Rob Van Dam recently spoke with Wrestlezone’s Kevin Kellam about his new documentary ‘Headstrong’ which is available on iTunes and other digital retailers now.
RVD opens up about performing stand-up comedy and how it changed his outlook on things, as well as talking about how he puts off dealing with stress and much more.
RVD comments on breaking into the stand-up comic world, how Headstrong ended up taking a look at his life:
“That’s something that I wanted to do always, as long as I could remember. When I was a kid going to Gary Field’s comedy club in Battle Creek, Michigan, I always thought someday I’m going to write a couple of minutes of material and go there on open mic night, but a much a bigger option came my way because I was already a superstar and [I was invited to go up]. I’ve been doing it for a while, I don’t do it that often and sometimes I might do it as much as four or five times a month, or zero in six months. It’s not something that I put a lot into that I’m looking to do, I’m not looking to change careers. I don’t really like to do that much at all, I like to chill believe it or not, I prefer a day off to a day on. But it’s something that I enjoy doing sometimes because it stimulates my brain and it’s fun. I don’t get hassled, I don’t bomb, and I’m pretty damn funny.
When people expect wrestling stories, I think it’s been precedented by some of the other wrestlers who tell stories from the road. I try to incorporate some of that but me on stage is a reflection of my very dry sense of humor and that’s what they get. It’s fun for me. The idea was because I do this sometimes to do it on tour, we line up several shows and it becomes worth it in the long run although I hate being on the road. We did a seven day tour and Tom Farland, my manager in that field, said “hey would you bring the camera shoot the road trip, make a little documentary out of it” and I said ‘yeah that sounds cool.’ But then I showed up showing some symptoms from a match I had a few days before that I hadn’t shaken off yet. I was a little bit loopy and at first I figured I would not make it to that of the documentary, I wouldn’t tell anybody. You never tell anybody, or I never did, and I kept saying I’ll be fine tomorrow, but it wasn’t. It took a few days and so it ended up timely, y’know, that we’d have to share this, and it’s such a big thing. The movie has a lot to do with education on concussions as well, we have Chris Nowinski in it as well—not to give away spoilers—but taking a hard look at myself. There’s a lot in the movie and there’s my stand-up comedy and you go back to my house, it ends up encompassing my whole life and pretty much answers any question about where I’ve been for the last two years. Why I do what I do, why I don’t do things that other people would and I’m very proud of it.”
RVD comments on the similarities and differences of pro wrestling and comedy:
“You get to see the challenges that I’m going through in a real behind the curtain kinda way in Headstrong. Nobody knew.. I pulled through, let me put it that way. For the first night of the tour I had stayed up just writing all kinds of new jokes. I wanted to have 45 minutes worth, I think the longest I’d gone was 30 prior to this tour, so I was writing out a whole bunch of new stuff, just writing, “hey smoking in the car” I’ll develop that later, you know how you do. And then when I went on stage the very first night, Tom didn’t give me the light. That happens a lot, people think they’re going to be disrespecting me if they dim the lights, but I’m expecting that, you know what I mean? A lot of times that’s counter-productive for me and for expectations, but the first time I went up there, and I haven’t done it long enough to judge.. When I’m in the ring, wrestling, I know during my match exactly when 12 minutes is or 17 minutes just because I’ve done that for 30 years, but..
Well on TV, that’s part of it on TV—believe it or not the referee doesn’t direct us—but anyway, I can feel that time out there. With comedy I haven’t done it long enough to feel—can we swear on here?—I’m up there and I’m like “fuck it hasn’t been 45 minutes so far” and I’m like “what else can I talk about? Oh, censorship!” y’know then I’ll just go into something. Anyway, I did an hour and 20 minutes on the first night, so after that I had enough material it made me a lot more confident for the rest of the tour.
I have a standing invite at Dangerfield’s in New York City and we go there on this tour and in the documentary. And what I remember most about that is I was not expecting, I can pop in and go on stage whenever, so I did and I was supposed to go 5 or 7 [minutes] or whatever, they had a lineup and I didn’t want to be rude to everyone else but same thing happened. I tried to make really short jokes that were quick and snappy and I actually tried to make like a five minute set but they ended up leaving me out there. After like 12 minutes I was like “dude c’mon, I have to do my time.” I appreciate the light because I’m expecting it, y’know. Everyone is there to see me when I do these, they’re there to see RVD, but I like to do them in places that have stand-up comedy. I don’t like to do them in places that don’t have stand-up comedy, like in the ring at a wrestling show.
To me is always trying to tell me about the business end. As soon as he brings it up, like two words into it I’m like “of course!” pretty much everywhere where there’s entertainment, or show business, if we can categorize it at all, is that. There’s so many similarities between the promoters and what they expect and what they try to get, everything all the way up, every step of the process. It’s very. Very much the same.”
Read More: Rob Van Dam On Sharing His Personal Life In On ‘Headstrong’, Feeling Energized By Comedy
