Dwayne Johnson is widely-regarded as one of the greatest talkers in professional wrestling history. His natural charisma and ability to control a crowd combined with the writing talents of Brian Gewirtz meant that whenever The Rock had a WWE microphone it was must-watch television.
During his full-time career Johnson delivered a number of memorable promos, while he had a particular knack for grabbing the audience’s attention in the lead up to a big match. Be that in the run-up to the show, or in the hours before he hit the ring.
Dwayne Johnson Delivered A Conan O’Brien Line At The Royal Rumble
Speaking during a recent interview, Conan O’Brien revealed that he actually coined a line used in one of these popular pre-match promos. During an appearance with Howard Stern, O’Brien discussed some of the people that he has worked with during his career contributing to shows such as Saturday Night Live and the Simpsons. The star explained that some of the most talented people he’s worked with didn’t go to college, citing writer Tommy Blacha, who eventually went to work for WWE.
“The most brilliant people I’ve worked with, I don’t know where they went to college, some of them didn’t go to college. One of the greatest comedy writers I’ve ever worked with went straight into the military out of high school. Tommy Blacha, an amazing comedy writer and one of the most original comedy minds I’ve ever met.
He was a fascinating guy. Here’s something I love about him. He left our show — some people leave our show to go work for Letterman or they have some amazing opportunity to run a sitcom out in LA. He left our show to go work for the WWF,”
O’Brien added that it was through Blacha that The Rock used one of his lines during a WWE show. Ahead of the 2000 Royal Rumble match, Johnson used the phrase “a nice tall glass of shut up juice” in a backstage segment. The line, it turns out, was an O’Brien staple.
This is one of my proudest moments in comedy, I used to screw around with the writers a lot and I would put on the attitude of this larger than life…I’d come into the room and be like, ‘Quiet down you idiots’ and I’d go on these long rants.
One of my putdowns that I came up with, it was so stupid but I liked it, if a writer was going on or said something I didn’t like, I’d say, ‘Why don’t you have a nice tall glass of shut up juice. Do yourself a favor.’ It was such a stupid putdown, but Tommy liked it and he said, ‘Watch the match this weekend.’ It was The Rock,
“The crowd went crazy. The next week, Tommy said, ‘check this out.’ I trun into that match and people are holding up signs that say, ‘Drink some shut up juice.’ Tommy is apologizing, ‘I know I borrowed it from you.’ ‘What are you talking about? Dwayne The Rock Johnson just said it. Vince McMahon gave you a high five.’ I was in heaven.”
Dwayne Johnson went on to win the 2000 Royal Rumble match, eliminating the Big Show via a helping amount of controversy to score the victory. The ensuing chaos helped set the scene for the ‘McMahon in every corner’ Fatal-Four-Way Match at WrestleMania 2000.
H/t to Fightful