Former WWE Writer Talks Sheamus as Next Cena, Bryan, Vince, Storylines, TV-PG, Ryder, Brodus, etc

Last edited by King Silva on Sat 26 May 2012, 12:40 am; edited 1 time in total

Bobby posted an article in the women of wrestling section that only focused on the diva info but the following is all of the info and it is a LOT of info from that very same former writer:

So on the WWE board at GameFaqs.com, there’s a poster who worked as an assistant for the writing team from September to December last year and is giving away some neat insights about the day-to-day workings of the writing process and some tidbits on some of the stars and personalities. It seems legit; the detail of his work was pretty, uh, detailed, and he posted a pic of the office he worked out of and a couple of the one-sheets from the shows. Some of the information is obvious (Cena and Orton have backstage pull on their angles, etc.) but there have some some interesting things he’s revealed (Sheamus was the planned Rumble winner since the previous summer and not a last-second swerve as a result of Chris Jericho, D-Bry being against pairing up with AJ). I’ve gleamed some of the better bits from the topic and thought I’d pass them along since a common cry on the Blog of Doom is “What are they thinking?” And I think it at least beats a fantasy booking e-mail.

I’ve included a lengthy list, so feel free to cherry-pick. If you’re asking why I simply didn’t include a link to said forum, it’s because the WWE board is inaccessible to anyone who doesn’t have enough “karma” built up on the site to keep the trolls out. If this makes for a blog entry, I’d be more than happy to do a follow-up e-mail later on as the topic continues.

--

His duties:

“Mainly note-taking and updating many documents that helped the writers do their jobs. There was a document that had the last 6 episodes of Raw and Smackdown broken down by segment. Another that listed the ‘Last 5 Times’ something was done (like the belt being used as a weapon, or a chair being used, or interference in a match). That stuff had to be updated every week so the writers could refer to it whenever needed.

There was a ton of word processing basically. Each week to write the shows we would write the numbers 1 to 11 on the board (the segments of the shows) and just discuss the stories and where to put things. Then I or another assistant would create a "one sheeter" out of those. Basically list each segment and a few bullet points of what they would consist of. The writers would then use this as a guideline to write the scripts.

The writing team is divided into a home team that stays in Stamford, and a road team that travels to all the shows. Unfortunately I was on the home team. My only backstage experience was at Survivor Series which was pretty dope.”

--

On who he answered to:

“Probably Brian Gewirtz, who was my true boss. If the writers told me one thing and Brian said another, Brian's word goes. Always.”

--

On scripting promos and on-the-fly changes:

“Cena has been known to throw the script out and do his own thing on occasion. I'm sure Punk does occasionally. Ziggler has gone off script a time or two and was reprimanded for it. It's hard to tell for me because the writing process is sort of an assembly line. We wrote the outline and first drafts of the script in Stamford after approval by Vince, then they'd go to the head writers and always through at least three more drafts. Then there'd be another meeting with Vince on location at the arena the morning of every show. More changes are made. Then there's last minute changes that are made with so little notice that they don't even have time to be put down on paper. Then of course someone may go out in front of the crowd and forget part of their lines, or choose to improvise for whatever reason. But the bulk of that happened outside of my view. So most times the Raw that aired monday was very different than the one that left the offices the week before, and I didn't always know where the changes occurred.”

On backstage pull:

“About as much input as you would expect. Orton, Punk and especially Cena have a lot of say in their stories I think. After Survivor Series, Cena felt he shouldn't lose clean again (or preferably at all) until Wrestlemania, and so he didn't. When Jericho was in talks of coming back, it was under the conditions that he work with Punk and put him over at Wrestlemania (Jericho's demands, not WWE's). He also came up with the light bright jacket thing and paid for it himself (I heard $10g for the first one). Cody Rhodes said in a recent interview that he had his leather vest cape thing custom made and paid for it himself, so I guess to a certain degree the wrestlers are responsible for their own characters. But on the other hand, Daniel Bryan complained a lot about being put into a story with AJ because his last girlfriend storyline with Gail Kim was so bad, but he couldn't really do anything about it.

So I guess you could say it varies quite a bit.”

--

On the tag and Divas divisions:

“The thing with Vince is he goes through these weird and seemingly random phases. For a while he'll be into the tag division, then he couldn't care less. He'll want to do Diva storylines, then he doesn't care if they make it on the show at all. He'll hire someone like Tamina and not do crap with them for years, then one day ask "Why aren't we doing anything with Tamina Snuka? She's a Snuka goddammit!" and Tamina will get a random push.

Right now I guess he's in the mood for some attention on the tag division.”

--

On HHH and Stephanie:

“Triple H is super cool. I actually met him in the men’s room. While he was washing his hands I nervously introduced myself and he took a second to stop, look me in the eye, say good to meet you and make sure he got my full name right. Also from my understanding he was the voice of reason that would reel in many of Vince's crazy ideas in the meetings.

Steph is very nice also, but does have a tendency to stare at you in a sort of psychotic-looking manner. But she's friendly and jokes around and tries to know everyone's name.

They're just normal people really.”

