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#Post#: 32520--------------------------------------------------
Chat with Big Show. Talks Vendetta, Retiring & More
By: ChrissiCalvert Date: August 17, 2015, 4:40 pm
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You shut down Michael Cole before Battleground when he said the
"R" word - retirement - but is Vendetta where you start to wind
down your in-ring career and do more movies?
I think absolutely. I've had a fantastic career - I'm still
competing on a full-time schedule, but nothing good lasts
forever. So eventually I'm going to have to transition out of
this industry and do something else that's entertaining and
exciting for me.
I think a natural evolution for me would be to try to transfer
over into the film and TV world and start playing different
characters. Hopefully that way I can keep entertaining my fans
that are fans of me, in different avenues and different
spotlights. It's a natural evolution.
Am I a little sad that my wrestling career is towards its end?
Well, yeah, because this has been my life for 20 years. But I
think I can continue to help some of the younger guys get over
and develop and find out who they are then find a pleasant
transition for myself. I'm not quite in the old folks' home yet,
I've still got more to do.
You've been in the main event for a long time and have been an
ever-present. Do you think because you're always there people
take you for granted?
I think so - I think the uniqueness and the special things that
I bring to WWE is sometimes a little bit downplayed because you
see me every week. I think that's one of the things that will
happen to me eventually. I'm going to start not being on our
programming as much, not being on TV every week.
Hopefully when I do get a chance to come back, I'll be able to
have a little bit more impact and a little bit more fun. That's
part of what I should have been doing my whole career anyway. I
think quite frankly I have been on TV too much, but part of it
is necessity and part of it's ability.
"I'm able to work, I am able to get other talent over. I am able
to carry storylines. When you're good at what you do you're
going to work. That's a good thing. But from the standpoint of
being an attraction, sometimes too much isn't good. So it's a
difficult fine line.
"I've had a great career with it and been very happy, I'm not
complaining, but I think as I'm getting older - I'm 43 now - I
don't wanna be on the road five days a week anymore. I really
don't.
"It's one of those kind of things. I have time left on my
contract here and I'll work that out, and when that contract
ends I'll always be a part of WWE as long as they want me, but I
think I'll go into more of a limited role.
"Who knows? Maybe even go into commentating or something like
that. Maybe I could do pay-per-view commentating or something -
special event commentating. I've only got three moves! I've only
had three moves for 20 years so I don't think I can do much
more."
Talking commentary, I loved the promo you cut on Ryback the
other week on SmackDown - I couldn't stop laughing.
"I got to have fun with that. I'm trying to get some excitement
going because Ryback's had this injury, this staph infection
which is really serious. He's very positive and motivated on
being back for SummerSlam.
I thought it was fun and a gas with him to have some some fun
with the promo. It got a lot of good reception, so now knowing
my luck I'm going to have to do all kinds of promos... I'm my
own worst enemy."
As a man who's beaten The Beast what do you think of Brock
Lesnar vs The Undertaker at SummerSlam - I'm excited but some
people aren't as hot on it - what are your thoughts?
"You've got Lesnar - he's such a monster right now. He's coming
off the stuff he did in MMA in the UFC and how well he did
there, and the dominant Superstar he was before he left. Since
he came back they've done a really good job of making Lesnar
everything that he is.
"He is a tremendous athlete, a guy that is strong, fast and
powerful, and knows how to wrestle, and has a mean streak.
They've been able to capitalise on it and the biggest thing is
trying to find opponents for Lesnar that are credible. Let's
face it, you can't put Brock in the ring with just anybody. It's
got to be somebody credible or else everybody's going to know
right away that it's just not going to work.
"The fact that Lesnar broke The Streak, who is the only guy that
should have, or could have ever broken The Streak - personally I
would never have liked to see The Streak broken ever - but all
good things come to an end. The Streak got broken.
So now you have Undertaker who's making his comeback. I think
Undertaker's going to be hopefully a lot more involved, and
doing a lot more with us. So this should be exciting to see what
those two guys pull out at SummerSlam.
"You've got Undertaker who's without a doubt the greatest big
man of all time, versus Lesnar who's without a doubt one of the
best shooters of all time. So it's going to be really
interesting for me as a fan, as a friend of both of them to see
what kind of match they put on at SummerSlam. It should be
absolutely amazing."
As a man who was a serious player in WCW and the then-WWF, what
do you think of the way the history has been told by the winners
in the Monday Night Wars Vol 1 series and DVD?
