Vince McMahon Claims “Mr. McMahon” Character In WWE Was Easy For Him
Vince McMahon believes that some of the things that he saw growing up in life made it easy for him to be the “Mr. McMahon” character on WWE television.
The highly-anticipated Vince McMahon Netflix docuseries called “Mr. McMahon” was released earlier this week. Many fans and critics have criticized that it didn’t go too far into the scandalous life of the former WWE boss while others likely enjoyed some of the candid comments made during the six episodes.
Throughout the documentary, they covered a lot of big WWE stories that took place during Vince McMahon’s 40-year reigns as the company’s Chairman and the man who was in charge of booking the shows.
It was in early 1998 shortly after the Montreal Screwjob at Survivor Series 1997 when Vince removed himself as an announcer on television to embrace his role as the real-life boss of WWE. The growth of that “Mr. McMahon” heel persona coincided with the rise of “Stone Cold’ Steve Austin as one of the most popular and successful babyfaces in WWE history.
During the fourth episode of the six-part “Mr. McMahon” documentary, Vince spoke about how the character was inspired by personal experiences that he went through in his life.
“Mr. McMahon, of course, is a character derived from, uh, Vince McMahon and is a character to someone I could relate to when I was growing up.”
“When I was growing up, I was dirt poor. Coming from that environment, I don’t like rich people, because I was around some people who thought they were better than me because, quote, more money. So, it felt like you weren’t anybody at all. You were a nobody. You learn certain things. In those days, I could fight, and I loved to fight. If you could do that, well, now you’re somebody.”
“I was good at fighting, but they would say, ‘You didn’t fight fair, you cheated.’ Yeah, I won. [laughs] So, with my character, Mr. McMahon, I can play someone who intimidates, because that was the way I grew up. That was the way I thought rich people were, they’d try to intimidate you.”
“I know how to be an arrogant person that just throws his weight around and a bully and stuff like that. It was easy for me to get into that character because I knew all the things that I disliked.”
Vince McMahon Tried To Prevent Netflix Documentary From Airing
On the day before the documentary was released, Vince McMahon criticized the content and there were also reports that he tried to buy it from Netflix to prevent it from airing.
It was mentioned throughout the documentary that interviews with McMahon and others took place before the explosive January 2024 lawsuit filed by former WWE employee Janel Grant against Vince McMahon, WWE, and former WWE executive John Laurinaitis. The lawsuit alleges that McMahon sexually abused and harassed Grant while also using her for sex trafficking purposes.
The lawyers and PR team representing Ms. Grant also sent out a press release featuring past instances of other people sharing their issues about McMahon’s “toxic” behavior running World Wrestling Entertainment for over 40 years.