CJ Perry, previously known as Lana, was released by WWE in 2021 along with several other Superstars. Two years later, she made her AEW debut at the All Out PPV when her then-ex-husband Miro (Rusev in WWE) faced Powerhouse Hobbs.
After her and Miro's real-life relationship broke down, Perry was paired with Andrade. That didn't come to much, and she was absent from AEW television for several months before her time in Tony Khan's company ended. Since then, Rusev has returned to WWE, they've reconciled their relationship, and Lana has signed a "WWE Legends" deal.
During her WWE run, Lana found herself thrown into a few different romance storylines. She'd been extremely effective as Rusev's manager, but Vince McMahon was eager to revisit the love triangle trope with the Bulgarian Brute and Ravishing Russian.
Talking to Chris Van Vliet, Lana admitted that things got weird when Vince and Head of Talent Relations, John Laurinaitis, started telling her—and demonstrating—how to kiss Dolph Ziggler.
"Yeah, it was a little awkward when I had to practice that kiss with Dolph and my, at the time, boyfriend was in the room," she recalled. "The whole thing was so funny, because Johnny Ace and Vince show what we need to do, and they get up real close, real super close."
"Yeah, showing how it needs to be done. We're giggling, and Vince is like, 'No, we're all professionals here. We're all grown adults.' So that already helped me go, okay, these grown men are very, you know, it is very professional," Lana continued. "I come from a performance background, and I can easily pretend to be a friend, assassin, lover, mistress, and then leave work and turn it off, go back home."
McMahon and Laurinaitis have both faced multiple sexual misconduct, abuse, and trafficking allegations, and allegedly engaged in threesomes together. So, it may have been stranger for Lana than it was for them.
Elsewhere in the interview, the former WWE Superstar addressed the backlash to her being named a "WWE Legend."
"I'm still processing it. It's funny, because I would say it's been kind of controversial," she mused. "One of the biggest things that I had on my podcast last week was announcing that I'm a WWE legend, and you thought I stole their Christmas presents or something, people were so mad. People were like, it's a stretch, and they're fighting, and then other fans are coming in and defending me."
"So I just want to acknowledge I understand, I was that shocked too. I absolutely understand that there's a huge difference between the character Lana and Randy Savage on the legend scale," Lana noted. "I get it, but this is what WWE calls their contracts, being a full WWE superstar. My agent called me. I was crying. I was shocked. Yeah, they gave Miro a contract, and they gave me the WWE legend contract at the same time."
You can hear more from Lana in the player below.