Gangrel Reveals Vince McMahon Hated His Vampire Gimmick

In an interview with E&C’s Pod Of Awesomeness (via Wrestling Inc), Gangrel revealed that Vince McMahon was originally down on his vampire gimmick and told him he wouldn’t get to use it in WWE. Here are highlights:

On Vince McMahon not liking the vampire gimmick: “Vince McMahon told me himself I’ll never use the vampire character, like, ‘get rid of the fangs’ because I was an idiot. I had fangs bonded in. That’s probably why they only let me be The Black Phantom to hide the fangs. Like, ‘this guy’s an idiot! Like, he bumps real good and will do a good job, but cover his head! Let him wear the mask!'” Gangrel continued, “‘so make sure you trim down, grow the hair out, and we’ll definitely give you a job, but just not a vampire.’ And they did. I was sitting home [for] a week, sitting home. Vince Russo called up. I don’t know if it was when he got that creative control thing, that brief 30 days or whatever it was. I’m real fuzzy on that kind of stuff. And he said, ‘hey, are you still doing that vampire thing?’ I said, ‘are you kidding me?’ So on a Friday night, I got everything ready for that Sunday to debut against of all people, mi amigo, Scotty 2 Hotty.”

On the idea behind the Brood: “I was really big on The Brood because of The Lost Boys.” Gangrel recalled, “I came up with it through The Lost Boys. And I said, ‘man, they don’t even [have] to win! It’s going to be cool. When they get their asses kicked, I’m telling you people will like them.’ And they were like, ‘no.’ I said, ‘old man, I’m telling you nobody hates a vampire.’ And I heard everybody say they hate vampires.”

On convincing people to let him be a vampire: “I never heard anybody heel on vampires besides Vince McMahon.” Gangrel remembered, “he didn’t like it. So I just kept giving them research through all these years and then, at that time, when I was in the camp and stuff too, like, I [brought] up, ‘look, it’s such an underground thing and it’s like Dungeons and Dragons, roleplaying.’ I gave them stuff from White Wolf Masquerade. I was just trying to show them that there was a community out there. ‘This isn’t going to go anywhere like vampire movies, they’re coming and people don’t hate on vampires. It’ll be cool.’ And they were like, ‘naw, naw, naw, we don’t get it. We don’t get it.’ Then, eventually, Vince Russo was like, ‘ah, I kind of get it!’ Then it clicked in Bruce Prichard’s head, ‘oh, I get what you’re saying.'”

On advice from Stephanie McMahon: “After The Brood, I kind of just drifted off.” Gangrel admitted, “I got hurt. I didn’t get hungry. I didn’t pitch ideas. I was friends with Stephanie. I was sitting, hanging out with her all the time, and she goes, ‘maybe you need to change your look.’ She was always trying to smarten me up, but I was just like, ‘ah, I’ll just go with the flow. Whatever. I’m just grateful to be wrestling’ and I’m still wrestling today and I’m grateful. But if I would have maybe asserted myself and the stuff that I do see and do know and let them know that I know that, or let them see that I see, maybe I would have been looked at in a different way.”