Steve Carell and Channing Tatum star in this weekend’s Oscar-bait movie “Foxcatcher” about the 1996 killing of Olympic wrestling champion Dave Schultz at the hands of eccentric multimillionaire philanthropist John E. du Pont. Dave’s fiercely private younger brother Mark, 54, of Medford, Ore., breaks his silence for the first time to tell The Post’s Jane Ridley the bizarre background to the case.



Fighting back tears, I walk up to the stand to give my victim impact statement over the murder of my older brother, Dave.

“He wasn’t just my brother,” I tell the court. “He was a superhero.”

I glance over at Dave’s wife, Nancy, who is sobbing uncontrollably. Next to her sits my mom, distraught at the senseless killing of her firstborn son at the age of just 36.

Then, I lock eyes with the man — or, should I say, the pathetic excuse for a man — who took Dave away from us.

Head cocked and mouth gaping like a fish, he stares at me along his all-too-familiar huge beak of a nose.

In that moment, I wonder if it’s possible to hate anybody more than I hate John Eleuthère du Pont.

I first met the multimillionaire so-called “philanthropist,” DuPont chemical company heir and failed athlete in 1986. At the time, he was obsessed with the sport of wrestling.

Desperately short of money after being fired as an assistant coach at Stanford University, I felt as if du Pont threw me a lifeline.

He asked me to head up his newly formed wrestling program at Villanova University, outside of Philadelphia, with much of it based on his nearby estate, known as Foxcatcher Farm. His aim was to use his wealth to create a state-of-the-art training gym for the US to chase Olympic glory.

By then, I had an Olympic gold medal and a world championship under my belt, but my career choices were limited. USA Wrestling didn’t pay its athletes — even though we were expected to compete at the same level as the Russian pros, who received a wage from their government — so it was a case of joining the Marines, going on welfare or accepting du Pont’s $24,000-a-year job.

Looking back, I should have trusted my gut and never let him into my life — or, indeed, the life of my brother a few years later. Everything about him was weird, from the dyed red Ronald McDonald hair with layers of dandruff in the roots to his dark yellow teeth, caked with food.

Within weeks of working for him, I realized I’d made a huge mistake.

When I took the job, he assured me he would drop by the program about once every three months, that his title of “coach” was in name only.

In truth, with so much time on his hands as an adult Richie Rich, he came by every single day, spending hours sticking his nose in, having erratic mood swings.

More often than not, he’d be drunk and high on drugs. Nothing he said made sense. His words spouted out of his mouth like an excitable parrot. After every sentence, he’d say: “Do you understand what I’m saying?” He just wouldn’t shut up. His words bore into my brain.

Meanwhile, everything was about building an image that showed du Pont in a glowing light, a guardian of disadvantaged youth donating large amounts of money to wrestling and other sports. He hired a documentary company to produce a film with himself as the subject and held awards ceremonies, where he wrote the presenters’ speeches praising him as some sort of father figure.

If ever there was a definition of an entitled egomaniac, du Pont was it.

He was full of contradictions. One day, he’d be absurdly generous, dropping $10,000 to fly a bunch of us in a Lear jet to South Carolina so he could fire the starting gun for some triathlon in his name. The next, he’d be whining about how much I spent on office supplies.

“Do you know how much this cost?” he once told me, waving a paper clip. “A nickel! Do you know how much a nickel is?”

By then, just the thought of being around him made me physically sick. It was affecting my wrestling, because I felt so unstable, never knowing whether I would get fired by du Pont and lose my home and livelihood.

I offered to shave his head to get rid of all that Ronald McDonald hair. After that, at least I could bear to look at him.

In 1988, I left Foxcatcher. I couldn’t look myself in the mirror and continue to work for du Pont or live on his estate. That was his whole strategy in his friendships and business relationships — to see how much money people would accept from him and how much they’d compromise themselves.

Even though I had nothing lined up, I had to get away from the stifling atmosphere and du Pont’s negative influences.

