In a recent interview with ESPN, WWE SmackDown Live commissioner Shane McMahon commented on a variety of subjects, including his father Vince McMahon pitching the historic WrestleMania 3 match between Hulk Hogan and Andre The Giant to Andre himself.

“Obviously, going into WrestleMania 3 and I don’t know if lots of people know this or not, but Andre was in not-so-great health, bis back was really messed up and Andre was shooting a movie with Billy Crystal called “The Princess Bride” and my Dad specifically had the idea to go, oh my gosh, something and Vince being the visionary that he is, says, I want to take the largest indoor stadium ever and fill it with 93,173 people for WrestleMania 3 at the Pontiac Silverdome at that time and like, what is that one attraction that can do that.

Vince flew, they were shooting somewhere in Europe and Vince flew and had a conversation with Andre and said to Andre, I had this amazing idea, I have a dream, I want to fill the biggest stadium, the biggest event of all time and there’s no one that should be a part of that more than you and it’s you versus Hogan and Andre lit up, he became very excited, but what that meant was that Andre knew that he’d have to go have back surgery and that’s exactly what happened.

So, to make a long story short, the back surgery was successful. The amount of anesthesia to put him out, the anesthesiologist was actually getting a little scared because it was basically the size of a small pony to keep a 500-plus pound man sedated. The surgery was successful and then Vince got Andre back. He basically came to our house every day, my Dad, obviously being very heavy into fitness, he had a huge gym and Andre came there every day and trained and rehabbed and got stronger and stronger and then was able to, obviously, get in very good physical shape and prepare for that one amazing match and obviously, the rest is history.”

The interview is available in full at this link.