Name: Why Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Changed His Presidential Vote | Letterman
Uploaded: 2024-04-08T22:00:17.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Why Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Changed His Presidential Vote | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-08. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Why Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Changed His Presidential Vote | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2024-04-08. Transcript available.

our first guest is the self-proclaimed most electrifying man in sports
entertainment he
currently stars in america's number one film the scorpion king ladies and
gentlemen please welcome
the rock nice to have you here thank you good to be here it's a pretty exciting
it's like a
it's like a big deal it's like the uh the biggest movie in the country that
must make you feel
pretty good doesn't it is yeah very lucky very humbled absolutely and how did
you get to wrestling
and then become a movie star and stuff like that because you know a lot of guys
can do it sort of
but then they don't become the number one star in the country you know what i
mean yeah yeah so this
this is quite an achievement but how did that begin for you um well when i
first started wrestling i
always thought that one day i would love to transition into film and become an
actor and
hopefully one day become a really good actor and uh i had the opportunity with
the mummy returns we did
that and uh and then blossomed into the scorpion king right right and and are
your other wrestling
peers are they jealous of you
you know what they're they're cool yeah they're very supportive and speaking of
wrestling quick side
story paul yeah whipper billy watson right right yeah it's a great story um whipper
billy watson who
paul was referring to my dad's from canada and my dad used to wrestle of course
in the 80s
whipper billy watson trained my dad how about that is that right yeah
now did you ever hear of dick the bruiser yes it was like a big deal in the midwest
and i guess all
over the country for a long time sure but that was that was in the the early
well not so much the
early days but like in the the 60s and uh nostalgic yeah that's right but he
was
he was he was the world's most dangerous wrestler you know he was yeah well the
name like that i
think you have to be and uh is it i'm guessing the answer to this is obvious
but it was because
of your family you were an athlete in college you played football university of
miami but it was
because of your family that you went into wrestling well the well because of
that lineage i mean it
it helped the transition and i love the wrestling business as well that that
live audience is
something that always captivated me now if a guy like me well not a guy like me
but let's say a guy
wanted to become wanted a career in wrestling where do you go to do that i mean
there are places that
teach you how to become a wrestler right yeah there are places you really want
to try and go to a
reputable school you know it's not like uh you know you so for example a guy
like you not necessarily you
who's ready to break into the business uh you know you'd want to go to a school
uh that you know not
uh you know uh jim smith's wrestling school you know someone you know who did
you you probably your
family just taught you right uh my dad yeah my dad and what do you what's the
what's the first what's
the most important what's the best thing to have when you get into the ring the
first time what's the
dumbest thing you can do what's the thing you should never do uh well let me
see probably the the
dumbest thing you could do is is think uh that you're actually beating somebody
all right that's
that's your first mistake and and the best thing you can do is uh is when you
beat him run around
tell all your friends hey listen i really beat that guy yeah yeah that's the
truth and then you have
you have the submission hold is that what they're called the submission hold or
the finale or whatever
it is and yours is something to do with the elbow it's the uh the people's
elbow people's elbow how does
that work now don't do it don't do it don't do it don't do it don't do it on me
of course but is it
something like that you like that is that kind of what it is there's a little
bit more velocity and
force than just that you come flying off the ring or the ring ropes or
something in there
well yeah it's it's a move that it's first of all dave it's the most electrifying
move in sports
well i don't i'm not going to argue with that and you played you played for the
university of miami
you uh you uh i did was second string not second string how what was your
football career in college
well i i played uh i played football at university of miami we won the national
title in 91 my junior
year i started half the season then i didn't start half the season and a guy
who some of you may
know beat me out for my position named warren sap oh my and yeah uh yeah well
huh oh yeah poor rock
yeah this is a shame it's a shame
did you appeared at the was it the republican convention that's what it was
wasn't it i did
yes yeah well now how did that come about and uh i was invited by the
republican party to speak at the
convention and i spoke there with dennis hastert and afterwards i i sat in the
uh presidential box
with uh the president's dad former president bush and and barbara bush and um
the funny story is at
that time you know i was i was weighing a little ambivalent on who i was going
to vote for and then i
i was checking out the presidential debates and um you know trying to get their
feel on tax reform and
other social issues things like that so i was flying i had my helicopter i was
flying in from new york
and hey this is true story so i'm flying and and uh i'm looking down where we're
going to land and
there this place is packed there's limousines there's all these uh cars around
and police squad
cars i think what's going on the pilot's like i don't know i said well just
land you know i gotta go
so i land and as soon as i land i get out and i just have a little backpack and
all these guys in
