Vince Russo, WWE, Ed Ferrara discussed on Talk Is Jericho
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That was, I guess that was the biggest storyline. I mean, Goldberg was still, you know, I think there was still trying to rehab Bill from his loss, the December prior. You know, there was all the, you know, all the guys that I thought were the, you know, the future of the company, you know, had you been there, Chris, you would have been one, but you know, dean and Addy and Chris and Perry and ray and Conan, who were the 6 guys that I eventually would end up doing stuff with. You know, they would come up with their ideas and bring them to me and say, can you take these to the guys and see if this would help? And with those guys, you know, they had really fun storylines just conflict within the 6 of them. And it seemed like at the time everybody was happy like, yeah, give them 20, 30 minutes to do this stuff every three hours, and to me it felt like they were treading water, but at least I was working with them and trying to get the stuff to Nash and Sullivan and sort of lobby for them. So what was the time frame you were there? You mentioned probably from about late 99 until mid 2000. So I was there, you know, I came in, everybody that I mentioned was in booking committee, I guess, at the time, I think dusty got let go a couple of weeks later and then within a couple weeks of that Vince Russo and Ed Ferrara came in from WWE and that's when everything structurally started to change. It went from a very short format to a very long detailed format every week. Right. You know, the 16 segs 210 components. Everything timed out in chunks of 20 seconds. You know, pretty much how shows, I think, I imagine there's still been the same way maybe with less long interview language, but because I know how it was like in WWE when Russo and Ferrara left. And it was a pretty big blow, at least to the locker room. The only guys that didn't really sell it were pat Patterson and Vince, McMahon, who were like, you guys have no idea it's really not as bad as you might think. What was like when you heard from your end in that writing room that Vince Russo was coming in. Was everybody super excited? Did they feel like it was a big coup to land Vince's quote unquote, right hand man, you know, at least we thought he was. Yeah, I think, you know, I'm not even sure who did the deal with him. I'm guessing it would have been JJ, Dylan, would have been the conduit for that. And I remember he told us these guys are coming in and we're all very, you know, we're all really excited. Let's try to make them, you know, let's really try to invite them in and they've done great things up there. And that's what everybody did. And they came, they came in. I think they had Bill banks with them as well. And I think Terry Taylor would have been a right behind those three that left immediately. So, you know, there was a lot of new people coming in and it was a big philosophical change. You know, Chris, I guess for me, I'm like, you know, my sort of my philosophy about the business is, you know, wins and losses matter, work rates are real important, character developments grow important, continuity is really important. That kind of stuff and the WWE, I think Vince Russo style was maybe a little more controversial, a little more not Jerry Springer has spent a lot of that kind of like real heavy on character conflict. Right. And I also like, well, you know, I'll do what I can to help me. This isn't what I would do, but I'm only here to help. And right away, the first week, Russo put me a gorilla. So kind of talk about a little bit for this perspective, so before we get into the Russo, I love this because you're just getting thrown in. Yeah. You know, but because let me ask you this first. How was your experience being in a rock and roll band? And, you know, having to go with the flow as we all know, you know, ant breaks down and you got to continue the show, whatever happens. How did that help you or hinder you in pro wrestling and live TV? I mean, once I got into gorilla, or with the whole thing, I mean, I have had a lot of stuff, like you said, a.m.'s break. You know, somebody gets hit with a bottle. Whatever happens, rock shows are especially at festivals, as you know, when stuff starts flying around, you're really no sound check, no mercy, just make it up as you go. I had done decades of heavy travel, the lifestyle. I mean, The Rock and roll lifestyle is pretty crazy, but the pro wrestling lifestyle was a bolder version I think of it at that time. So I guess I just had, you know, I could think on my feet, I could react pretty quickly. I could keep a lot of things straight at once. So I mean, I think that's why they probably sat me at gorilla and said, here you talk to Keith and you talk to the refs. And listen to.