--

On the anonymous GM:

“There were a few directions they were considering. The obvious one being Vince, but they also were heavily considering JBL. But Vince killed the story. In fact at one point when the head writers pushed him to at least tie up the loose end some how, Vince suggested to reveal that it was Laurinaitis all along in a "throwaway line backstage."

The whole thing was dropped though. When Vince stops caring about something, it's dead.”

--

On FCW:

“Sure there was a booklet that had bios of the "top talent" of FCW. We would also get weekly FCW DVD's of the latest show which were available for whoever had time to watch them, but any decisions as far as new talent debuts or anything like that were done by Talent Development, which Triple H is in charge of together with Matt Martolaro, former FCW announcer.

But on occasion we would have a task like "We need a list of the top 5 choices for names for Donny Marlow." And we discussed as a group and put our favorites on the board. They had to be cleared by the legal team to make sure we could trademark them. Marlow and Hunico themselves liked Camacho best, so Camacho it became.

I remember seeing paperwork for Ryback 's debut plan. It included the design of his attire as well as storyboards for his vignettes, but I guess they decided not to do the vignettes.

That's the thing about the place, and about TV in general I guess, it's so so SO fluid. Things change constantly and at last minute and you have to learn to just go with it.”

--

On Punk at Survivor Series:

“I can tell you a CM Punk story from Survivor Series. Punk was warming up because his match was coming up soon. He was jogging in place and such backstage psyching himself up. MSG is a relatively small arena backstage, so things were a bit cramped. About 20 feet away Miz and Truth were about to pre-tape their backstage interview with Matt Striker (who btw purposely opens his stance up so he's shorter than the people he interviews).

The PA asked everyone to quiet down so Miz and Truth could record there thing. It's at this moment that Punk starts doing box jumps. While everyone else is silent, he's jumping loudly on and off a storage crate. The PA comes over and says something like "I'm sorry Punk but we're trying to tape this thing. Could you please keep it down?"

Punk says nothing, continues jogging in place but turns over to Miz and Truth and flips them off.

I think he was just joking around, but he did seem like kind of a douche.”

--

On Kane’s re-masking and feuding with Cena instead of Henry:

“From what I can recall, though Kane was taken out by Mark Henry, Glenn Jacobs did not want to come back and feud with him for whatever reason. So they instead had him return on RAW and go after Cena, though I think it was already planned when he was written off with the broken ankle that he would come back with the mask.

However the design of the outfit, as well as the look and filming of the vignettes teasing his return were both done by other departments and had nothing to do with the writers. We were as anxious to see what he would look like when he returned as everyone else.”

--

On the Natalya Neidhart “farting” gimmick:

“We used to make fun of Natalya a lot because from what we heard she had kind of an eccentric personality. It was in good fun though and not malicious, but at some point the "Nattie Neidfart" joke came up and we had a good laugh talking about stupid stuff like changing her move to the "shartshooter." Several weeks later when I was already fired and the story actually made it to TV my jaw dropped and I cracked up. You'd be surprised how much stuff is done just as a rib on people.”

--

On Daniel Bryan:

“Everyone knew that DB would not hold the briefcase until Wrestlemania. I don't know why that became part of his story, but likely it was a promise he could break later to facilitate a heel turn. I heard that Bryan winning MitB was actually a last minute same-day decision. From what I could tell, nobody had much faith in Bryan as a draw while he was a face. Bryan almost had to turn heel, because he wasn't very good at giving face promos. When he first won the championship and started cutting promos still as a face, he would emphasize the wrong parts and say things in the wrong tone. It actually came out kind of obnoxious and heelish, which probably encouraged the decision to turn him. However when he became champion, Vince and the writing team wanted to do a very "sophisticated" and slow-burn gradual heel turn which obviously worked wonderfully. I think they had a lot of fun with that story. I remember something in the notes that came in once that said something like

* From now on, when Daniel Bryan wins any match he should celebrate like it's the biggest victory of his life

This is was when he was right in the middle of the gradual heel turn and that's where YES! was born.”

--

On Nash/Punk/HHH:

“It was Nash not being medically cleared to compete by the time he was supposed to face Punk. The writers had to scramble and think of a reason to stall the story, and then it became Kevin Nash vs. Triple H. Again the story took on a life of its own and they had to go through with the feud, even though it was pretty clear Nash had nothing to offer. Instead of Big Daddy Cool, he was screaming all of his promos. His ring abilities were shoddier than ever. So it was decided Nash and Trips would have one blow off match and we'd be done with Kevin Nash on the show. Punk vs. Nash almost happened on RAW a few times, just to tie up the loose end, but I think they didn't want Nash competing a big match before his match with Triple H so it never happened.”

--

On Brodus Clay’s gimmick change:

“The whole writing team was under the impression that Brodus would come back as the monster heel depicted in the vignettes. It was Vince who saw things differently. When the vignettes were already airing and the writing team asked him when they should debut Brodus, Vince said something like "What's his character? We don't have anything for him. I don't understand who Brodus Clay is. Let's hold off on his debut until we have a better idea."

Backstage it was well known that Brodus has a lot of charisma, loves kids and is a great talker. Vince decided he wanted Brodus as a face, and for some reason, despite Brodus having no dancing ability, he wanted Brodus to dance.

