Fandango Shoots On ‘Ridiculous’ Ballroom Dancer Character

Former WWE star Fandango has shared his honest opinions of his dancer gimmick, recalling his WrestleMania match against Chris Jericho.

At WrestleMania 29 in 2013, Fandango rolled up Chris Jericho for the upset victory. According to Fandango, the match was originally going to be a one-sided beatdown.

Speaking on the Such Good Shoot podcast, Fandango recalled hesitation from Chris Jericho surrounding the match. Noting that he didn’t blame Jericho, Fandango stated that he never wanted to be a “F**king dancer”, saying:

“Chris (Jericho), he was a big reason why I wanted to be a wrestler. So working my first major program with him, you know, obviously, you’re nervous, you’re intimidated, and I didn’t want to be a f**king dancer, but I knew that you got to make the best of it. So if I was him, I probably won’t be too excited about it, too. Maybe he was told he was gonna work someone else which I could see him being pissed off,”

“I don’t blame him, it was a ridiculous character. So, you’ve got to look at it this way, guys. Vince probably thought it was stupid that (Jericho) went on Dancing with the Stars, right? Vince thought Bryan Danielson was crazy to be a vegan. So anything that Vince thinks is stupid. He’ll make a character out of it, right? He thought Chris going out Dancing with the Stars was stupid. So what is he gonna do? He’s gonna remake an evil dancing gimmick because he thinks it’s outrageous. It’s funny.”

“I remember that Vince didn’t want us to have a wrestling match. He just wanted Chris to beat the s**t out of me for like five minutes. They gave us too much time, so the way that it was supposed to be, I think, was like Chris just beats the s**t out of me and I roll him up out of nowhere. So it was supposed to be like the biggest upset, but I think they gave us like 10 minutes. So it ended up being more. It was way too much time for what Vince wanted, I think.”

“Vince didn’t want me to wrestle, he didn’t want me to be a wrestler. That was the whole thing. Yeah, he just wanted me to be a dancer, so it was weird. It was a weird situation that I think we pulled off as good as we could, you know. On me, though, I just relied on, in retrospect, a lesson learned. For any young talent out there listening, don’t rely on what’s getting over now, and think about what I can do next.”

Fandango was released by WWE on June 25. The former NXT Tag Team Champion now goes by “Dirty Dango” on the independent circuit.

Quote via Fightful.

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• Dancer
• gimmick
• fandango
• wwe

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