James Ray Hart[2] (born January 1, 1944) is an American professional wrestling manager, executive, composer, and musician.

Before becoming involved with professional wrestling, Hart was a member of rock band The Gentrys, best known for their 1965 top five Billboard Hot 100 hit, "Keep on Dancing".

He was brought into wrestling by Jerry "the King" Lawler, who knew of Hart because both had attended Memphis Treadwell High School.

After splitting from Lawler, Hart created a stable known as the First Family of Wrestling to attack Lawler, which among others included Hulk Hogan, King Kong Bundy, "Ravishing" Rick Rude, "Leaping" Lanny Poffo, Jim "the Anvil" Neidhart, Ox Baker, Kamala, "Macho Man" Randy Savage, "Hot Stuff" Eddie Gilbert, The Iron Sheik and Kevin Sullivan.

He was nicknamed "the Mouth of the South" due to his loose-lipped style, often augmented by his trademark megaphone, which he used to instruct and encourage his protégés, to discourage and annoy opponents and announcers (especially Gorilla Monsoon) and also as a weapon.

Hart later traded Bundy's contract to Bobby "the Brain" Heenan for The Missing Link and Adrian Adonis.

With Hart in his corner, the Honky Tonk Man captured the Intercontinental Heavyweight Title from Ricky "the Dragon" Steamboat on June 2, 1987, and held it until August 1988.

Then came the six-man tag match, pitting the Hart Foundation and Danny Davis against the Bulldogs and Tito Santana.

Jimmy Hart's third appearance on the show was when The Honky Tonk Man fought Jake "the Snake" Roberts who had rock legend Alice Cooper in his corner.

Also in 1987, Hart managed the WWF Women's Tag Team champions Judy Martin and Leilani Kai, known as The Glamour Girls.

Martin and Kai mostly feuded with Japanese team the Jumping Bomb Angels (Noriyo Tateno and Itsuki Yamazaki).

When the Nasty Boys lost the title to the Legion of Doom at SummerSlam 1991, Hart sent The Natural Disasters, a team formed out of Earthquake and his former opponent Typhoon (formerly known as Tugboat), to depose the new champions.

Beefcake's long time friend Hulk Hogan came out the following week and expressed gratitude to Hart for his uncharacteristically heroic actions.

At King of the Ring, Hart was in Hogan's corner as he lost the WWF World Heavyweight Title back to Yokozuna.

At Bash at the Beach in 1994, Hart managed Hogan to win his first WCW World Heavyweight Title by defeating "the Nature Boy" Ric Flair.

During that era, he managed Ric Flair to a 12th world title victory over Macho Man Randy Savage at Starrcade '95.

After the demise of the First Family, Hart was placed in charge of booking TBS's WCW Saturday Night show prior to the program's cancellation.

Jimmy Hart was also the first Strapmaster for the Yapapi Indian strap match in which Hulk Hogan defeated Ric Flair on March 19, 2000, at the Uncensored PPV.

In 2002, Hart restarted his feud with Jerry Lawler by buying, for the XWF, part of the upstart Memphis Wrestling promotion.

On January 19, 2010, Hart announced that his all-female wrestling promotion Wrestlicious would be premiering on MavTV and BiteTV on March 1, 2010.

He is a staple at all of the Wrestlereunion shows, and also does various appearances as part of the VOC Nation wrestling radio program in Philadelphia on 1360 WNJC.

[1] On June 19, 2005, at Slammiversary pay-per-view, The Naturals were assisted in a title defense against Team Canada by Hart, who ran to ringside and threw his megaphone to Chase Stevens, who hit Petey Williams with it and pinned him.

[8] On March 1, 2011, it was reported that Jimmy Hart had left Total Nonstop Action Wrestling and re-signed with WWE to work on WrestleMania-related projects.

[10] On April 10, 2012, Hart made an appearance on SmackDown: Blast from the Past, where he managed the team of Heath Slater and Tyson Kidd, but ended up getting the mandible claw from Mick Foley.

As of April 2014, Hart was a regular cast member on the WWE Network original reality show Legends' House.

In April 2017, Hart purchased a beachfront property in Daytona Beach, Florida, and opened “Jimmy Hart’s Hall of Fame Bar and Tiki Deck“, which is a beach bar featuring an abundance of autographed pictures, wrestling paraphernalia, and at times an intercontinental championship belt.

On January 4, 2021, he made an appearance on the RAW Legends Night where he was involved in a segment with Hulk Hogan, Drew McIntyre and Sheamus.

Later, after the leader of the group Larry Raspberry left, Hart took over and they had a few minor hits, most notably "Why Should I Cry" and a cover of Neil Young's "Cinnamon Girl", but were never able to match the success of "Keep on Dancing."

During his years in the professional wrestling business, Hart composed many theme songs for wrestlers in the WWF and WCW.

Some of the wrestlers for whom he composed music were Honky Tonk Man, Jimmy Snuka, Brutus "The Barber" Beefcake, The Rockers, The Hart Foundation, Crush, the Fabulous Rougeau Brothers, Dusty Rhodes, the Legion of Doom, the Nasty Boys, Ted DiBiase, the Mountie, Hulk Hogan, Sting, the nWo Wolfpac, and 3 Count.