chorus of bell tolls, along with an original transition section to the song of a slow, lugubrious instrumental feel. Of his entrances, Calaway has stated, "When that gong went off, that was go time. The music fit the character. That's the key element of it: the end is at hand for whoever's going to be standing in that ring waiting for me to come down. That was the mindset behind the gong. And the music was just doom and gloom, you knew what was coming."
Gimmick reflective nicknames The Undertaker generated many nicknames from commentators throughout the course of his active wrestling career, some of those names more associated with his Deadman Undertaker identity, including "The Grim Reaper" (variants of this used were "The Reaper" and "The Reaper of Wayward Souls"), "The Demon of Death Valley", "The Man from the Dark Side", "The Prince of Darkness", "The Lord of Darkness". He also generated nicknames associated with his American Badass Undertaker identity, including "Big Evil" (used in reference to his American Badass heel side), "Booger Red". Some of his nicknames were not identity specific but used for the character in general, such as "The Phenom".
Domestic backstory, parents and brother
The Undertaker's gimmick has a dark and disturbed family backstory which involves him intentionally burning down his family funeral home as a teenager, resulting in the deaths of his parents and purportedly a brother of his as well. Undertaker initially denied his then ex-manager Paul Bearer's charges of him committing the arson murder of his family, (though later confessed in late 1998). Instead, Undertaker blamed his younger brother of whom he thought long dead from the incident, describing him as a "pyromaniac". This led to Bearer's shocking warnings to proof in the form of the brother, "Kane", as alive and well. In late 1997 at In Your House Badd Blood, Bearer unleashed a vengeful Kane: the fire-personified, juggernaut half-brother of Undertaker, who was fit with a mask to conceal the scarring from Undertaker's arson. In what became a fickle sibling relationship with Bearer (later revealed to be Kane's father) only adding to the pendulum and complexities, Undertaker and Kane went back and forth from one extreme to the other, feuding barbarically at points and yet teaming as the Brothers of Destruction at other points. In the duo's final feud in mid to late 2010, Kane emerged victorious in all of their matches.
Gimmick fused with wrestling move set and style
The Undertaker's wrestling performance and move set were carried out with significant amounts of character-driven physical theater and kinesics. In keeping with his Deadman routine for example, Undertaker was forbiddingly slow and measured in much of his maneuvering and offense. Taking his opponents and audience by surprise, however, he combined his slow, measured physicality with wrestling moves and action uncharacteristic of a wrestler of his vast height and weight. Not limited to just ground offense and power moves, Undertaker was conspicuously aerial, swift, agile, loose-limbed and animated in the other half of his wrestling style and move set: flying clotheslines, guillotine leg drops, running DDTs, ability to land on his feet poised and motionless if thrown from the ring, over-the-top-rope suicide dives (on one occasion, over the top rope and combined active flames during an Inferno match at In Your House Unforgiven), etc. During matches, Undertaker would also pay homage to Don Jardine by performing an arm twist ropewalk chop, dubbed "Old School".
Calaway's performance of The Deadman Most famed for his Deadman Undertaker identity in particular, the role won Calaway the Wrestling Observer Newsletter awards for Best Gimmick a record-setting 5 years in a row (1990–1994). Calaway was highly protective of his Deadman public image: for the vast majority of his career while performing the gimmick, he was so private that he wasn't seen outside of character in the media. Calaway's approach of presenting only in character publicly was done in order to maintain the mystique of the Deadman and facilitate disbelief suspension. However, during the last few years of his wrestling career, he allowed himself to be seen out of character, giving interviews as Mark Calaway and filming a documentary called The Last Ride.
Character history and evolution
Old West Mortician (1990–1994 and March 23, 1997—WrestleMania 13) The earliest of The Undertaker's Deadman incarnations (nicknamed in external media as "The Old West Mortician" to distinguish from his other Deadman incarnations) depicted him as a menacing derivative of the Wild West undertakers in television westerns. In his own rendition, he was garbed in a black trench coat; gray-striped tie; black-ribboned, black stetson; gray boot spats; and gray gloves (black gloves for first few appearances before gray).
This original incarnation emphasized a slow, emotionless, and mortician-like presentation. The Undertaker's movements, facial expressions, and eerie silence helped establish him as a figure who seemed removed from ordinary human behavior. Although this version was not yet as visually supernatural as later versions, it established the funeral imagery, psychological intimidation, and aura of invulnerability that became central to the Deadman gimmick.
The Undertaker would make a special, one-off reappearance under this Old Western Mortician presentation of his Deadman persona at WrestleMania 13, once again donning black with added gray accessories (gloves, boot covers, hatband). Customary of his entrances in this form, a neutral white spot light shined over him during his entrance. In this final appearance, he faced and successfully defeated Sycho Sid for the World Wrestling Federation Championship.
Rebirthed Deadman (1994–1996)