The Rock won his first singles title in WWE when, as Rocky Maivia, he defeated The Sultan at WrestleMania 13 for the Intercontinental Championship.
The Rock was booed out of the building by fans—this was at the height of the "Die, Rocky, Die" era—and Dwayne Johnson reflected on that while doing the rounds to promote The Smashing Machine.
"This is me at WrestleMania 13 in Chicago," The Rock said while looking at a video of the match. "I was a rookie and Vince McMahon told me very early, 'You're going to become the youngest Intercontinental Champion, but you have to smile all the time. When you go out, your music plays, you got to smile. As you come back, you got to smile.'"
"I remember telling him, I was like, 'Man, that doesn't feel real authentic,'" Johnson added. "And he goes, 'Yeah, but I want to make sure people know that you're grateful to be here.' And I went and I thought, 'God, I wonder if there's another way, but he's the boss.'"
"So what you're seeing there at WrestleMania 13 is that's a culmination of months of being inauthentic, not being real, smiling. I mean, dude, I used to go out, my music would hit, and fans would be like, 'You suck.' And I'd have to smile, yeah, yeah, thanks, man," the Final Boss concluded.
Ironically, his cousin, Roman Reigns, faced similar issues years later. Once again, at McMahon's direction, he was the smiling babyface that fans couldn't get behind. That all changed when he turned heel and became the Tribal Chief.
In The Rock's case, he also had to break bad to be accepted by fans and later became one of WWE's biggest stars. However, recent years have once again seen him rejected by fans. Why? Well, he tried to steal Cody Rhodes' spot at WrestleMania XL and, in a desperate bid to stay relevant, started inserting himself into storylines (John Cena's heel turn, for example).
We haven't seen Johnson in a WWE ring since Elimination Chamber, and a return isn't looking likely now that he's focused on being viewed as a "serious" actor in Hollywood. He received positive reviews for The Smashing Machine, but the movie was a huge box office flop and isn't likely to get him the Oscar nomination he was hoping for.
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