John Cena Talks About Not Being Allowed to Wrestle While Shooting Movies

John Cena was interviewed by ESPN and talked about not being “allowed” to wrestle in WWE while shooting a movie because an injury could jeopardize and delay the production.

He also said that he apologized to The Rock for criticizing him about missing WWE shows to shoot movies in the past, saying that he was “totally wrong and ignorant.” The Rock has been in a similar situation, not being able to wrestle while shooting movies for the past few years, which has not allowed him to work WrestleManias despite WWE making him offers. In 2013, The Rock tore a muscle in a match against John Cena at WrestleMania 29, which delayed filming of “Hercules.”

Cena said:

“I have learned, and I’m trying to fight this system but I’m losing, once you’re in production for a movie, they don’t allow you to wrestle. I can’t go to a WWE taping [and] have my nose put over here. Not only doesn’t it look good, it’s, ‘Man, you don’t look right,’ so they shut the whole movie down. [There are] 150 people that are expecting a paycheck for that movie and I just screwed them out of their wage. It ups the budget of the movie, so I just put the movie behind the eight ball of possibly being a financial success.

“So as much as I want to do everything, you can’t. This was a giant misunderstanding I had about what Dwayne was doing — what The Rock was doing — because he does movie after movie after movie. I know the feeling of wanting to go back — and I’m going back as soon as I can — but I can’t go back until I’m done with this. So I totally get it. And I kinda called him out for it and that was me being an ass, and I was totally wrong, and ignorant, and young, and stupid, and I’ve told him I’m sorry but I think that’s something our fans don’t understand.”