They worked on the gimmick for weeks, mainly down in FCW (as dark segments I assume). All of it was completely out of the writers hands and was probably handled by Talent Development instead. The reason his debut was teased so much was because at first we thought he was ready, then Vince would decide he isn't ready yet. His ring work isn't up to par, or the choreography isn't good enough, or the outfit needs work still, or the whole production needs more time, or the timing is off. All kinds of stuff like that.

When Brodus finally debuted, the writers came into work the next day and the reaction was as mixed as it was [on the IWC]. Some thought it was cheesy and a disaster, some thought it was fun and entertaining, some thought it just needed time to get over.

In the end, it was a way more fun and original idea to make him the Funkasaurus than generic monster heel #622978 I think.

Although admittedly after a while we had Laurinaitis tease Brodus's debut just to get him heat. There was an idea that Brodus would debut as a monster, but then turn on Laurinaitis and break out the dancing character. Or that Laurinaitis would be under the impression that he was bringing in a monster, only to be dismayed when Brodus shows up dancing. There were a few possibilities, but they ultimately decided to drop Brodus and Johnny's connection all together.”

--

On Zack Ryder’s depush:

“I didn't feel that the writers had anything against Ryder really. I think Gewirtz feels that he's a natural underdog, and that's why people like him. The moment you give him too much exposure or success, he's no longer an underdog and becomes annoying so they try to stick to that.

Any personal feelings that stop someone from getting more success probably come from Vince himself. Absolutely no major plot points, no title wins or face/heel turns get on TV without Vince's approval.”

--

On planning for the Royal Rumble:

“The winner is determined months in advance usually, but it's always subject to change. The way they usually book is that they set up the main events for PPVs all the way from now until next Wrestlemania. They then work backwards between PPVs to develop the storylines on RAW and SD. There's a document that charts the main events, but a lot of the stuff ends up changing. When I flipped through this document in September, Sheamus was already scheduled to win the Rumble, but he was also supposed to take on Mark Henry for the WHC at Wrestlemania. But things happen. Henry got injured and had to drop the title, Bryan cashed in and became a phenomenon, etc. Del Rio was supposed to take on Orton, but he got injured as well. Sin Cara and Mysterio, same deal. So most of the stuff they had planned did not actually come to fruition. And even before the Rumble there was lots of consideration about making the winner Jericho instead since they knew they wanted Jericho to take on Punk at Wrestlemania. I think ultimately it was decided that Sheamus needs a Rumble victory more than Jericho, and Jericho could get to Wrestlemania by other means.

As for the specifics, Michael Hayes does most of it with some of the agents. They plan the list of participants, then work on the order and some of the big spots. The reason it was 30 people and not 40 again this year was because the roster was so thin because of so many injuries. Hell even with 30 they had to resort to guys like Jey Uso and Michael Cole.”

--

On Sheamus as the next Cena and a Cena heel turn:

“Sheamus is being built as the next John Cena. Which is a good thing, because it will free up Cena to do other things in the future, like turn heel. Kids love Sheamus. He moves merch. He's good at press appearances and talk shows and junk. He's the best possible candidate to replace Cena as the top babyface. As far as the man personally, I don't remember hearing anything interesting. He's just a loyal hardworking guy. Last I heard he wanted to add a cloverleaf as another finishing move.

From what I've heard, Cena would LOVE to turn heel. The Thuganomics character was a lot more like his real persona, and I know he feels limited by being a face. It's the company and Vince that doesn't want to take the leap until they have an established replacement for him, which is most likely Sheamus. It's not just the show itself, but they need someone that can do all the Make A Wish stuff, the PR appearances, the sponsorships, etc that Cena does. Cena works his ass off for the company, and nobody else even comes close right now. So there's a lot of things lost in turning him heel.”

--

On the planning process from September onward:

“Tough question to answer. Like I said they had a very skeleton idea of the major feuds and matches all the way through to Wrestlemania. They always work backwards from the PPV card to book the Raws and Smackdowns in-between, so they always know what the end goal is. As far as specifics of matches and promos, that's usually a week by week basis, with the team planning one week ahead of real time. Some feuds that were story-heavy, like Cena vs. Kane, would sometimes have "grids" which is basically a chart with four columns representing the four weeks until the next PPV. Writers were encouraged to work in that grid style, keeping in mind how one week relates to the next, rather than winging it week by week.”

--

On the sanitized TV-PG product:

“A lot of the restrictions nowadays are not so much about PG vs Non-PG but because the world has gotten more aware and more critical about health and sports as a whole. For example, whereas blood was rampant in the Attitude era, now if someone bleeds they practically stop the match and have a cut doctor with gloves work on them. This is not because of PG, but because of higher concerns over hepatitis and things like that that are tied to legal issues about workplace risks and red tape like that. Same goes for chair shots to the head. Has nothing to do with PG, but with society up in arms about concussions and life threatening head injuries in the NFL and anywhere else.

However PG was a roadblock on a few occasions. For example in the Cena vs. Kane story, we were told that lighting anyone on fire was not PG and was not a possibility, and even lighting any THING on fire was unlikely to be approved. When you're dealing with a Kane story that's kind of a kick in the balls.”

