By Jason Powell, ProWrestling.net Editor (@prowrestlingnet)
CBS Sports interview with Ronda Rousey
Host: Shakiel Mahjouri
Interview available via CBSSports.com
On whether she want her kids to fight: “If they wanted to, I would do everything that I could to make sure that they’re as great as possible, but I would never push them towards it. You can’t make somebody fight. It’s something that is inside of you that you can’t help. I’ll make sure they know how to fight because it’s a survival skill and it builds a lot of discipline… but whether or not they want to compete, it’s up to them.
Ronda Rousey on writing a “martial arts romantic comedy” called Expecting the Unexpected: “It’s very autobiographical in a way. It’s the first thing that I ever wrote. It’s what got me into writing creatively… I was trying to write a part for myself. I was like, ‘Well, no one brought ‘Rocky’ to Sylvester Stallone. He went and wrote that.’ So I wrote a part that no one could play better than me. And I ended up writing a story that no one could have written except for me.
“It was right when me and my husband were trying to get pregnant the first time. I guess it was delving into the dilemma of bringing a child into a hostile world and I was getting pregnant during COVID and all this stuff. It’s a crazy act of optimism having a kid and bringing them into the world and believing that you can guide them through all of this that’s going on.
“It was something that was inside of me as a martial artist and hopeless romantic. It’s very much if you read it, it’s me and my husband and our relationship, but taken to the nth degree. What is more difficult than trying to have a baby and no one’s helping you? Oh, trying to have a baby and everyone’s trying to kill you, but not taking itself too seriously at all and doing a lot of it with a laugh and a wink and a cute little love story.”
On whether she has confidence in the new WWE regime: “I think anyone’s better than Vince McMahon. The only place you can go is up. I really enjoy Triple H and working with him, and honestly, I haven’t been watching, but I saw something from Natty [Neidhart] saying that they had a card recently that had just as many women on it as the men. That’s what I would really like to see, the women equally represented with not just matches on the card, but time on the show. I feel there’s no place they could go but up and I’m really, really happy for all the women still there and thriving under the new regime. I think there’s, yeah.”
Paul Heyman’s legacy (he pushed her to write her memoir and graphic novel): “I feel like he’s the absolute backbone of that entire industry. People don’t see the backbone. It is hidden underneath the body, but he is literally everyone’s mentor. Every successful storyline has its roots back into him. I think the industry would be a shell of itself without him. They should feel so lucky to have his time because he could spend that genius on anything else. But he spends a hundred percent of his time and energy on the WWE. He is the person who encouraged me creatively. He really believed I am so much more than just what my body can do. He really encouraged me to write and create. He’s the person who told me, ‘You need to go and write your own story.’
“No one saw me in that light before or had that kind of belief in me. I didn’t even have that kind of belief in myself. I wrote the logline, and then after shattering my knuckle, going to surgery, jumping straight into a plane doing ‘The Stephen Colbert Show’ to promote ‘Mortal Kombat 11,’ and finally laying in a bed for the first time in four to eight hours, I sat and I typed in a cast on the notes on my phone for 11 hours straight to write the first draft of this. It was something sitting inside of me and Paul Hayman was the only one who saw it.
“Five years later, I’ve learned so much and put in so much work and so much love into this, and it is finally seeing the light of day. It’s not something that I’m doing to impress anybody. I’ve finally gotten away from that part of my life. You know what? I’m retired. I’m going to do whatever I feel like. I feel like writing a graphic novel and here it is. It doesn’t really matter. If people take it one way or the other. It’s like a compulsion. I had to tell the story and write it. I hope it finds someone, even just one person who needed to read it just as much as I needed to write it.”
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