The Rock Talks Past Tension with John Cena and Almost Fighting Him Backstage

The September issue of Muscle and Fitness has an exclusive interview with WWE star and actor Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. Rock talked about a number of wrestling topics, particularly his two-year feud with John Cena.

After being asked about his tendon injury at WrestleMania 29, Rock closed with some interesting words:

“With John, by the way, we went into that two-year feud agreeing that things are edgy between us and things are salty, and let’s carry that into the arena.”

This led to the magazine asking if it was “real.” Rock explained:

“Yes, it was very real. When I came back, I needed something real to sink my teeth into, as a performer.”

“John had said some things in an interview that I took exception [in essence, that the Rock cared only about being an actor not about wrestling or WWE fans]. He felt they were okay, I felt that they weren’t okay. I also laughed it off years ago but it wasn’t until I came back and realized that the marquee match-up was going to be between he and I that I would take that edge that we had—and let’s use it. So, we don’t have to hang out, we don’t have to be best friends, we won’t be friends at all.”

Continuing, the 10-time world champion talked about the tension between him and Cena behind-the-scenes:

“It got really uncomfortable for a lot of people. And it gets uncomfortable for the fans–that they sense something. But then when it gets uncomfortable for the wrestlers and to the executives and the company, then it’s something special. [It did get there] Right away. And it continued to build. And what happens in wrestling is anybody who is in a feud and anybody who is in a match, everybody knows what everybody is going say. In this case, we approached it differently.”

“I’d say ‘John, here’s what I’m going to say tonight: Go f*** yourself.’ He’d say, ‘Well, here’s going to be my response: F*** you too.’ I mean, it was like that. And it was palpable for the fans, and it was palpable backstage. And I would never be like that under any other circumstance. I’m collaborative with everyone I work with. And I take a lot of pride in that, and you know something? So is John.”

He even revealed that the two almost came to blows backstage:

“He’s a great guy. He’s one of the best guys out there, but here’s what we realized: If we wanted to build the two biggest matchups back-to-back and create something special in Miami and in New York, we’re going to do it this way. And we might fail miserably at it. People might think it’s not real or you run into the challenge of the potential for people to go, ‘It’s so real that it’s not real.’ But in this case it worked out very well and through all that edge and attitude and bite that we had and nearly coming to blows backstage and one night in the ring—literally we were nose-to-nose, it was any second. And through that in a crazy, weird completely unexplained way, we became great buds.”

Be sure to read the entire interview, here. Rock also talks about a potential in-ring return for WWE.

Editor’s Note

I definitely agree with Rock. The best feuds in wrestling truly come when it feels “real.”