--

On the writers as a group:

“The writers are a lot like [the IWC]. They want stories to be entertaining, deep, and make sense. But sometimes their plans are derailed by what Vince wants to do. Sometimes they're so busy working on the main storylines that the midcard guys like Primo and Epico fall through the cracks without having a storyline for weeks. They're doing their best. And I believe Vince has always been the way he is.

You gotta realize that Vince has lived and breathed this company for 30 years. It's all he thinks about, so he's a very unusual guy and very disconnected from the "real world." He has no time to watch TV. He has no idea whats going on in pop culture. He's never seen most major movies of the last 40 years that everyone has seen. Like I remember making a reference to The Shining, and Brian Gewirtz said "I can guarantee you that Vince has never seen The Shining." He has to have other people explain these things to him because all he knows is the WWE.”

http://www.rspwfaq.net/2012/05/behind-scenes-at-wwe-part-deux.html

On the interview process and pay:
"Pay was $13 an hour with time and a half for overtime, and there was lots and lots of overtime. I worked 50-60 hours every week.

Interviews were pretty typical. They asked me questions about past job experiences, why I wanted to work for WWE, and made sure I knew the high demands I was getting myself into. I don't think a degree would be enough necessarily. The other writer's assistants got in because they had a good amount of TV experience. One of them, the oldest, used to be Howard Stern's personal assistant for a few years. Another worked on Maury. Another worked for ESPN. I had an internship at CNBC while in college, have a documentary that's played around the world (rather not divulge it) and had some people put in a good word. Plus I was hired by a clueless dude as stated earlier. But a big part of interviews is also just being clean-cut, professional and charismatic and acting like someone that people would want to work with."

--

On if he hid his WWE fandom when interviewed:
"No on the contrary. I wrote "Life-long WWE fan" on my resume and brought a picture of myself at age 10 dressed up as Kane to show the interviewers. I had three interviews, two of which were just normal HR corporate people who didn't really know anything about the product and didn't recognize Kane in the photo so they were just mildly amused. The third interview, and the guy who probably made the decision to hire me, was by a guy who was head of Creative or something at the time. However by the time I actually started working he had already been let go, and from what I heard from coworkers he was pretty much wildly incompetent and knew nothing about the product. So it was probably kind of a fluke that I got hired at all."

--

On meeting Vince:
"Yes I met Vince on one occasion. I was leaving work for the evening and bumped into him at the elevators. I was sort of blindsided and blurted out "Hi Vince!" instead of Mr. McMahon but he didn't seem to mind. I introduced myself as a new writer's assistant and he shook my hand. We shared an elevator down and he said something like "Welcome aboard. You know we need a lot of smart minds in that writer's room" and I said yes sir. I said that it was a dream come true to be working there and I was a fan since I was 6 years old. That made him smile and he said "Thank you." He got off to leave and since then I only caught a few glimpses of him backstage at Survivor Series. Seeing him in the halls of the building is like seeing a Mewtwo."

--

On Vince's presence at shows:
"Vince goes to every TV taping and has for the last however many thousands of years. I remember a note coming in towards the end of my run there that Vince may start not going to every single show soon, and that was groundbreaking news. I'm not completely sure but I think Triple H travels with Vince every time.

Vince was very close to coming back on TV at one point around the Kevin Nash conspiracy text message crap, and even facing Punk in a match on RAW, but changed his mind and decided to remain off TV."

--

On Triple H:
"Triple H gets a ton of undeserved heat. I've never heard of him changing feuds purposely to get more attention, or burying guys because of a vendetta against them. I don't think he gives a crap. He has a day-to-day job at Titan Tower as head of Talent Development. He's there every day in a suit and tie. His concerns these days are with developing FCW talent and bringing them up in the best way possible. And when Vince has a crazy idea, Triple H is often the voice of reason in the meetings. In my time there I got the impression that the storylines will make much more sense when Triple H inherits the reigns. The IWC should consider him a friend, not a foe.
The only thing is that Triple H vs. Undertaker at Wrestlemania 28 was locked in stone, and no one was gonna tell Vince or Triple H otherwise."

--

On how the writers view wrestlers:
"The writers don't usually have strong feelings for or against any particular guys. They're just characters in the fiction that they're writing. Although some guys have a reputation for being crappy ring workers, like Mason Ryan and Zeke Jackson. But on other people opinions are usually mixed. For example, I never gave a crap about Ted DiBiase, but one of the writers really liked him for some reason. Though ultimately it all just comes down to making a good show. They realize that they're responsible to serve all the characters on their roster, with first priority being the talented ones who can work storylines and draw. So when Barrett was doing nothing for a while in early September, there came a point where they said "Alright, we're not using Wade to his full potential." The Barrett Barrage became a story, Wade got a win streak and was pushed back into the limelight for a time until his injury."

--

On proposed angles that were rejected or dropped:
"Hm the first one that comes to mind was kind of a joke. With the tag division in pathetic shape, Brian Gewirtz suggested to throw Tyson Kidd and Heath Slater together as a tag team and call them The Rock and Roll Kids. We all kind of laughed about it but he even pitched it to Vince. Vince didn't go for it.

There was brief discussion of some wilder ideas, like making Mason Ryan gay or giving Alex Riley a long-term storyline where he fakes having cancer to get sympathy from the crowd. Both of these never made it anywhere.

