Dwayne Johnson Wanted To Put Bray Wyatt Over

According to former WWE Head Writer Brian Gewirtz, Dwayne Johnson not only wanted to work with Bray Wyatt, but to put over his “dynamic personality.”

In the wake of the tragic passing of Bray Wyatt, many wrestling personalities have been paying tribute to one of the most unique wrestlers to ever enter the squared circle.

This included Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, who worked with the late star at WrestleMania 32. Johnson called Wyatt an “incredible shining star” and spoke about how much he loved his presence, promos, and in-ring work.

The Rock got to experience all of those aspects of Wyatt personally on the Grandest Stage Of Them All when the Wyatt Family confronted him. Johnson put Wyatt over as a revolutionary, while Wyatt said he was there to kick the door down, saying Rock had no idea who he was fooling with.

Brian Gewirtz recalls working with Dwayne Johnson and Bray Wyatt

During an interview with Steve Fall of WrestlingNews.co, Gewirtz remembered how Johnson had wanted to work with Wyatt and everything came together really easily.

“Even when we worked together at WrestleMania 32 with The Rock, we wanted to, I know taking to Rock, it was like, ‘This guy, Bray Wyatt, he doesn’t have a match. This is the promo we should be doing.’ That’s basically what we discussed with each other.

“Rock wanted to work with him, I wanted Rock to work with him. Bray obviously would be more than happy to do a segment with The Rock. But even when we put that segment together, it was like, ‘Alright, Bray, you’ll say your stuff, I’ll just let you do it. Because I’m certainly not writing anything for Bray Wyatt. Here’s the outline. Whatever you say, Rock will respond to.’

“That’s sort of, it’s not necessarily a given with a lot of performers. A lot of performers can and do write their own promos. But Bray, from the start, from the incarnation of the Bray Wyatt character, it was all him putting forward the character, the aura, the mood, the atmosphere. He’s just really, really remarkable.”

Gewirtz went on to say that a key part of the segment was for Johnson to put Wyatt over, and that it wasn’t to be a normal babyface/heel promo.

“The other thing I would add is that in putting that promo together, the one key in that promo that we wanted to do, above everything else, is Rock putting Bray over. Usually, there’s this dynamic where the heel comes out, and maybe there’s a line, some lip service or whatever, of ‘Yeah, you’re a great athlete, but,’ blah blah blah, typically with a heel and babyface.

“But in this particular case, we had the spotlight on us. The world of wrestling is watching. This is a good opportunity for The Rock to really put over the dynamic personality, the magnetic presence, the fact that he’s supposedly a heel, and 101,000 people are holding up their cell phones.

“I always thought, certainly at the time, at WrestleMania 32, that the Bray Wyatt character should transcend babyface/heel. He’s just this agent of chaos, and you can either like him or not like him. I don’t like that be as sometimes pigeon-holed as, ‘You gotta be a heel because wrestling is babyface and heels.’

“I thought he was just an anomaly in the sense that he transcends that and is much more than that. So we definitely took that opportunity for The Rock, and the fans responded too, by the way. When The Rock’s talking about how he’s got the look, he’s got the charisma, he’s got this magnetic power about him, and of course, you can’t teach this stuff, and I couldn’t teach it, but Bray and Rock, with the presence to take that moment and take their time, acknowledge the crowd.

“They’re popping, they’re responding to it. There’s not a ‘What?’ in the building during the time where lots of ‘Whats’ would happen, where Bray and Rock would go back and forth. Everyone was truly listening to hear what they would have to say. So yeah, that was really great to be able to work on that promo with those guys.”

H/T to Fightful for the above transcription.