WWE Raw Superstar, Zelina Vega recently spoke with the Cheap Heat podcast where she discussed portraying AJ Lee in “Fighting With My Family.” Below are some highlights from the interview with a H/T to WrestlingInc.com for the transcriptions.
“The funny thing is I have known AJ Lee. She started in New Jersey; I worked in New York. We have crossed paths and she was always great with me and always sweet to me but obviously I went one way and she went to WWE,” stated Vega. “But when I got the call initially I was on my sixth or seventh tryout with WWE and they kept saying not right now. I also had been trying out for a part in Spider-Man and I was texting Dwayne Johnson saying to him that I didn’t know what to do and he asked me to hold on for a moment, he may have something for me. When he told me that I was going to be playing the Divas Champion, of course, I wasn’t processing any of this yet, and then he said AJ Lee. I was like, oh my God, I can do this. I know I can do this. But you never really know until you step into that person’s shoes. He really showed me how to separate Thea Trinidad and step into AJ Lee.
“I remember at times during training he would say, okay, cut the promo right now. Talk like her, move like her, I want you to be AJ at this moment, go. You have to adapt and really feel how someone would be feeling in the moment and why. That is why I went to talk with a bunch of people she was working with at the time asking what the mindset was. What was she feeling at the time? A lot deeper than just a promo and a match, but that is something The Rock is really good at. Anyone who has seen his matches you see the passion that he does in everything that he does.”
Cheap Heat Podcast