Kaitlyn was supposed to be the third heel diva to join Beth and Natalya in the Divas of Doom. They even went so far as to have her turn on AJ at Smackdown, but due to poor planning the segment was really poorly done. Kaitlyn, Beth and Natalya didn't really know what to do and it didn't look good so it was edited out of the show and planned to be re-done the following week. However some other Diva drama came up backstage or whatever, leading to the whole division being kind of in the doghouse in Vince's mind. Vince ultimately decided there didn't need to be a third heel diva at all, and broke up Divas of Doom soon after before deciding to push Tamina.

Ziggler and Swagger breaking up was teased at first, but Vince told us to drop it and keep them together.

There was talks for a long time of Layla returning with an eccentric fashion-centered gimmick in the style of Lady Gaga, but obviously that didn't happen.

When Punk was feuding with Del Rio we had an idea of having Del Rio cutting a promo, when someone dressed up as a WWE ice cream bar comes out from the back. Del Rio assumes its Punk and beats him up, but then tears off the costume to reveal that its Ricardo tied up with tape over his mouth, and it was just a scheme by Punk to mess with Del Rio. It didn't make much logical sense and never made it to air.

A few of us wanted Cody to go absolutely batshit psychotic after his mask was destroyed and be more of a loose canon character I guess like how Dean Ambrose is. Instead he went back to being regular heel Cody. I'm not sure why.

There were some plans to have Drew McIntyre feud with Sheamus by having Drew bully Sheamus with a picture of him as a little fat kid. There was also a lot of background with them because they wrestled together in the indys but it never got off the ground.

Hunico introduced Primo and Epico and Camacho and the initial plan was to form a stable, but Vince was concerned that it was too gang-like and racist and split them up pretty quick.

At the time I left, the idea was for Zeke's losing streak to culminate in a heel turn, but that's yet to happen.

There was an idea to having something that makes the Usos stand apart -- one idea was that Jimmy could be really smart and Jey could be really stupid.

They were considering doing a relationship between a face Diva and a heel superstar. I believe the frontrunner was Kelly Kelly with Wade Barrett, but that never happened."

--

On meeting Superstars and personalities:
"I had a brief interaction with John Morrison backstage at Survivor Series. I introduced myself awkwardly saying my name was John as well. It was right before he was planning to leave, while I (constantly) was afraid of getting fired any day now. So he said something like "One of us won't be here anymore in a few weeks!" and I said "Maybe two of us" and he said "Nah you'll be fine! You have a great name!"

I also saw Sin Cara without his mask backstage (spoilers: looks like a mexican guy). I speak spanish so I wished him good luck. That was the night his knee exploded >_>

I shook Mark Henry's hand, which is an enormous mass of muscle.

I was ten feet away from The Rock cutting his (completely live btw) backstage promo at Survivor Series. There was a large crowd of crew watching him backstage completely in awe as he went through the whole thing. Backstage promos are usually pre-taped during the show, but Rock insisted on doing it live so he could interact with the crowd.

Personally from what I saw at Survivor Series Punk is kind of antisocial. He may very well be a decent guy too, but I wouldn't call him approachable.

I saw Michael Hayes regularly. He's funny as hell. I had John Laurinaitis call me into his office to clear something up with me. I saw John on a few occasions and he was always really nice. He would occasionally pop into the writer's room just to say hello.

I think Undertaker was backstage at a Raw in Texas just to say hi to people. He was bald with a long grey sort of wizard beard, which I was really hoping he'd have at Wrestlemania but no dice. I didn't see him as I didn't travel, but I heard it from the writers who went."

--

On being backstage at Survivor Series:
"You're encouraged to introduce yourself and meet everybody, but everything was so hectic and everyone so busy that I was very hesitant to interrupt most people. I only approached guys who were standing around and not doing much at the time. I was told that even if you think no one is paying attention to you, it doesn't go unnoticed when you fail to introduce yourself. That being said I did shake the hand of many of the agents including Dustin Runnels, Arn Anderson, and Bill DeMott who gave me the nicest warmest smile and greeting I could imagine.

But yeah there's a huge amount of people. If it was a RAW or better yet a Smackdown taping I would've been more willing to interrupt people, but it was a big 4 PPV. For christ's sake, The Rock was walking around backstage. Tension was high."

--

On the HHH/Awesome Truth conspiracy angle:
"You're right, it was a mess and the writers knew it, but by that point they kind of had written themselves into a corner. There's times where ideas take on a life of their own and you just kind of have to see them through and try to end them and forget them. This was definitely one of those times. I don't really remember if there was more to it than what made it on TV.

However I thought Awesome Truth was really entertaining, and their run-in at Hell in a Cell was awesome. The walk-out on Triple H didn't make much sense, but it made for captivating TV for two weeks. Sometimes that's the only goal."

--

On Cena's work:
"Anybody who calls Cena lazy doesn't know the first thing about him. The guy is a freakin workhorse and model employee. Him saying he's not changing for anybody is just his character right now. It doesn't mean he'll never turn heel ever ever ever. As far as complaining about his cheesy promos, millions of people love them so the WWE doesn't give a crap. And this is just speculation, but I believe he used to limit his moveset in the ring to limit the risk of injury -- since losing Cena to injury would be a huge wrench in everything. However I think he's been doing much better in the last couple of years than in the late 2000s."

