Santino Marella Knew Arianna Grace Would Be a Star When She Was Eight

Santino Marella is proud of his daughter Arianna Grace, noting that he knew the NXT roster member would be a star at an early age. Marella spoke with Chris Van Vliet for a new interview and talked about how Grace had the a superstar quality from the time she was eight.

“Yeah, so she was identified young,” Marella said (per Fightful). “When she was a child, everyone would come up to me and tell me that [she was] gonna be something or that she’s a superstar or that she can do anything. She was just articulate and her personality was incredible right… so now all of the sudden, I have all this pressure like I have to be able to nourish this. I have to be able to get her where she needs to go, she has all of this potential and this talent. If she doesn’t become a superstar, it’s because I dropped the ball.”

He continued, “So we had some very serious conversations when she was eight years old and I’m like ‘You were born to be a superstar. I don’t know how to take you to Hollywood, I don’t know how to get you there but what I can do is I’m pretty good at this wrestling thing. WWE, they make movies. WWE Studios. I’m gonna go become a professional wrestler and then we’ll make those connections and I’ll pull you in.’ That was the plan, the 18 year plan we called it. I had to go, I left to go to Japan for a year and I went to Kentucky for a couple years and it was hard for us, very hard. But, it paid off when she got signed, not when I got signed.”

Grace has been off screen since she suffered an injury in October of last year. Marella, meanwhile, has been working for Impact Wrestling as their Director Of Authority.