Steve Carrier on February 12, 2019
Lillian Garcia welcomes Rusev and Lana to the show.
Rusev informs that they met in NXT the first day the Performance Centre opened. Lana didn’t even remember meeting him because she was meeting so many people that day. Rusev initially thought she was a stripper, and Lana says she used to get that a lot and she’d have fun with that.
Dusty Rhodes took a liking to Lana right away, and liked her outspoken nature. He paired her with Rusev right away as he knew that would get her to the main roster the quickest. Dusty even made her his assistant for a while and allowed her to help him produce vignettes.
Rusev and Lana started to hang out more away from work, and although Rusev liked her he thought she was cool and didn’t want to ruin their friendship by getting emotionally involved. However, eventually they formed a relationship.
Lana informs that she was mistreated by 6 or 7 people during her time in NXT. She was genuinely happy there and those people probably thought she was being fake. Dusty was one of the people who always had her back, and Charlotte Flair was very nice to her as well.
Triple H really moulded the “Lana” Russian character, and they really protected that character for a long time. She would only be allowed to speak with an accent even when making appearances, but Total Divas really opened the door for her to show her true self.
Both Lana and Rusev really enjoyed their time on Total Divas. Lana always wanted to be on the show and auditioned a few times, but Vince McMahon only wanted her to use her Russian accent if she was going to appear and the show producers didn’t want that.
Lana says it was very important for her to tell the story of her in-ring journey on Total Divas and she was shocked to hear that they weren’t invited back for the next season.
After the last season ended they were told that they’d basically be guaranteed spots on the next season, but new executives started working for E!, and WWE officials were told by them that Lana and Rusev were disliked by their demographic and it was a “strong no” in terms of a return for next season. This was very difficult news for Lana and she struggled with this emotionally for a long time.
Lana notes that Total Diva producers would edit things strongly to make each character fit whatever mould they like. She would get frustrated with this from time to time but she understood what she was signing up for. However, when they edit her scenes to make her character unlikeable, they shouldn’t be able to dismiss her from the show for being unliked.
Rusev says he’s done with Total Divas because once he gets cast away from something like that, he puts it behind him. He says he wants his own show now. Garcia thinks they can pull that off easily.
Lana says they still have a lot to accomplish in WWE. Rusev says he’s still working 250 days a year, performing at every live event and he still loves it. He’s not sure what the future holds but he’s excited to find out.
Lana says she’s wrestling 3 days a week at the live events as a babyface, and she wishes the WWE Universe could see how much better she’s gotten in the ring. She notes that she’s been having tag team matches on the live events that she’s very proud of and the crowds have been very loud.
Lana and Rusev both agree that they love being a married couple working together and travelling up and down the road together. They’re actually writing their own comic book now with the help of a comic book writer, that will be coming out sometime this year.
Lana mentions that a big storyline on Total Divas last year was supposed to revolve around her learning disability. She was excited to share that information with the audience but the storyline got cut. She informs that she couldn’t read until she was 10 years old and she suffers from dyslexia.
She would often get yelled at by teachers and trainers and called stupid because she was a slow learner and that was difficult for her, but luckily she was able to persevere. She doesn’t think that storyline should have been cut because she thinks her story could really help other people with learning disabilities.
That sums up today’s episode of Chasing Glory. You can listen to the show yourself anytime here, and I’ll catch ya next week for another recap!
February 12, 2019 8:26 am
Disqus Comments Loading...