"Yes - the winners always write the history books. That was a
magical time, because you had so many amazing Superstars,
especially in WWE. At the same time working every night you had
The Rock, 'Stone Cold' Steve Austin, The Undertaker, Kane, Mick
Foley, Triple H, APA, the Hardys, Edge and Christian, New Age
Outlaws - there was just so much talent in the ring at once.
"Everybody was comfortable with their characters and who they
were, and there was experience in there and it was just a great
time for everyone, because it was wide open. We were just making
the rules up as we went.
"As things mature and our company matures, and our brand
responsibility matures, we've become responsible to our audience
and younger viewers and stuff like that. The wild and crazy
Attitude Era stuff had served its purpose and went away.
"Now we're developing a whole new crop of talent. You've got
some amazing stars coming up now, Roman Reigns and Dean Ambrose
and Seth Rollins and Bray Wyatt and all these other guys.
There's a lot of guys that you haven't even seen yet that are
coming up through the developmental that in a few years you're
going to be talking about what fantastic stars they are.
"I'll be a footnote in history! The business goes through
evolution and for every guy that's a fantastic Superstar,
there's a lot of guys along the way that made him to help him
get to that point where he can carry the ball and make the
product better, make everybody better.
"My footnote in history, I'm gonna stick to it, whether anybody
likes it or not, I'm the greatest giant that's ever been in this
business and that's my attitude."
Does the WWE miss that competition it had from WCW - that guy
running at pace alongside you pushing you on?
"I think competition is the best thing for everyone. Competition
is what makes us evolve, from when we were itty bitty little
tadpoles in prehistoric times to what we've turned into now.
Competition makes us evolve and makes us push ourselves better.
The biggest problem right now is we did such a good of being
competitive that we really don't have any competition. We have
to create competition for ourselves within our own company - we
have our brands.
"There was competition between Raw and SmackDown, and now
there's NXT guys coming up which is stimulating a lot of the
other guys too. There's young, fresh talent coming up that's got
exciting ideas and creative matches and exciting characters so
it motivates a lot of us in the locker room to step up our game.
"I think everything runs in hills and valleys. I think that
Attitude Era was a magic time because there really was a good
versus evil - there really was somebody - there was competition.
Now you have to try to strive to put a better product out and
create your own competition.
"Who knows? Would it be great for the fans if there was another
production that could come along with the ingenuity and the
money and the way Vince built WWE, this incredible, global
product? Sure, that would be fantastic, but the way things are
now, I don't see how it's feasible.
"I really don't see how it's feasible with the limited talent
that's out there. With the entire billions of people on the
planet, there's probably only 100, 120 guys that are really good
at this - that are worth watching on TV. Out of the billions of
people in the world, that's pretty slim margins for being
successful."
Back to Vendetta, what was it like going head-to-head with Dean
Cain - Superman!
"It was fantastic working with Dean Cain, he's done so much
television and has so much experience. He's such a good dude to
work with, but this was a great character change for Dean Cain,
because he always plays the good guy, clean cut, pretty boy
role.
To come bat against me in Vendetta he gets a little bit dark.
It's a different side that I think fans haven't ever seen from
Dean Cain before. He gets really gritty and kind of grim.
"I know I walked on set one day and his hair was done up and it
didn't really look like Dean Cain - it look like some kind of
crazy guy. I think it was a lot of fun for him to dig into some
deeper character stuff and do something a little different for
him.
You've been a bad guy in the ring, but not like your role here -
18-rated in the UK - which is way beyond PG! What was it like
for you to go so dark?
"It was a little disturbing, to tell you the truth. My first big
film role was Knucklehead, which was a very comedic, loveable
character with a good heart. There's nothing likeable about
Victor Abbott, my character in Vendetta, nothing likeable about
him at all.
"He's a very vicious psychopath. Trust me, if you watch
Vendetta, you will not like my character in the first 10 minutes
of the movie. In the first 10 minutes of the movie you're gonna
want to kill me. It was pretty disturbing.
"We got to go a little bit higher in the rating with this. It's
directed by the Soska Twins, so there's a lot of blood and a lot
of violence and it was a change for me which is something I was
looking for.
"I don't get the chance to do a lot of films and TV like I want
to, so to try to show the difference between Knucklehead and
Vendetta was such a difference in character, so hopefully it
shows some range."
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