But du Pont merely traded one Schultz brother for another.

Dave, who was 17 months older than I, with an Olympic gold medal and a world title to his name, took a job with him as a wrestling coach. In 1989, he came to live with his young family in a house on the grounds of the Foxcatcher estate.

Dave, with his wrestling expertise, good looks, easy manner and charisma, was everything du Pont wanted and couldn’t be. Everybody loved Dave. He was the most unselfish person I ever met, always willing to teach other wrestlers his moves, even though most athletes would have balked at the idea of giving away their techniques.

Du Pont became a ticking time bomb. His drinking and drugging got worse. He started carrying a gun everywhere he went. - Mark Schultz, on his brother's murderer, John E. du Pont

I think that’s what stuck in du Pont’s craw. Dave had dyslexia as a child — a disability that ended up becoming an advantage for him as he was ambidextrous and could move equally well in wrestling with both sides — yet succeeded against the odds. He became this superhuman who reached the top of his sport with none of the financial advantages du Pont had.

None of us realized it back then, but, as the years went by, du Pont became a ticking time bomb. His drinking and drugging got worse. He started carrying a gun everywhere he went. By now, there were several athletes living at Foxcatcher, so he didn’t bother Dave as much as he’d pestered me, but he’d become even more of a social pariah.

In the spring of 1995, he kicked three black wrestlers off the farm, saying the Ku Klux Klan ran the place. Earlier, he’d driven his brand-new Lincoln Continental into his pond and claimed he was Jesus Christ and the Dalai Lama. He had a bizarre set of conspiracy theories and forced his staff to look for “Nazis” hiding on the grounds and ghosts in his attic.

As it went with everyone in du Pont’s life, his friendship with Dave soured, especially when Dave announced that he was planning to leave Foxcatcher.

Another factor was du Pont’s newfound obsession with the Bulgarian wrestler Valentin Jordanov (he left 80 percent of his estate to him) and his jealousy toward Dave because he was tight with Valentin and could speak Russian to him.

On Jan. 26, 1996, du Pont shot Dave at point-blank range while he was fixing his car radio in the driveway of his home on the Foxcatcher grounds.

“Do you have a problem with me?” was all he said before he fired three bullets from his .44 Magnum revolver.

Dave desperately tried to crawl across the snow for cover, leaving a trail of blood. But he died in the arms of his wife, who watched in horror from the doorway of their house.

Du Pont fled and holed himself up in his 44-room mansion for two days, prompting a standoff with the cops. Only when the police turned off the house’s heating and tricked him into coming to look at the boilers was he apprehended.

When my dad called to tell me that Dave had been killed, I threw the phone and destroyed everything in my office where I was working at Brigham Young University in Utah.

Then, I curled into a ball and cried. I must have cried for a week.

The case came to Delaware County Court a year later in January 1997. And every moment of the monthlong trial was grueling for the family. We were terrified that du Pont’s fancy hotshot lawyers would somehow get him off the hook.

The jury eventually found du Pont mentally ill, but still guilty of murder. All the money in the world couldn’t stop him from getting 13 to 30 years.

Making my victim impact statement, I thought I’d feel some closure, but I didn’t. The lingering question remained: Why did du Pont feel he had the right to take my brother’s life?

Nearly 18 years later, I decided to write my autobiography because I didn’t want Dave to be forgotten. It was a tough decision for me as I’ve always been a man of few words.

But I’m thrilled that my book, “Foxcatcher,” is out on Tuesday. I’m also pleased about the movie. To my mind, it’s a sublime piece of filmmaking.

I spent nearly a week on set. Watching Steve Carell play du Pont was like coming face-to-face again with the man who broke our family’s heart. It was like du Pont had been resurrected. It was extremely difficult to relive the darkest part of my life.

As for du Pont, he was found dead in his prison cell at the age of 72 in December 2010.

But to me, he died the day Dave was killed.