Nick Dinsmore Says Steve Austin Vote Of Confidence Helped Get Him on WWE TV As Eugene

Nick Dinsmore memorably portrayed the character of Eugene in the mid to late ’00s, and he recently recalled how Steve Austin played a role in him bringing the character to WWE TV. Dinsmore was a guest on Steve Fall’s The Ten Count for WrestlingNews.co and talked about the origin of the character and more. You can see highlights below, per Wrestling Inc:

On the original concept of the Eugene character for WWE: “What about a character, much like Rain Man, that might not be very sociable, might not be able to tie his shoes correctly, but when the bell rings, he can do everything he’s seen on TV flawlessly, [like an] ‘idiot savant’ of wrestling. I pitched that idea to the [WWE producers] when they would come down to Louisville. We had one come down every week. I pitched it to guys like Dean Malenko, and Fit Finlay, and Arn Anderson. They said, ‘No, no, no. Wrestling’s gone beyond that. We’re more reality-based now.’ This is probably mid-to-late 2003.”

On telling Doug Basham that he was planning to quit WWE and go to Japan: “I just wanted to see what would happen. So Doug tells Dean Malenko, Dean tells Johnny Ace, [and the] next thing I know, February 2004, I’m sitting in a meeting with Vince McMahon and Stephanie. Vince goes ‘I want to get back to character-based wrestling!’ And I just spit out that idea. Right after that, Stone Cold Steve Austin walks in.”

On Austin giving him a vote of confidence because he trained with Danny Davis: “And Austin kind of looks up and goes, ‘Well, he’s probably one of the best.’ That vote of confidence from Austin [was enough that] Vince [was] like, ‘Alright, we’ll start on Monday!’ The squeaky wheel gets the grease. I tell that to anybody I train now. You have to do it properly, and do it nicely, and just vent a little bit and put it out there. And on the flip side, you have to put out what you want in the universe so you can attract it.”

On Austin’s support giving him his shot: “I felt like it was like, ‘OK, let’s give this kid a shot’… The writer, Brian Gewirtz, knew how to write for Eugene. And it was his brilliant writing that put me in a good place being Eric Bischoff’s ‘nephew,’ and teaming me with William Regal. It was a perfect odd couple.”