Nathan "The Front Row" Jones

Wrestler, Bodybuilder and Actor

Nathan "The Milkman" Jones (born August 21, 1970 in Gold Coast, Queensland) is an Australian professional wrestler and actor.

Career

Pre-wrestling
Before his career as a wrestler, Nathan Jones was sentenced to 16 years in prison for eight armed robberies between 1985-1989, two of them in Tasmania. He ended up serving seven years in a maximum-security prison and one year on work release. While in prison, he was introduced to the sport of powerlifting. Within a short space of time, Nathan became the National Powerlifting Champion of Australia.

Nathan was considered one of the best young talents in Australia and mouthed off Anthony Mundine at one stage.

Nathan also began competing in strongman contests. On the strongman circuit, he was dubbed The Megaman for his imposing 6 ft 10 in, 360 lb physique. As the reigning Australia's Strongest Man, he entered the World Strength Championship at Callander, Scotland on July 29-30, 1995. He took first place, topping a field that included 1993 World's Strongest Man Gary Taylor. The following weekend, he competed in the World Musclepower Championship held at Mintlaw, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. That contest was won by Magnus Ver Magnusson, with Nathan finishing fifth in a field of twelve competitors.

Nathan next took part in the 1995 World's Strongest Man contest. In the arm wrestling event in the qualifying heat, he was matched against Magnus Samuelsson, who had been Sweden's arm wrestling champion for several years. Samuelsson won the first match after a back and forth battle. Then, as Samuelsson was about to win the second match, Nathan pulled himself with his opposite arm in a last ditch effort, and suffered a broken arm (a spiral fracture of the humerus). Jones returned to strongman competition in 1996 and placed 3rd in a Heat behind Magnus ver Magnusson and Jorma Ojanaho.

Wrestling
Later, Nathan worked as a bodyguard for infamous known money man Rene Rivkin. He also began a career in wrestling during this time. Jones first gained fame working in the World Wrestling All-Stars, making a large impression at the first WWA Pay Per View Inception, where he was accompanied to the ring by Rove McManus. He also participated in a MMA match at PRIDE 1 with PRIDE Fighting Championship in October 1997, submitting to Japanese sumo wrestler Koji Kitao in his only match.

During his time in the WWA, Nathan won the WWA Heavyweight Championship on April 7, 2002 before losing the belt to Scott Steiner. Both men joined World Wrestling Entertainment during the same time period. Vignettes aired with Nathan Jones standing in a prison saying "I am Nathan Jones. G'day" to further his gimmick.

Jones' first appearance as a WWE superstar was in a storyline where he became the Undertaker's protege. He was scheduled to team with Undertaker to face Big Show and A-Train at WrestleMania XIX, but was billed as injured, only appearing during the closing moments of the match to assist Undertaker.

After winning a match on SmackDown by disqualification, the Full Blooded Italians gave Nathan Jones a post-match beat down, which included "shattering" his ankle with the steel steps. Nathan was then sent to OVW to improve his wrestling ability. When Nathan was sent there he was down in strength and was only 290 pounds, much smaller than when he competed in WSM. In the OVW school Nathan got back into shape, adding over 40 pounds of muscle back onto his huge frame. It was during this period that Jones appeared in a bit part for the movie Troy, as Boagrius, a warrior who fights Achilles.

Nathan then was absent from WWE TV for several months, returning as a heel known by the nickname "The Colossus of Boggo Road", a title referring to his time spent in Boggo Road Prison. He formed part of Brock Lesnar's Survivor Series team, which also included the Big Show, A-Train and Matt Morgan. They were not victorious however, and Nathan Jones was then used to make run-ins along with the other members of Team Lesnar, and was placed in matches by either Lesnar or Heyman to do their dirty work for them.

The rigour of WWE lifestyle became too much for Nathan, and he quit the company on December 6, 2003 while on the WWE Passport to SmackDown! Tour in Perth, Australia. Since then, Nathan was scheduled to make his pro wrestling return in 2004 at the Australian Wrestling Supershow III booked against Mark Mercedes, but did not appear as advertised at the event and a battle royal was held following a profanity laced shoot on Jones by Mercedes.

Post-wrestling
Jones would leave wrestling to once again go into the movie industry after previously having a role in Jackie Chan's first Strike as a Russian hit man. Jones first role after wrestling was in the movie Troy, he played a Greek Champion who was dispatched in one blow by Achilles.

He appears as bad guy "TK" in the Thai martial arts movie The Protector and as the wrestler Hercules O'Brien in the Jet Li wuxia movie Fearless.

In an interesting note, Jones once again worked for WWE, this time under the WWE Films banner, playing 'The Russian' in WWE Film The Condemned, starring Stone Cold Steve Austin.

