Kevin Kelly Talks About Working with The Rock, Brian Gewirtz, Women's Wrestling

Former WWE personality and current Ring of Honor ringside commentator Kevin Kelly recently spoke to Jim Ross on The Ross Report.

On The PG Era Helping Women’s Wrestling: On the subject of the women’s professional wrestling today, Kelly professed that the so-called ‘women’s revolution’ is a byproduct of WWE producing strictly PG programming is that women are not objectified like they used to be. “That’s one of the best byproducts of PG, is that now women on the roster are being presented not being objectified or abused in any way. But instead, they’re put on a pedestal and their athletics are showing through more than ever.

On Working With The Rock: “It was a lot of fun and one of the things that always cracked me up, so we did them live-live, so the people could react. I always had the ISB in so, of course, I can hear Lawler and so, Rock serves up a shot, and I try to then stone-face it, and then, I hear Lawler in my ear, ‘ahhh!’ And it was Jerry’s reaction that almost got me to break more than once, but those were always a lot of fun. They really were. And I think I get asked by fans about that more than anything else.”

On The Rock’s Promo Ability: “It’s the difference now between the way The Rock captivated the audience, held the audience, used the audience, as opposed to nowadays where the crowd can hijack a live promo, and the talent may not be strong enough to get it back. Rock had that gift to be able to heel on the crowd and make the crowd love him even more for it and he could push through and get to the point. It’s amazing how you see, generationally, how skilled he was in that regard. Today, there [are] some, still, who are able to do it naturally, but it’s a skill, man. It takes practice; it takes feel; it just takes confidence to be able to burst through.”

On Not Being a Big Fan of Brian Gewirtz: “I can’t sit here and say blow smoke and say, ‘oh, I think it’s great [that The Rock and Gewirtz are working on a pilot inspired by their time in WWE].’ I didn’t care for Brian personally or professionally. I didn’t like the idea of Hollywood writers coming along and without any kind of wrestling background. And having a role or influence or say on anything that these guys do because they have no idea what these guys experience. How could they possibly write for them? Of course I was wrong and of course they still do this to this day.”