suits come running up to me apparently they're secret service guys i mean
running up and and
holding the helicopter there and don't move and i said hey what's the matter
and the guy's like
oh it's the rock and he's like he radios the rest of the secret service that's
the rock you
know it's okay everything's fine so it wound up being um al gore's plane so
they just let this
helicopter land had no idea who it was so after that i said there's no way bush
would have went for
any of that bs because i had to vote because of the lack of security yeah
now what well wrestling is a sport you can stay in for a long long time you can
you know you can be
uh much much older than you are now and still be a wrestler when when will come
the time when you
say okay i've had enough wrestling i want to be a full-time movie star actor
how do you know when
that happens i don't know i really don't know i'm not i'm not too sure and of
course you know in
wrestling the entertainment industry you're able to go for a long period of
time but uh but in movies
will it work that you'll be able to do both will people accept you as a bona fide
movie star a
legitimate actor if you're also still wrestling or eventually you'll have to
part company with that
i don't know dave actually i can honestly say this is uh i'll always i'll
always be a part of that
yeah and whether it's once a year or ten times a year i'd always love to go
back for that because
i love performing in front of a live audience but becoming an actor and a good
one and continuing to
grow um as an actor is something that's very important to me as well good for
you now during
the commercial go over there and put a move or a hold on paul please that's a
pretty good picture here
and if there were any doubts about your future they must have been resolved
right there at that moment
my goodness that's you and andre the giant and he was a friend of your dad's
friend of your family's
sure would come over to the house and eat a lot and uh i'm only kidding he was
a fantastic man yeah
and he how tall was the guy was well over seven feet i think legit probably
seven three seven four
and how old are you in that picture there um probably four wow a cute kid thank
you yeah very nice
now you did go on you played you played some canadian football which team i did
uh i was up
i played for the calgary stampeders and uh which was wow calgary's in the house
who's season ticket holders
and it's it's different i mean the field is wider is that what it is and there's
only three downs
there's only three downs field is wider and the pay is a big difference between
the nfl
um so i was up there and i was i was on the practice squad so i would and the
practice squad you're not
required to go to these team meetings on friday so you know the practice squad
doesn't have to go to
the meetings well well the practice squad would have to go to the meetings but
at the end of the week when
it's time just to put the game plan together it's just the it's just the
traveling well that must have
been terribly hurtful well it was it wasn't that hurtful because i got over i'm
gonna tell you how
this is what happened up there i was making literally 250 a week american it
was worst time
ever for me and i um that's that's funny thank you i uh i would um i would go
to these meetings
and the guy handing out the sandwiches they would give out these sandwiches for
the traveling squad
would never look he'd just hand them out and i'd walk in i said hey can i have
some and give me
another one and he'd say yeah sure and i'd sit in these meetings because
actually the only way i
would be able to eat over the weekend i'd have three or four it's very funny
that's great thank
you i would have these sandwiches with me and the coach would come in and say
uh duane again for the
tenth week you don't have to be in these meetings oh really i don't see you
know i would walk out but
i had sandwiches for the whole weekend yeah sure gotta use the head absolutely
exactly did you ever work
your way into the game squad did you ever play in the in the i did i did i
played a couple of games in
cfl i remember one game in particular we played vancouver but uh and again just
at that time you
know you work so hard to achieve something it really didn't come to fruition i
mean you're you're
still a very young man and already had a very very interesting life i mean to
go from college
football possibilities with the nfl and then up to the cfl and then a big time
wrestler now movie star
that's pretty good sure that's a pretty good run thank you and you were you
were in uh just in spain is
that where you were i was i was doing there i was just in spain promoting the
movie and um we're up
there and just a funny story about spain just this morning i was in spain and
the one thing i play
classical guitar and and really you play classical guitar in addition to
everything else i just ran down
i just feel like a dope now for god's sake no wait a minute you're still dave
letterman well that's
well that's what i'm saying
so you found a guitar i did well the one thing i said listen i told everybody
around me my team listen
i have to go get a classical guitar because generally that's where they're made
the best ones so um i
bought a classical guitar in los angeles for eight thousand dollars right and i
exactly and uh so i i
you know justified it but you know i love classical guitars i'm going to treat
myself just once so i
find this out of the way place in spain and madrid and this little old shop a
little old man i'm looking
at this classical guitar same brand that i just bought for eight thousand
dollars and i said uh god you
know i'm looking at this i said i've never seen this one it's exquisite looks
great i said the
interpreter can you ask him how much this is in american and uh he told her and
she looked at me
and she was kind of wincing she said well you know um three hundred dollars
can you smell what the rock is cooking
great to have you here thank you congratulations on everything thank you very
much come back and play
the guitar for us i shall i will
great to have you here we go you can see you next time and see you next time
and see you next time