Physique
Nathan's weight varies. At his heaviest he weighed in at 360 lbs, yet has admitted that a lot of it was bodyfat. According to Nathan the weight was for leverage in powerlifting. Today normally his weight is about 322 lbs lean, with visible abs and vascularity. During his first few months with WWE, Nathan had dropped down to between 290 and 305 lbs. Also according to Jones, the heaviest he has ever been lean was 340 lbs for his role in the movie Troy. He wears size 18 shoes (US). (Credit: Wikipedia)

Interview (Network Nine, 60 Minutes - 15th June 2003

LIZ HAYES: The last place I expected to find myself was ringside at the wrestling, but duty called. And I can now report that yes, it is brawny, it is butch, and its appeal is still a mystery to me. But you can't dismiss professional wrestling as simply a bunch of boofheads throwing each other around a stadium. It's seriously big time, as bold and as brassy as any Broadway extravaganza, raking in more than $500 million a year in America alone and, as you already know if you have cable TV, attracting a legion of young fans here in Australia.

This is no business but show business. It's all just a great big act, and its heroes certainly great big actors. Bruisers like Hulk Hogan, a veteran of 23 years in the ring and still the one they come to see. A-Train.

ANNOUNCER: A-Train!

LIZ HAYES: [There's] Big Show, who, at 500 pounds, walks a bit slow. Playboy centrefold Tori, who gives as good as she gets. And then there's the new kid on the canvas, a former Australian bank robber called Nathan Jones.

Just give me a thumbnail sketch of your size.

NATHAN JONES: Six foot 10 and 300 pounds. That's about it basically.

LIZ HAYES: And growing?

NATHAN JONES: And still growing. Six foot 10 on the slack, 350 pounds of bone-crushing terror.

LIZ HAYES: They call him the Colossus of Boggo Road, named after the Brisbane prison where he served time.

How long did you spend in jail?

NATHAN JONES: Me, oh, I think about seven years all up.

LIZ HAYES: For?

NATHAN JONES: Armed robbery, eight of them.

LIZ HAYES: Eight armed robberies?

NATHAN JONES: Yes.

LIZ HAYES: In any other new career, that's probably a past you would prefer to forget, but in this business, if it hadn't been a fact, his boss, wrestling promoter Vince McMahon, would have probably made it up.

VINCE MCMAHON: It's so cool because in some situations you create these stories and storylines. Nathan comes with his own, you know.

LIZ HAYES: The Colossus was only 19 years old when he went to Boggo Road and while he was inside, he testified to a Senate committee inquiry on drug abuse, telling how he had committed his crimes under the influence of a massive cocktail of steroids and amphetamines.

NATHAN JONES: The way I felt, it made me feel like I was invincible, you know. I don't think I could put it [down] to any one thing. It's like a whole lot of things, incidents through my life, my childhood, that eventually I got frustrated and so angry I snapped and I did something very stupid. It was sort of like self ... like suicide in a way. I knew I was going to prison, I just ... it was very self-destructive behaviour, you know. It took a few years for me to sort myself out. But anyway, I'm alright now. A lot of people think these days, "Oh, he's got muscles, he's taking steroids". But it's not always the case. It's hard training. I think people think steroids are magical and they're not. It really requires hard training. You have to get in there and grit your teeth and work hard. That's the key.

LIZ HAYES: It's a bit like a rock show.

VINCE MCMAHON: It's a lot like a rock show. It's also like a Broadway drama, combined with a Superbowl or the rugby championship or whatever it may be. It's all those things. It's all the greatest aspects of sports and the greatest aspects of entertainment all entwined together.

LIZ HAYES: Wrestling as entertainment has been around for more than 50 years and like every other show, every move, every line ...

WRESTLER 1: The people got a need to know!

WRESTLER 2: I tell you one thing, you talk too much. HULK

HOGAN: Well, you know, they said it was my last ride, man!

LIZ HAYES: Every facial expression is a work of art.

NATHAN JONES: What they're doing is having me a little bit crazy and I could just snap at any time and sitting there quiet and polite and next thing, bam! I've got someone by the throat.

VINCE MCMAHON: He's a charming individual, as most Australians are. You know, they're just charming people and you get to know them and he's, again, he's, you know, a common man kind of mentality. I can relate to that and sure he got in some trouble — I did too. We get in trouble, we make mistakes. You pay for the mistakes, so why not use it as part of his legitimate past. "The Colossus of Boggo Road" is great.

NATHAN JONES: It's so bloody huge.

LIZ HAYES: I hope you don't mind me touching them, but my God, they're big! They're even bigger. Nathan Jones has always had superhuman strength. In 1995, he was voted the strongest man in the world. In prison, he knocked cell doors from their hinges and frightened the living daylights out of prison officers.