--

On other wrestlers who go the extra mile for WWE:
"I think Miz and Sheamus are two guys who are willing to do anything WWE asks of them, in the ring and out. You'll notice whenever there's a wrestler on a talk show or doing some kind of promotion, it's usually one of them because they're just good at it and willing to do it. Guys like Punk and Orton would never want to do these things."

--

On the TV-PG direction:
"WWE is always looking to expand. They want to be a large media company, that makes movies, has a network, etc. This kind of expansion needs money. And making money is made harder when there's a segment of the population that thinks you're trash TV or not suitable for children. Children is how most media companies make money."

--

On how the company views TNA:
"I don't think anyone at WWE really thinks about TNA or has time to care about what they're doing. They're not real competition, and they have a very different approach to wrestling that WWE. WWE aspires to always be as sophisticated and professional as possible in their presentation. They want to be grandiose and mainstream, not appeal to a niche. Not to say there's anything wrong with TNA's approach, it's just not what WWE is trying to do."

--

On smarks:
"Smarks are seen as a minority that usually shouldn't be listened to -- which from a business standpoint is sort of true. Dirtsheets are sort of laughed at because they're wrong all the time. Most of what's on dirstheets is just news aggregated from press releases or superstar twitter accounts. A small portion is speculative stuff about backstage stuff and most of that is total BS. Dirtsheets are an ad-revenue based business so they do what they gotta do to get eyes on their sites - including making stuff up. I think if there were real insiders, surprises like Brodus's debut or Brock's would be spoiled well in advance.

I think the writers like to stick to their own ideas until the possibility to make money rears its head. Like when an entire arena is chanting YES YES YES -- they go ahead and make a new t-shirt.

But like I said the writers are wrestling fans themselves. They love a great Tyson Kidd match as much as the next smark, but they also know that putting him on RAW against Heath Slater is gonna make the ratings nosedive for that segment.

As for the last question, as much as the writers may hate to admit it they are smarks themselves, so they get a kick out of some smarky things. For example Santino's joke a few months ago about repealing the rule instated by Jack Tunney about not allowing reptiles at ringside. That came straight from Brian Gewirtz because he always thought that was a funny rule. Most non-smarks wouldn't get that reference at all."

--

On dirtsheet sources:
"No idea who the "sources" were. I wondered that a lot while I worked there. It certainly wasn't anyone that I worked with on the writing team. Could possibly some dot com guys or crew people that got second hand knowledge of upcoming storylines. Most of what's on the dirtsheets is made up bullcrap though. Very rarely does a true backstage story make it out. When you hear something like "The original plan was to have so and so win, but a last minute change..." that's almost always completely wrong."

--

On the writers' reaction when a heel is cheered or face is booed:
"I think it's just part of the business. Also the writers are well aware that there are smark cities and mark cities, so they have a good idea of the kind of reaction certain things will get in certain places. Occasionally they're completely wrong though. Many of them expected Zack Ryder to get heavily booed at Survivor Series because "New Yorkers hate Long Islanders" but they couldn't have been more wrong."

--

On bad pitches:
"I don't know about pitches really because I was never in the room for the Vince meetings where things were pitched to him. However if the writers thought it was a bad idea, it would never get pitched to Vince in the first place. The bad ideas that make it on TV are often coming from Vince himself."

--

On the writers' involvement with the WWE Network:
"I even brought that up one time like "Who exactly is going to write and work on all these shows on the new network?" and my coworkers didn't really know. I assume the plan was/is to bring in new writers to work on those shows -- specifically ones with lots of reality TV production experience. But to this day I have no real idea what part of the company was working on the network. There was a lot of the left hand not knowing what the right hand was doing at WWE."

--

On any writers left over from the Attitude Era:
"Gewirtz and Ed Koskey. I'm not sure when Dave Kapoor started, but they're the oldest. Everyone else has been around less than three years. Most less than one."

--

On NXT:
"NXT is written every week by only two writers, and they pretty much have free reign to do whatever they want, so they had a lot of fun with the whole Maxin/Bateman/Curtis soap opera. I remember people questioning when the season would end. At one point the 100th episode in Las Vegas was supposed to be the end, with Bateman and Maxine getting married, but it kept going after that for some reason.

I don't know much else, but the road team writer that worked on NXT was always praising Bateman, Maxine and Curtis for their talents and enthusiasm. They all loved working together. You gotta remember that although NXT and Superstars are just web shows in America, they do air on TV internationally and actually pull good ratings in some parts of the world."

--

On the Divas:
"The biggest complainers are probably the Divas, and rightfully so. They always wish they were getting more TV time and longer matches and I can't blame them. Daniel Bryan as I stated before complained a lot about the girlfriend story with AJ, but I bet he ain't complaining now.

The divas all seem very nice and friendly. I only managed to introduce myself to AJ backstage at Survivor Series. She was sweet and introduced herself as April. Beth, Natalya and Alicia walked by me on a few occasions backstage and smiled or nodded professionally."

