Cody Rhodes recently spoke with Joseph Staszewski of the New York Post; you can read a few highlights below:
Cody comments on the perception that ‘the wrestlers are running the show’ with All Elite Wrestling, saying he hears the chatter and this won’t be the ‘Cody show.’
“In wrestling, some people tend to want it written and some people want it booked. I like wrestling when it’s booked. That’s the wrestling my father [Dusty Rhodes] was famous for, the territory era. I’m not trying to bring back that era, but I think it yielded really good content, versus sitcom writers writing a wrestling show. I know that sounds so anti-WWE, it’s not. I’m just telling you from a standpoint of what we provide.
If you want heavily scripted TV, that’s something WWE can do. If you want sports-centric booked wrestling, I think that’s something we can do.
I’ll say this, my dad always got a lot of criticism for when he was involved with Ric Flair for so long, he was the champ at certain times and he was also the booker. Well, if you were living in the era or coming to those shows, those were pretty much the two most over guys in Ric Flair and Dusty Rhodes.
We do want to be careful and not do that, but the cool thing is, we’re still wrestlers at heart. If the fans want it, we’ll absolutely give it to them. But I’m very cognizant of it. I grew up in the era of everybody knows the business of the business.
I’ve had to have so many conversations that I didn’t want to have with people telling me the mistakes my dad made. And every time I just grit my teeth, but the truth is, I hear them. I know what they’re saying. I learned from the things he did really, really well and the things he might have not. I’m very cautious stepping into this because even when we talk to talent and hire talent, I want them to know it’s not the Cody show.”
Cody talks about butting heads with Chris Jericho, but understanding Jericho knows what he’s doing and is glad to have him in All Elite Wrestling:
“Chris Jericho is always gonna be the same. There is a reason he’s closed out a WrestleMania. He’s very, very, very involved and he’s very smart and very fair.
I think heavy, heavy, heavy disagreements with me and Chris Jericho. I have a ton of respect for him, but we disagree on a great deal. But him coming to AEW is a huge endorsement, massive. This guy, I grew up watching him and to watch him at that rally, it was MJF [Maxwell Jacob Freeman] who he walked by. To watch MJF, who doesn’t sell anything, and literally his eyes light up so it was a surprise. That to me is a big endorsement.
He’s not wrong when he says he’s the bridge between the fans we have and the fans we don’t and I’m glad to have him [Jericho]. He’s kind of a d–k, but I’m glad to have him.”