NATHAN JONES: They used to shake and I don't know, I was in a pretty distorted frame of mind and he managed to get his gun, he goes, "Hold it there, hold it there or I'll shoot." And I said, "If you're going to shoot me, shoot me right between the eyes because you won't stop me anywhere else" and he goes, "Oh, he's crazy!" He drops the gun. He picks it back up and he stays there outside like this. They called the tactical response group and they're all with their machine guns and everything. I couldn't believe it, all this for me!

LIZ HAYES: What are they thinking now when they see you in a wrestling ring in America?

NATHAN JONES: I don't know. They probably think, yeah, it's probably a good place for him.

TOM GREEN: He's probably the number one student I've ever had and I've taught literally thousands of people. If you had to take a piece of clay and design it into a pro wrestler, that's what you'd have, you'd have Nathan Jones. He comes up, I give him the kick, the punch, one punch.

LIZ HAYES: Instructor Tom Green teaches young wrestlers the tricks of the trade.

TOM GREEN: That's where I want him to be. From here, I clean throw him. You obviously got to hit in order to make it look real. No-one's buying Hollywood punches and kicks where I just breeze past someone. So I'm making an impact and stopping. That's where the skill of pro wrestling comes in.

LIZ HAYES: How to hit without hitting. How to fall without hurting. And most importantly, how to act.

TOM GREEN: You're smiling, you're killing it, you can't smile. Check it out. Here's what we need to see. We need to see chins up high and we need to see heads shaking. Look at me real quick. Look at me. Chins up high, head shaking "you sonofabitch"-type thing. You can't see smiles. Smile kills it.

LIZ HAYES: The truth is before a match even begins, the winner has already been decided. Every move in the ring is choreographed.

NATHAN JONES: It's entertainment, you know, it's also, it's when you go out and watch football, people get together and you can cheer for a good guy or a bad guy or your favourite team. You can feel the emotion. And also you can sit there and enjoy it. Just sit there and enjoy it. It's purely for enjoyment.

VINCE MCMAHON: The onus is on us then to be even more entertaining, to have a better story line than you might find ... A lot of the athletes, the Olympic athletes, are boring in real life. We can't have anybody that's boring.

LIZ HAYES: And that's the difference?

VINCE MCMAHON: Oh yeah, a huge difference, absolutely.

LIZ HAYES: If you're boring, you're not going to make it in wrestling?

VINCE MCMAHON: No. If you're boring, no. People want to be entertained. That's what we do — we entertain them.

LIZ HAYES: For Vince McMahon, wrestling is a multimillion-dollar business, and this year, their biggest pay day will be here in Seattle. The city is hosting Wrestlemania, the Superbowl of wrestling, and this weekend, nearly 60,000 fans have come to see the show and meet the stars.

FANS: We're not worthy. We're not worthy.

ANNOUNCER: Put your hand up next to Nathan, let's just see the size.

NATHAN JONES: How big are your biceps?

LITTLE BOY: What are biceps?

NATHAN JONES: Come on. There you go!

LIZ HAYES: For Nathan Jones, this is a brand new experience.

FAN: You sign me.

NATHAN JONES: If you haven't wrestled in Wrestlemania, you've never wrestled at all.
Wrestling against A-Train and Big Show, 350 pounds of A-Train and 500-pound Big Show, seven foot two.

LIZ HAYES: Seven foot two?

NATHAN JONES: Yeah, it's going to be heavy.

LIZ HAYES: You're not going down, are you, Nathan?

NATHAN JONES: No, I don't know, I'll have to find out.

LIZ HAYES: Before doing this story I thought that this kind of wrestling was more about big boofy blokes doing a lot of bad acting in a well-padded ring and frankly I haven't exactly changed my mind about that, but what I wasn't prepared for was the fact that so many of these fans know exactly what it's all about, but are still prepared to fork out millions of dollars to see a show. In fact, by the end of tonight, Vince McMahon will have taken about $80 million for four hours of television. Fans have paid up to $1200 for a seat here tonight. Another 40 million have paid to watch it live on television. And it all went according to the script. Nathan cancelled Big Show and derailed A-Train. It looks like Nathan Jones has traded his dark past for a bright future.

I think you're a bit of an actor, frankly.

NATHAN JONES: Me? Yeah, maybe.

LIZ HAYES: Have a look at Arnold Schwarzenegger.

NATHAN JONES: Yes, big Arnie.

LIZ HAYES: You've only got to be able to say, "I'll be back."

NATHAN JONES: I'll be back!

Profiles

Bodybuilding

Wrestling

Celebrities

Attention Media: If you are interested in contacting Nathan Jones e-mail us, and the message will be passed on. Please note that Media Man Australia is not an exclusive agent for Nathan Jones. Media Man Australia does act in a media capacity for wrestlers such as "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, Mick "The Cutta" Cutajar, John "Vulcan" Seru, Steve "Crusher" Rackman, Mario Milano and Johnny Valiant.