--

On Kharma:
"By the time I started Kharma had already left for several months for her pregnancy, so I don't know what they had in mind long term. They were probably playing it by ear and seeing what kind of reaction she got.

I remember hearing about her miscarriage way before it made it to the dirtsheets. Like months before. When we'd try to find out when she'd be back, the answer we'd get would basically be that she's on an indefinite personal leave until further notice."

--

On Randy Orton:
"Don't know much about Orton. I get the impression that he too is a joker that messes around with people, but pretty reserved like his on screen character. The only thing I saw him do backstage at Survivor Series was take pictures with a family that was brought backstage for some reason. Also I heard a story from some random RAW/SD where Orton was waiting in gorilla to go out for his match up next, right behind the curtain. In gorilla is usually Vince, Triple H, the agent of the match, sometimes Stephanie and a writer or two if they're not busy doing something else. Anyway Orton's getting ready to go out, and he turns his back to everyone and starts peeing in a trash can in gorilla. Triple H is like "Randy what the hell are you doing?" and he just shrugs and says "I always get the urge to pee before I go out."

--

On Jinder Mahal:
"Well I guess he was brought in for the Indian audiences, though his storyline with Khali and Ranjin Singh (played by Raw head writer Dave Kapoor) was kinda dropped. I guess Jinder is one of those guys that Vince saw something in. I remember we would get notes from meetings with him on the road that would say like

* From now on VKM wants Jinder to speak only in Punjabi
then a few weeks later he cuts a promo in english, then we'd get a note like

* VKM says Jinder should always speak in an indian accent
and then that wouldn't last very long either.

*Jinder Mahal will start wearing a turban to the ring
The last Jinder-related note I remember was

* VKM wants Jinder to put his turban in a glass case before his match.
So these ideas all coming from Vince, I think it was safe to assume Vince saw a lot of potential in the Jinder character as an anti-american heel."

--

On other random superstars that he was asked about:
"Christian- It's acknowledged that he's getting older and is probably best served to put over younger talent at this point in his career. He does have a rep for complaining when he feels he's not being used right.

Curt Hawkins - Respected for being good at his position. He's a good jobber because he bumps well and makes guys look good.

Evan Bourne- Evan Bourne was kind of a hush hush topic. The head writers didn't really tell us much about what was going on with him until it was pretty public knowledge that he had fucked up twice. But lots of people fuck up twice. Evan just had the misfortune of breaking his ankle right as he was gearing up to come back.

The Great Khali- When Henry was champion there was a point where he was supposed to feud with Khali, but his injuries threw a wrench into the whole story and he dropped the belt. But I wouldn't be surprised if Khali gets pushed again one day.

Hunico- I think it was at a Smackdown taping where there were a number of heels in the ring cutting a promo. During a commercial break, Vince told them via headset to give the mic to Hunico, just to see what he could do on the fly without warning. Hunico cut a good promo off the top of his head and that really impressed Vince. I think he's been in Vince's good graces ever since.

Jack Swagger- Swagger is complicated. I got the impression that nobody had much faith in him on the mic, and though his character is obviously stale and has degenerated to jobber status, at the time that I was at WWE the roster was very thin. People kept getting injured and no new stars were coming in. So we kind of needed someone in Swagger's position -- a big guy who looks like a serious competitor but can be beaten to make someone else looks good. And like I said earlier, Vince had no intention of splitting up Ziggler and Swagger, so a face turn was not in the cards for the time being. Quick story about Swagger. On the Muppets episode of RAW after he lost to Santino, Swagger kicked the glass beaker out of frustration. It flew into the barricade and smashed on a little girl and her father. WWE took them backstage to check on them and apologize, they met a bunch of superstars and Swagger apologized personally. The father left extremely satisfied with the professionalism of the company and a potential lawsuit was avoided.

JTG- He's a good jobber and makes guys look good. But I remember he got in big trouble for pulling Tamina's hair during some random NXT promo. WWE doesn't even want to think about man-on-woman violence on the program.

Mark Henry- He was doing great and Smackdown ratings were up noticeably while he was champion, but he was working injured and then got even more injured to the point that they had to make him drop the title. One day the writers came back from the weekly meeting with Vince and said "Welp, Daniel Bryan is gonna cash in and win this Sunday"

The Miz- I got the impression they didn't really know what to do with Miz a lot of the time. I don't know much about his situation now. Maybe Vince is pissed at him. I'm sure the writers couldn't care less and don't have any vendetta. It's a bummer though, because I'm personally a Miz fan.

Sin Cara- I think in general people like Hunico better than Sin Cara because Hunico came up through our own farming system and is very familiar with the WWE style. Sin Cara as has been brought up many times before had a lot of trouble adapting to the American style of wrestling. Also he was a bit of a puss, as he would often complain of some nagging injury. His neck or his shoulder or whatever. There was always something with him. But he's a god in Mexico, and we just started going to Mexico a few times a year, so to have anyone else but Sin Cara play Sin Cara on a permanent basis would get them eaten alive. I think WWE still feels theres tons of money to be made off Sin Cara, but I'm a big Hunico fan personally."

--

On feuds within the company:
"Not among wrestlers. I heard that Cena and Rock aren't huge fans of each other, but they're professional about it. Like I've stated before Gewirtz doesn't like Paul Heyman because of some history they have. I hear the Divas all mostly hate each other and are very catty and competitive because Diva TV time is so sparse. Don't know much else."

--

On Vince's treatment of Jim Ross:
"It's clear that Vince has something against JR, but nobody knows why. Vince got a big kick out of any opportunity to embarrass JR on TV, but Jim is always a good sport about it. I remember nobody wanting to be the one that gets on the phone with JR because he'll talk your ear off for two hours. I think some people think JR was a better EVP of Talent Relations that Laurinaitis is."

--

On the reaction to the Cranky Vince twitter feed:
"Yes I first learned about it while working there and we would laugh about it all the time because Vince can be like that sometimes. He says "GODDAMMIT" a lot from what I hear. However the consensus is that it's probably a former writer, because they know a lot of stuff only insiders would know but it doesn't really match what's currently happening in real time. So I think it's just an ex-writer guessing."

--

On anyone not on TV that the company is high up on:
"Good question, but no one really comes to mind. Of the FCW group, I know there's high expectations for Husky Harris and Bo Rotundo as well as Richie Steamboat. One writer based out of Baltimore was friends with Calvin Raines so he's been rooting for him. I think Seth Rollins is looked down on a bit as an indy darling, but it's not serious. The Baltimore based writer also watched TNA pretty regularly, and often said he wished WWE raided them for talent. Specifically Bobby Roode and James Storm."

--

On dark matches and house shows:
"The agents script house shows. Usually one of them is assigned to book and run the whole show. They used to send us reports via email after every house show. One of my favorites was -- I think maybe from Arn Anderson -- "Alex Riley went out for his match, slipped on the turnbuckle while going up for his taunt, and that was the best part of the match"

Dark matches seem to be reserved for developmental talent nowadays and matches on Superstars usually just comes down to who isn't being used that night on RAW/SD."

--

On if the writers dislike the gimmick PPV format:
"I'm sure some of them do, but its completely out of their hands. It's ultimately (I'm assuming) a business decision. Giving each PPV a gimmick makes it special and gives you a reason to buy, unlike the generic ones where buyrates can vary wildly based on feuds. They probably want to create some sort of predictability in their business model. For example there's already low expectations for any December PPV because people usually splurge on Survivor Series and then save their money for holiday shopping and the Royal Rumble."

--

On the possibility of Slammy awards and fan polls being rigged:
"Online and TV polls are 100% real. They're pretty honest with all that stuff. The viewer polls are real, and that glitch or mistake in the accounting system was real. I don't think it'll be a problem. The script will just say like "CHRISTIAN vs. [VIEWERS CHOICE]" or something like that. It's not a big deal. They'll probably decide on the fly who wins, or already have finishes planned for each of the possible opponents."

--

On any ideas he had that were successful:
"My responsibilities were not really to be creative. I was welcome to throw in my 2 cents on discussions and brainstorms, but I didn't write anything. I was mostly just the creative team's bitch. However there are two things that made it to TV I can take credit for. When the Slammys were coming up and we were given the task to come up with names for the awards, I'm the one that threw out "Game Changer of the Year" which everybody liked and eventually made it to air. For the montage for Pipebomb of the Year, an email was sent out asking us to reply with some of our favorite quotes from the past year and a couple of mine got in. The only one I remember is R-Truth saying "THE GRITS ARE GON HIT THE PAN!"

Also on my last week working there, I suggested combining a Miz vs. Truth and Sheamus vs. Somebody match into one tag team match. Leading to Sheamus teaming up with R-Truth, which to my knowledge had never occurred before or since. Pretty minor things, I know."

--

On any of his ideas that he wished were approved:
"Probably turning Swagger or Miz face. Or bringing up Brad Maddox. I pitched an idea for a love triangle between AJ, Zack Ryder and eventually AJ's "old boyfriend" played by Brad Maddox. This was way before the AJ/Daniel Bryan storyline."

--

On his favorite and least favorite memories during his tenure:
"Greatest memory was probably meeting Vince in the elevator, or some of the moments from Survivor Series. Watching the Rock cut his promo live. Standing around backstage with some of the superstars watching the matches on a big TV. Little things like at one point I was given the task to fetch Stephanie her iPad while she was in gorilla and she gave me a smile and a thank you when I handed it to her.

Least favorite memory is probably several uncomfortable moments being reprimanded by my boss Brian Gewirtz, who is a genius but not much of a people person."

--

On working there diminished his fandom:
"No. This was a concern of mine before I started. Like I wouldn't be able to enjoy it anymore after looking behind the curtain, but it's been quite the opposite. While I worked there I really enjoyed seeing how things I read in the script would translate to the screen, and how people would react to storylines, and playing dumb on the forum. Now that I'm not there anymore, whenever they're backstage I look out for people I know or can just imagine how the stories and discussions came up. Or a joke from months ago like Nattie Neidfart will make it on screen and I'll crack up. It's fun and gave me a new appreciation for the business."

--

On if he has anything left from his time at WWE:
"When I was released they took my ID Badge, Blackberry and laptop so I don't really have anything from there besides free DVDs and action figures that anyone could have."

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